| I have a similar arrangement but I look at it much differently than you. The retainer allows a client the freedom to contact me over what they think is nothing, because it is nothing, but 9/10 times that nothing will lead me to discover some issue that did need my attention, and I can give it that attention when it's still a nothing and not a barn-on-fire problem in their business. It also means I can log a trivial amount of hours doing the monthly maintenance that most clients gripe and piss and moan about you charging for: they already paid me. If a retainer hasn't been used up by the end of the month (and it usually hasn't) that's when I go do housekeeping for them. Client gets a consistent-ish expense in their books, I get paid, everyone's happy. > If you bill by the hour, first they fight you over the hourly rate. Then they want to argue over how many hours it will take to do the work. Then they want to argue over you billing them for all the project management and planning hours you are spending with them, they only want you to bill them for "the work." Then when they get the bill they want to argue over the hours you bill them. I mean this is just the game, dude. I personally just do not have these arguments, I'm not open to these discussions. This is the price of my time, this is how much time it took, this is the bill. If people don't pay then I don't perform services and anything I have access to goes down until I will, but I've only had to do that once so far, and they got the point very quickly. If you don't want to do this then yeah freelancing/contracting isn't going to be your bag. I don't judge you for it but like, that's just how it goes when you're in business for yourself. Also worth noting: I absolutely charge for time spent haggling. Any time I'm doing thinking work for you, that's time I will be compensated for. I outline this very clearly from the off, and if people drag it out over hours, then they pay for those hours. Simple as. I'll never inflate my hours or make something take longer than it does, but also, I demand compensation for what's spent on their whatever. |