Business practices -- advice wanted

[danaeris]

(1) I forgot to bill an editor for some freelance editing done in March. I have no idea how many hours it took, and having cruised through that month on LJ, there are no clues in there. Unfortunately, this piece was to be paid for by hour, and not per word.

The per word payment rate at this magazine is $0.20, up to $400. If I were billing on a per-word basis, it would come to $155. I have no idea, though, if it took me 10 hours to do the work (since the rate is $15). For all I know, it was far less hours than that.

What should I do?

(2) The textbook contract is winding to a close. When I send in the last chapter, what do I do/say? Do I ask where to send the invoice, and while I'm at it, ask what the late fee will be? Do I ask for more business, or let it lie? If I ask for more business, do I emphasize smaller projects in order to imply that I bit off more than I could chew this time, and that this won't be a problem on smaller projects? This is such a tough one...

Comments

[redhawke.livejournal.com]

Caveat (required by law): I'm not giving you legal advise here. My expertise does not include this type of employment contract, and as such, I am only offering general advise. If you need advise on the legalities of this matter, I recommend that you contact compentent legal counsel (which is NOT me).

(1) I would think that a reasonable estimate of your time would be appropriate here. Do you have a copy of the work you edited? How does it compare to other work you've done in the past (assuming you've done other hourly work in the past)? Is it longer, shorter, etc.? If you have an unedited copy, how messy was it (i.e. how much work was it to clean up)? By comparing it to other work you've done for them (and comparing how much time you billed for those works), you should be able to get a rough estimate of your time.

(2) This sounds comparable to a "closing out" situation. In my office, when we close out a file, we send a brief letter with the final bill, effectively saying "We're closing our file in this matter. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us, and if we can be of any assistance to you in the future, please let us know." This sounds about like what you're looking for.

In your case, unless you know where to send the bill, you should ask. A professional way to do this would be something like:

"Enclosed is the final chapter in '[insert title].' I understand that this concludes this project. If you could, please provide me with the proper address and contact to send a finalized bill for services rendered, which I will prepare immediately. I also need to know if a late fee is appropriate foir this project. Please advise as to your office's policy in the matter.

I have enjoyed our work together. Please let me know if I can be of any further assitance in future projects.

Yours very truly,
questioner"

That's probably a bare-bones framework, which might give you a starting point. Good luck!

[auros]

Have you ever tried to make an estimate of about how many words or pages you wrote in an hour, on any similar projects? If so, you could use that... O/w, I'd just use the $150 estimate. Seems fair enough. (Also, you might be able to figure out, based on when you had no major social-y stuff in March, which days you probably did work.)

Not sure about the latter... Partly I'd think it depends on how much has already been said about the lateness thing, and how friendly the relationship with the customer has been. :-/

[auros]

s/wrote/edited/g;

Really, I did read the entry. :-P

not a lawyer

[http://users.livejournal.com/_duncan/]

Tell me you're not offering to pay your employer for delivering a few chapters later than expected.

Tell me instead you're asking for prompt payment of your bill. If that's the case, pick a timeframe like 14 or 30 days after which a penalty of your choosing will apply on any outstanding amount. Don't let them specify the terms too closely.

There's another term for the discount incentive but it's slipped my mind. The idea on that one is they may deduct 2% if paying within, for instance, 7 days.