[Hidden-tech] Billable hours question

[Shel Horowitz]

I'd pretty much agree with Anne and Rich. My statement of terms now 
notes that e-mail and phone time are billable, and that I will 
continue to revise until the client is satisfied, but the clock is 
running. Likewise, I charge for all time except billing issues and 
personal friendship time. I also usually get a credit card number and 
exp. date.

Once in a while i will eat a revision if it's my fault, like when I 
had a dyslexic fit, read a chart to mean the opposite of what it 
said, and wrote a press release using that as the hook. That was 
totally my fault ad I cheerfully did the make-good plus an extra, for 
free.

>Anne Campbell wrote:
>>One of my clients has recently raised a question about what activities are
>>billable. I'm a Web designer, and I pride myself on my honesty in billing (I
>>don't dawdle or pad my hours). I'd love to have some feedback about 
>>what's fair
>>to charge for.
>>
>>When I'm working on an hourly basis rather than a flat per-project 
>>rate, I bill
>>for time spent: discussing plans for the design (whether on the phone, in
>>person, or by e-mail); creating and revising the comp; creating the graphics;
>>coding the HTML and CSS; debugging so the site looks good in all browsers;
>>uploading files; and all the project-related correspondence that 
>>happens along
>>the way.
>>I *don't* bill for time spent generating invoices or contracts, or
>>correspondence about same. If a client and I are friendly and spend 
>>ten minutes
>>chatting about what we did over the weekend, of course I don't bill for that.
>>If I make an obvious, careless mistake that's my fault, I usually don't bill
>>for the time it takes to fix it.
>>
>All the above is fine - although if you have to do especially 
>complex billing because of client request, I do change,
>this is specifically true of time spend for some government 
>projects.  As for mistakes, time is time, it would take
>a really dumb mistake for me not to billing a client. You are being 
>paid for the time, and the rate is set based on
>your level of experience, and since all humans make mistakes 
>occasionally -- that is part of the project and hence
>billable.
>
>>This particular client was concerned because on a recent project, 
>>there were a
>>lot of CSS-related incompatibilities between browsers, which took time to
>>unravel. She thought the "time spent correcting things that really ought to
>>have been part of the original work, designing for a variety of browsers and
>>screens" was unreasonable. She also believes that if I "answer the 
>>odd e-mail,"
>>that should not be a billable activity.
>Both are very billable in my book -- they are part of the complex 
>world of the Internet.
>>I certainly don't want to cheat this client, or any client. If it were you,
>>what would you do in this situation?
>>
>It sounds to me like this client has no qualms about getting some of 
>your time for free.
>>BTW, my work is pro-rated by the quarter-hour. This client is a small
>>for-profit company but is paying the hourly rate I normally charge nonprofit
>>organizations.
>Even more of a verification that this client is looking to getting 
>paying less than they should.
>
>--
>Rich Roth
>CEO On-the-net

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