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09/12/2006 07:12:19 PM · #1 |
I just landed a contract with a major company. Fairly simply job though - $1750 for the project + licensing.
However, I checked some pricing resources and none of them said if you should collect a portion of the money up front.
Should I ask for 25%, 50% or nothing up front? Anyone aware of the standard in this situation? |
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09/12/2006 07:47:49 PM · #2 |
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09/12/2006 07:54:41 PM · #3 |
Hi Kevin,
Congratulations on your gig! I'm not super experienced with commercial photography, but I'd think that payment arrangements would be covered in your contract. If the standard contracts do not address it, I'm not sure I would either.
With a signed contract, you would have legal recourse should payments not be fulfilled.
In the end, demanding up-front money does not seem conducive to building a trusting relationship with the client. From a corporate business point of view, I'd guess that the bigger the client the less likely they are going to want to muck around with two purchase orders for two separate checks.
Just my two cents -- upfront! :)
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09/12/2006 08:08:37 PM · #4 |
| If it were me I'de figure my hard costs; gas, mileage, media, proof costs, printing, trip charge and figure a minimal time on the job cost. If they are as honest as you they will not balk at a 25-50% upfront at signing the contract. |
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09/12/2006 08:09:27 PM · #5 |
The standard is whatever you want it to be.
You can set payment terms however you want 25% up front, 25% the day of and the remaining 50% payable in 30 days or whatever. Personally, I'd get enough up front to make reserving the day for them worthwhile if they should back out and would not deliver the finished product until I had full payment. But it's really up to you.
Make sure you understand what the company's payment terms are. Many will set their terms at 90 or even 120 days. That means that after you invoice them, they will not pay you for 90 or 120 days. It can be hard to operate a small business if you have significant part of your income that is 3 or 4 months out. Many companies have default terms listed on their Purchase Orders, but usually, if you tell them the term,s are not OK, they will shorten them, but not unless you ask. Whatever you agree to, make sure it's written on the PO you get from them. |
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09/12/2006 08:17:01 PM · #6 |
Originally posted by L2:
Hi Kevin,
Congratulations on your gig! I'm not super experienced with commercial photography, but I'd think that payment arrangements would be covered in your contract. If the standard contracts do not address it, I'm not sure I would either.
With a signed contract, you would have legal recourse should payments not be fulfilled.
In the end, demanding up-front money does not seem conducive to building a trusting relationship with the client. From a corporate business point of view, I'd guess that the bigger the client the less likely they are going to want to muck around with two purchase orders for two separate checks.
Just my two cents -- upfront! :) |
Asking for partial payment up front might seem like it's not conducive to a good business relationship, and, in some cases it might not be necessary. If you are facing a significant layout of your own money to even start work, it's a good idea to at least cover your initial expenses. I wrote Capital Equipment PO's for a major corporation and it was not unusual to split payments that way, especially for smaller vendors. It was easy to do it all on one PO, I simply separated each payment into it's own line item and then could assign different terms to each line item and the vendor simply had to invoice for each line item at the right time to get their money. |
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09/12/2006 09:32:05 PM · #7 |
Thanks for all the great advice...
I never thought I'd have trouble getting the payment, I just was interested in what the standards are.
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