I am completely with you on that, Devon. We who have done this for a while have little time to waste, do we?

I thought you’d like this one, Gabriella. 🙂 And rant away — this is one of my peeves, as well.

“You’re selling your talent and time. That comes at a certain rate. If it’s truly that easy, the client won’t be spending much even at your price.”

My time is worth my time. If you don’t want to pay what others pay, no hard feelings. But don’t insult me and pretend that I’m not established and successful and damn good at what I do.

Oh, boy, you just got me going!

That’s the kind of thing that can really help some of the smaller clients organize better, Paula. I agree that there should be an additional charge once the project is done and the stragglers show up. That’s like doing double the work, in some cases.

I occasionally write and edit executive bios for a major national brand focused on wealth and wealth management. Because the information and bios trickle in from different offices across the country, I’m used to being asked what I’ll charge to write four and edit 10 (or whatever combination it may be) only to have two or three more straggle in after I’m done.

It’s gotten so annoying that instead of adding the late ones to the total invoice like I used to do, I’ve begun grouping them as a separate job. What’s great is the additions are usually small enough that I can charge my Minimum Project Rate which is about the same as I charge for editing 10 bios.

Better yet, the client pays a price for being disorganized. This client is large enough not to care about the additional charge, but a smaller company would quickly learn to pull everything together BEFORE making the assignment.