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Chapter 3

Reasons For Not Getting Paid

There are a lot of lessons our parents try to teach us as kids:

Treat others as you want to be treated.

Eat your peas.

Put yourself in the other person’s shoes.

It’s that last one I want to focus on for a moment. If there’s one thing I hope you to take away from this book, it’s that getting into a client’s head can help you avoid most of your problems with them.

There are many different reasons why clients don’t want to pay us. And it’s not all because they are bastards. I mean, yeah, some of them are. Dirty, rotten, evil bastards. But most are just like you and me; people just trying to get by. If we can put ourselves in their heads, it becomes easier to understand what is happening. Which not only allows us to come up with a solution, it also helps to prevent the issues in the first place.

They Don’t Think You Did Your Job

Look, we have all been in this position: faced with paying for a service that we don’t feel was done correctly. Maybe it was a bad haircut, or trying to determine what to tip a shitty waitress. The point is, not wanting to pay because you don’t feel as though you are getting what you paid for is a normal reaction that most people experience at least a few times in their lives.

The problem is, judging creative work on that spectrum is fairly subjective. If my refrigerator breaks, I call for a technician. From there, it is very easy for me to decide if he did his job or not. If the fridge can cool down my beers and cheese – he fixed it. He deserves a fair payment.

But creative work is not like fixing a refrigerator. There is no standard way to measure whether the work is done or not.

Many clients, upon receiving a final product from you, won’t like what they see. Some will think you just “didn’t get them” and will be disappointed in your work. Others may have expected something else entirely. Revisions and iterations are a natural part of the design process. You go back to your desk, and make changes until your client is happy. Or until the number of previously agreed upon revisions has been reached.

But what happens if you are dealing with a client who doesn’t seem like they will ever be happy? It may be the tenth time you’ve gone back to the drawing board, and you are reaching the point of not wanting to do any more revisions. After all, your time has to be worth more than this, right? It’s not that you don’t get them – they don’t get you!

Either way, the client’s not happy with your work. And because they aren’t happy, they don’t think they should have to pay. They didn’t get the design they wanted. They feel like you didn’t fix their fridge. And they are telling you they have to hire someone else to do the work now, so why should they pay you?

If you’re anything like me, you must be furious by now. Doing creative work is not a like fixing a fucking fridge! You’re thinking.

But take a breath before you crack your MacBook screen and try to get into your client’s head for a second. They might not be used to working with creative people. Up until now, they have only dealt with very cut and dry exchanges of money. They pay for a pair of jeans and they get a pair of jeans. They pay for a technician to fix something and he fixes it. Simple.

So it makes sense that they would feel justified in not paying you, if they didn’t get the final product they thought they were paying for to begin with.

Which is why it is your job to explain to your clients what to expect from the very beginning. You must teach them that they pay for your time and creativity. That there is no guarantee for liking your creative work. You will do your best, and will absolutely offer revisions up to a point, but they chose you because they liked your portfolio and your style. That is what they are paying for. You can do the work based on what they tell you they want, but there are no guarantees you will be able to exactly match their vision.

Explain to them that they should trust you, that you know what you are doing, and that you want the best for them and their business. But if they can’t do that, they shouldn’t be contracting with you in the first place. Because in the end, they will be paying for your time and creativity. Regardless of how they feel about the end product.

Also, ask yourself: Are YOU happy with your work? Do you think you did a professional job? Sometimes we just want to finish working on something that has already taken up hours, days or weeks of our life. We are tired or get bored of certain projects and just want to be done already. But then when we look back at what we did, we have to admit – it wasn’t our best work.

In that case, you may want to take a break for a day or two from this project, and then look at it again and decide if it meets your standards. At the very least, it needs to be as good as you promised the client it would be. After all, if you wouldn’t use it in your own portfolio, how can you convince a client that they should pay for the work?

