I just don’t understand how some people expect a freelancer to put in all the work and not get paid for it.
I’m dealing with a certain client that will remain un-named – although I have had people tell me I should call him out publicly – where I have completed a job two weeks ago, and I’m still waiting for the final payment.
I’ve been told he’s waiting on his client to pay him. My thought on this is, I wasn’t contracted by his client, my work is done, I should get paid. I understand times are tough for everyone, and there may come times when a client will have to wait until they are paid in order to pay me, I get it.
The issue I’m having is I keep being told things that don’t happen. After completion of the job I was told request for payment was being made and that it would take aprox 3 days for the funds to be available in order for me to get paid. Okay, I can handle that. Three days passed and I find out their client hadn’t yet signed off on the final design, and I was being asked to make a quick edit. Okay, I’m still fine with that. Edit was done, and I was told the client should sign off the next day and was given the same story on the funds availability. No problem, I’m being patient, this should be fine. Friday was the day, I make contact … I was told final payment still hadn’t been made, “sorry for the delay, but even if I have to pull some money from another account, I’m be sure to get you your money by Tuesday”.
Well today is that Tuesday … guess what!! … still no money. I was told final payment was JUST made and again given the 3 day funds availability. I leave a nasty message on the voicemail stating I’m done, I can’t continue to work like this and to call me when my money is ready.
I get a call a bit later from my client which I could tell he wasn’t too happy with my tone. He tried to convince me he wasn’t stringing me along and he had to wait for his client to make payment. For which I replied to him that wasn’t what I was told, I was told come Tuesday that I would get my money one way or the other, he comes back stating he just doesn’t have the money.
So … the lesson learned here … I refuse to o any more work with the person, and any future work I pick up fr contract work will include a written agreement as to when I get paid for final work.
I don’t think I am being unreasonable here. I do understand if he didn’t have the money to pay me, then I would have to wait until he get paid. The part that just burns me up … don’t tell me then I can expect to be paid one way or another and back out.
The other part that is extremely frustrating with this situation is during the time I was doing the work for this client, I had turned down a couple of jobs that would have paid nicely. I turned them down because I didn’t think I would be able to complete them on time because of the work I was doing for THIS client.
I guess I’m not the only one experiencing these issues as a freelancer. It seems to come with the title, but that doesn’t mean I should accept it as the norm. I can’t put food on the table for my family working for free.
Thank you for reading my RANT … do you think I’m asking too much? Should I not expect clients to have enough working capitol to pay me for my work once it’s complete? Looks like I have will need to be more selective with who I do work for.
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Here’s a Boise home inspection site I recently finished a redesign for. I’m really pleased with how it turned out.
