Credit: Lucas Cobb on Flickr

Recently I parted ways with a long time client.  It was an agonizing decision: my contact person had always been wonderful to work with.  The projects I worked on were always right up my alley.  So why did I ditch this seemingly perfect client?  Their payment came from a third party, and typically took up to a year to arrive. And if I didn’t put pressure on them, I’d probably never get paid at all.

I had prepped myself for this for months.  I told myself that before taking another project, I’ll explain the problem and suggest better payment terms. If no improvement could be made, I’ll pass on the job. However, I accepted ‘just one more’ assignment a few too many times before I finally bit the bullet.

Continue Reading

Clients from hell. We’ve all had them, right?

There’s the client who doesn’t get it, the client who’s cheap, the client who’s nasty, the client who asks too much, the client who doesn’t give us enough, the client who wants it all yesterday, the client who pays in two years, the client who doesn’t understand value, the client who treats you badly, the client who lacks two bits of brain to rub together…

Yeah. The list goes on. Clients from hell are the people we all hope we never do business with. Ever, ever, ever. Continue Reading

There are just some clients who you no longer want to work with. It could be that the client in question is difficult to work with or it could be more a matter that you’ve moved on from the type of work you’ve been doing for that client. Whether you’ve only done a little work for the client or you’ve been together a long time, it’s never easy to fire a client. Not only do you have to get past the freelancer’s natural reluctance to give up money, but you’ve got to make the break in such a way that the client will still speak positively about you to other prospective clients. Continue Reading