You Are Charging More Than They Originally Agreed To

This one is especially relevant for those of you who are paid by the hour. Yes, you work by the hour, but clients still routinely ask for an estimation of how long the work will take. In this case, maybe you told them it would take about 30 hours. Then it took 45…

Now the project is pricier than the client expected, and they are upset and refusing to pay. Shouldn’t be a problem because your rate was always by the hour, right?

Wrong.

Put yourself in the position of your client for a moment. It’s not fun for them to see an invoice for 50% more hours than they originally agreed to. A reaction of, “I’m not paying for those extra hours!” is normal.

You know how you avoid this? You communicate with your clients. You explain prior to the start of the job that estimations are just that… estimations. You have language in your contract making it clear that the work required may be more than originally estimated. And you let them know well ahead of time if you are going to need more time than originally expected to complete the job. They should hear about it as early as possible, long before you even finish the hours you originally agreed to.

Then don’t continue forward unless you have their approval. Anything short of that, you’re just asking for trouble. For all you know, your client may have a set budget they can’t exceed. And if you wait until it is time to submit the invoice before you communicate, you only have yourself to blame when they refuse to pay for those extra hours.

All too often, a client may contact you mid-project and say, “Oh, I also need you to do X and Y!” Or they may e-mail you saying, “I’d like to see another version for this and that.” That’s cool, but it is another opportunity to communicate. Your response should be “Great, I can do that – no worries. It will probably take X more hours than we agreed on, though. Do you approve the extra work?”

It is always preferable to make these communications via an email, so that everything is well documented. That way when it comes time to bill, you are able to back up each and every agreement that has been made.

Granted, there are some clients who clearly prefer actual conversations to e-mail. And since we are in the business of customer service, there are times when you just have to follow their lead. But if you are having these conversations via phone or Skype, always at least be sure to quickly follow up over e-mail with what was discussed and to ask your client to send a short note agreeing to the changes you will be implementing. This way you still have what you need in writing, while also giving the client what they want with verbal conversations.

Working With You Sucked

While in the midst of working on a project, there is so much that can go wrong. Requirements can be misunderstood, you won’t always get the client’s vision, and sometimes – bad moods can result in angry e-mails that throw the whole dynamic off.

Just as in a romantic relationship, if you guys don’t work on it, things can go badly and stay like that until the project ends. And an unhappy client, who feels as though they just don’t like you as a person, can easily turn into a non-paying client. So even when there are creative disagreements, you still want to strive to maintain a good relationship with your client. You don’t want small misunderstandings to snowball into a client who refuses to approve your work.

Remember, clients are people too, and business isn’t always just business. What can you do?

They Just Don’t Have the Money

More often than you ever might realize, nonpayment is the result of true cash-flow problems. It isn’t about them not liking you, or not being impressed by your work – it is about them not having the money to pay you.

Some clients make deals knowing that they won’t be able to pay until they get paid themselves. This is known as a cash flow problem. They are supposed to use your work as part of a bigger job. When they get paid for that bigger job, only then will they be able to pay you.

In an ideal world, they would warn you of this up front and it would be part of their contract with you. In reality – plenty of clients are cowards and won’t tell you this is their plan until after they have your work in hand.

Let’s go over a simple example. Say a big branding studio took a project for a bank. The job is:

1. Create a new brand identity for the bank.

2. Build a website that includes that branding.

They do the branding themselves, then they hire you to design the website for them. When you’re finished, they hire a developer to build the website you designed. Eventually, they deliver the bank a new, well-branded, well designed, well built website.

The branding studio is your client. But the bank is theirs. And if the branding studio doesn’t intend to pay you until they are paid themselves, you are ultimately getting paid from the bank’s money.

Is that ever a good excuse for them to delay your payments? No. You didn’t contract with the bank, you contracted with the branding company. And the branding company should hold themselves to the terms you originally agreed to. No doubt.

But should you care? I mean, if you are going to get paid eventually anyway, is it really a big deal?

