No one appreciates the bullshit a lot of design jobs turn into that have become classics.

Granny dies 12 times. My new iMac blew up and I have to install everything. My phone dead. ICQ not working for 3 weeks. My email hacked. Among countless other classics many paying clients have heard over the years.

On a real world side note, I am sure that the models working for me would LOVE to get 50% of the pay at the interview prior to work. They would then "promise" to show up for photo shoot and commitment to work. They would of course right? Oh, and be on time?

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh

I can only imagine that my cleaning lady, lawn care dude, drive way plow driver, handy man doing construction on my house the past two years would all love to get 50% down before they ever lifted a finger. The quality of the work, and timeliness, would be spot on I am sure.

Barefootsies, when you sell content or anything else - do you provide first and then collect?

I always pay designers up front.

Also when I am buying crack in the hood I often get a local crackhead to go buy it for me so I don't get busted. I'll give him a $50 or $100 bill, have him fetch me a dime bag of rock and bring me my change.

Both work out equally well.

I did it recently with a bigger project of mine. It was a mistake from my side. I am still waiting for a partial refund from this designer... Shame.

My contracts vary.

I can send out content to buyer, without license and docs, with tracking number. They do not get the docs/license until paid in full. I can build sites for people, and control the domain name, and not turn it over until paid in full.

So the short answer is, "have I"? Yes.

That said, a design is no different in your example. A design is one piece of the puzzle. It still must be cut and encoded, typically, to CSS/HTML and integrated into the design. So you are not 'done' until all of it is completed (assuming you actually have the skill set to do it all. Some designers do, some do not).

Hence, you flash your pretty design, and get paid before they can actually 'use' it.

:2 cents:

You will almost never get a refund.

They don't have it.

usually always 50/50.. some take it all if it's $300 or under....

designers who do shit for nothing are the ones you wanna stay away from. :1orglaugh

this question wouldn't even be asked if this was mainstream cause in mainstream custom web design is still looked on as being a "premium service"...

in Adult it's looked on as being a "free service" because no one makes $hit in adult anymore.

Really?

I have always paid my programmers and designers for their completed work. Where are these 'free' ones you speak of in the adult industry?

:1orglaugh

paysites even collect their membership fees before giving access to the full thing - reason why they do it is they have put in an effort to produce or get it and they want to secure their part of investment before providing whole thing.

so on the other hand they don't trust anybody with their product before one puts money on table, on the other hand they ask to trust them 100% in the commitments where they're payees - this model is old and i don't find it fair for all parties involved.. its all about trust and delivery. you expect one put out 100% but laugh when someone expects same from you. i can't find it right.

You asked about MY business. For example, when I build a site for another, or license my personal content. Memberships have nothing to do with your O.P. you had asked in regards to your statement.

Big difference. They see what they want. They pay for it. Receive the goodies immediately for instant gratification. Not waiting weeks of months on end for what they hope is right.

Not exactly the same thing.

Um, if you do fulfill 100% of your commitment, you are paid 100%. I do not see the problem here you are arguing. I did not say anything about someone not being paid for their work. Work being completed that is.

sorry was not attacking you and your business.

i just can't find any reason why would i order my staff commit days or hours solely based on "promise" to get paid and then if anything goes sour baring financial responsibility for the time of my employees.
and you know what they say about thing going wrong, if you allow it - it will go wrong.

I've done 50/50, 100% upfront, 100% on completion.

Usually (and I'm generalizing here) people who have no problem paying a retainer are 10 times easier to deal with in a long run.

With people that I've a long working relationship with I just do the work and invoice twice a month and everyone's happy.

But there's no way I'm lifting a finger on promises of someone who says they'll pay me sometime in the future if I do this 30-hour project for them. There's not enough hours in the day to deal with that shit.

You are obviously used to working with flaky designers. Probably your budget that there's something wrong with - you probably go shopping for "better" offers all the time instead of sticking with the guys that helped you out in the past. Your bad. Not mine.
´
You asked a question, I gave you my reply from my side of the table.

Exactly my sentiments. I don't even bother to reply to those prospective clients that say "I never pay anything upfront". Much easier to ignore them - lots of time and agony saved :)

No worries hoss. I feel the same.

I was not attacking you either, nor anyone else in this thread. I have stated several times now that people can opt to run their business how they see fit. That goes for both sides.

If a client wants something done, and will pay upon completion. You either accept the bid or you do not. Trying to rationalize it to someone who opts to run their business that way will get you no-where.

Just as if you tell a client it's a 50/50 deal for you and your business, and they say no. Then spend endless thread posts, or hours, trying to convince you that you are wrong and should let them pay how they want to.

No business will get done as either will not budge.

That said, people can run their business however they see fit and typically have a lot of good reasons and experience for doing it the way they are. However, the designer asking for a 50/50 or 100% down is not any type of "standard" that is accepted by the industry on the whole. Not in adult, mainstream or real world.

That was really the point.

Dude your bitching is not going to change the way the industry operates.. it's always usually 50/50.. it's been like that.. it's gonna be like that...

this post is dumb.

designers who have good testimonials / references and are gettin paid to do work are not gonna give a crap about people wanting them to wait till the end to get paid. Why should they when they're already gettin paid to begin with?..

Your logic only attracts desperate people..

I don't even do 50/50 anymore. I found an AMAZING guy who does everything when it's completed. He earns his bucks and gets paid every time and now works exclusive.

