Advice please, am I mean ?

Paige

I have been lurking on here for about 18 mths now. I am in debt but dont usually post, I have taken all the advice on here and finally I am getting my budget under control. Part of doing this was finding jobs to earn extra money, I have been mystery shopping, working a small cleaning job and also taking freelance consultancy work (I was a business consultant before I had my children)
My problem is with one of my freelance clients. I have spent a lot of time and effort trying to help her get her business on track, her business has come a long way since my input and although she is not making alot of money, she is doing better. I charge her an hourly rate of £35 for all of the work I do for her, but now she rings almost every day asking for advice, sometimes on the phone for 30 mins at a time. I dont charge her for this but it is now adding up to about 2 hours every week. I dont want to loose her business as I am making over £100 per month on the actual work I do for her but I am feeling that she is relying on me too much and taking time up that I could be doing other work and getting paid for. Any ideas please. Thanks

Cleosmum

Can you screen calls for a bit? I know its mean, but she may be less likely to call if she gets greeted by the answer phone a few times. Or if you are feeling brave you could ask her to write down any thoughts/questions/concerns/ideas and bring them up when you do meet up, make an excuse that its easier face to face.

Paige

Thanks - I could ask her to save problems for when we meet up, that is a good idea. I did try to screen calls but then get bombarded with a load of 'urgent' emails.
I dont know weather to explain to her that now she is doing better I will be billing her for all long conversations. I think she feels that she has to run everything by me. She even called today to discuss some labels being printed for her stationery !:mad:

tyllwyd

Your figures don't make much sense - you are billing her £35 per hour and making over £100 on the work you do ... so you are billing her for about 4 hours work maybe? And you say you are talking to her on the phone for possibly 2 hours per week, which would be, say, 6 to 8 hours per month? So you are giving more of your time for free than you are for the work you do!

I think you need to rethink the payment structure to include some of this telephone support. You could maybe say that you are reviewing your fees for all clients to take into account inflation etc etc etc. How about offering her a package that includes your regular work, plus, say 4 hours telephone/e-mail support per month at half your normal fee. If she doesn't like paying for the support, you could offer to give her, say 2 hours per month free ... and she pays if she goes over it!

cat4772

Paige

I think you need to tell her how much extra it would cost if you billed her; it may be that she just needs someone to 'approve' her ideas if she's isn't that confident and as you've already proven yourself to be full of good ideas she's happy with your input. I guess it's making her realise that at some point she needs to have faith in herself withouth running everything past you.

Apologies if I'm way of mark with this but this was my interpretation.

Good luck.

Cat.x

kazwookie

Tell her in a nice way that you are restructuring your business, and telephone support is now chargeable @£ x per hour or part thereof.

And give her a date of the restucturing.

Paige

Thanks for all the advice. I have decided to restructure my billing system and to stress that for long phone calls I will be charging extra.