The answer is, yes! Absolutely! Because when you know ahead of time where problems might occur, you can make sure you don’t get hurt in the process. Some clients will be honest enough to detail their cash flow situation at the start of a project. Others will do everything in their power to hide it. They want to delay their headache and hope for the best. If all goes well, they hope to be able to pay you on time. So they don’t feel as though you are entitled to this information. But what if the developer isn’t working fast enough and things get delayed on that end.

Why is that your fault?

Always make sure you know where the money is. Then protect yourself by untying your work from the cash flow chain.

Don’t know how to accomplish that? Don’t worry, we’ll be addressing those intricacies soon.

The Project Went South

Look, there will be times when a project becomes obsolete through absolutely no fault of your own. Things fall through, business ideas die, and clients find themselves suddenly unwilling to pay for work they no longer need.

Need an example? Let’s say a client called you up all excited about a new restaurant he was opening, and hired you to design the menus. But somewhere between you starting work and submitting the final project, the restaurant idea went under. Maybe he couldn’t get the funding or perhaps his business partner pulled out. It doesn’t really matter why things went south – just that they did. And now you find yourself, two weeks later, presenting beautifully designed menus to a client who no longer wants them.

Let there be no doubt, this is a really shitty reason to try to get out of paying you. Your client entered into a contract for your services, and it isn’t your fault his business fell through. If he couldn’t have foreseen that possibility prior to hiring you, that’s his bad – not yours.

But now he’s miserable and has no budget to pay you. You might feel bad for him, understand what he is going through, and have all the compassion in the world for the dream he has lost out on. But you know what? You’re still justified in being annoyed. Because you committed your time and are losing out on the money you are owed. That’s bullshit.

This is another one of those situations that can actually be easily avoided, and we will discuss how soon. But the only thing that matters in the moment is that you lost out on your time and money. And you have a right to be pissed about that.

What can you do about it, though?

Well, for starters, don’t get angry or personal. Instead, approach this non-paying client from a place of empathy before going on the warpath. You probably know how it feels to be tight on funds every once in a while. Express that to your client, and then try to brainstorm options and plans that might resolve the situation with minimal pain and unpleasantness.

For instance, can a payment plan be arranged?

Being friendly and understanding here will almost always get you further than going straight for the jugular. Yes, this is a terrible way to conduct business, and it is probably indicative of exactly why their business plan didn’t work out. But educating them on that fact isn’t really your responsibility. Make getting paid your priority instead. If you respond with empathy and understanding, your client is likely to make you one of the first people they pay when they do have the funds. And you also increase the chances that he or she will want to work with you in the future, should their business plans ever come to fruition.

Serial Non-Payers

When I was in fourth grade, I missed the bus to school because a bully pushed me out of line seconds before it pulled away and the driver didn’t notice me. When I got to school, my teacher wouldn’t let me in. I tried to explain to her what had happened. “It’s not fair!” I cried.

“Indeed, kiddo,” she responded. “But life isn’t fair.” And with that, she closed the door and left me outside to cry.

I’m pretty sure the situation would play out far differently today. No teacher would lock a late child out, for fear of getting sued. Which also probably isn’t fair.

But life isn’t fair. And not all people are inherently good. There are plenty of villains walking amongst us.

Some people are just serial non-payers. They leave behind a trail of debt, refusing to pay most of the people they hire or commit to. You might be able to sense their creepiness at first sight, but more often than not, you miss it. These people are professionals. They have done this many times, and they know exactly how to dupe you. What’s more, they stopped feeling bad about their behavior long ago. If you have been unlucky enough to work with this type scam artist – well, good luck with that. Even a lawyer can’t help you here most of the time, because they know how to disappear. Or how to declare bankruptcy, if all else fails.

Sometimes, life just isn’t fair.

Which is why it might be time to talk about how to avoid those clients you just never should have started working with from the start, protecting yourself long before it ever reaches the point of you needing to put yourself in their shoes.