With all said above, your cleaning lady, your handy man, your gardener you are ready to finally hire couple designers inhouse and stop looking for a bargain like a cheap ass. Time to grow, no? Cus it sounds like trolling.

Ignorance at it's finest reinforced over and over. :1orglaugh :thumbsup

You do not know me, my budgets, or who I do and do not work with. Yet to make these remarks and ASSumption says a lot about you.

:2 cents:

Why does this have to be about deigners? This same ethic could apply to programmers, coders, SEO, any consultant, anything.

This 50/50 thing seems acceptable. Personally I go with what my builder did me for - 3rd on "signature", 3rd midway, and 3rd on completion. Half up front is (imo) too much for the client if they don't know the person doing the work.
It's been so long I did some major work for someone I don't know I don't even have any rules now!! But, yeh, 1/3:1/3:1/3 would be it for anything >€2k and someone I didn't know/trust.

Oh, and there was a comment way back in the thread on timely invoices.... yeah, that's important and luckily the one time I had 3 invoices for 3 diff clients that were sitting there waiting to get invoiced (past stuff ranging from 3-5 months) when i sent them out (with apology for delay), they all got paid within 48 hours. Now I'm sure, each of those 3 guys were like "fucking hell, where did this come from", but they all paid up without grief. BF was one of those 3 ;)

Heh. I don't care to get into any discussion with you. Not much point. You obviously weren't looking for any opinions on the subject, rather you were looking for somewhere to vent your apparent frustration over someone requiring from an unknown client, a retainer before commencing any work for them.

Doesn't matter much what you think of me, because since you're so adamant in the way you run YOUR business, that you feel that you should have any say on how I run MINE, I seriously doubt we'll ever be doing any business together, anyway :)

Agreed with on all points. :thumbsup

:winkwink:

I'd pay Crazy Sy @ http://www.ibuildfreesites.com/

He gives good deals with payment 100% upfront.

He came highly recommended by other people I trust.

The point of discussion was about the 'standard' as if everyone does it the same way (100%, 50%, 30%, benchmarks, etc.), and they do not. It varies by contract, size of project, as well as repeat business, new client, and so on.

Every time a thread like this pops, a bunch of designers, get their panties in a twist and want to defend their little turf or business practices.

The point was, there is no 'absolute standard'.

That would be correct.

Usually I consult for large financial corporations (citadel, aon, northern trust, etc..) and the standard in that realm is to bill for previous hours every month on NET30 terms.

With some stranger off of a message board though, i'm not writing a line of code until there's money sitting in my bank account. Usually most get scared and run off when i quote them $125/hour anyhow :)

:thumbsup

Yes, all designers should move to billing per hour instead of per project.

Ah-hahahahahahaha.

I would love to see the 85 hours I get billed for a WP skin.

dat fris foo would be a rich man.
:pimp

I would imagine most respectable designers would want payment up front... that way they get less headaches, less chasing around for payment, etc... and the buyer likely ends up paying slightly less too since the risk of non-payment for the designer is eliminated... win-win for everyone involved.. :2 cents:

95% of the time, upon completion

sometimes i pick a client that I dont know and throw up a flag and insist on 20-50% up front. Very rare though.

A good portion of my clientele is return though, so we already have a balanced business relationship.

To be honest though... its the names people know here that have ripped me off. Not the unknown nobodies...

Why switch? I operate an either/or system - some guys prefer a complete price on for project, in which case, it is all done to their specifications, and any deviations are billed on "
time+half" billing after thatm, or the lot on hourly rate (and each expertise field is different hourly rate)

I would *only* trust anyone external if they could provide a real-time billing/logging feature so I know when they are working (and on what).

*cough* like someone we know *cough*

In short, my work ethic is my clients have to see what I'm doing and when. And it has to be live viewable. I have a logging system that tells them the hours I'm working on their stuff, and my dev server gives them live access in all its glory to the code I'm working on (if it's not on their servers). I do prefer to work on my server, since then I hold the code until final payment, but like I said, all my clients are known to me and I trust them all to do work and bill later.

A *standard* would be some industry escrow chief that takes a 1% cut on bills and acts as an arbitrator. Now there's a point - I sure as shit wouldn't want that job, not even for 2.5%!!!

The majority of my billed work has been hourly for over a year now...

Its better for both me and my clients. I get what i deserve and they get what they pay for nothing more, nothing less.

No project is the same.

There is NO reason to ever pay a designer upfront.

Why do you pay someone a deposit upfront? Usually because there is a material cost to he job. When I had my patio laid the guy wanted 20% upfront so he could buy brick. Sure.

But a designer? HELL NO. They are sitting there in front of their Mac, all they have to do is get to clicking. I would pay a percentage upon delivery of a comp, possibly.

There is no upside to me paying upfront, none.

It all depends who you are working with... go to a respectable designer that has a few weeks waiting list, and propose some 50/50 deals and he will likely tell you to get lost... 50/50 deals often turn into chasing around to get that last 50% paid... respectable designer who has more work than he can handle, has better things to do than chase people around for payment...

on the other hand, designers who are looking to get more business often have more flexible payment terms, some may even do work with no $$ down... :2 cents:

I feel so attacked...

Amen to that shit!! Congrats Brother - wish I could afford to do the same. :)

I actually think that the general direction of this thread explains a lot of flakey designers out there... webmasters looking for the best deal + freelancers living check to check can be a pretty bad combo.

Most designers I start with, I do 50/50%, after that, I only pay after the project is done. From time to time if I need a quick banner done or something for like 50 bucks, I pay upfront to save me from hassle.