[consulting] Proper Collections Procedure

[Bill Fitzgerald]

I have to echo what Henri said -- after the code has been delivered, you 
don't have a lot of recourse -- basically, work your way up the 
hierarchy of your client's organization, or take it to the courts.

And, at the end of the day, this requires time and energy that can be 
put to more constructive uses.

The cost of these interactions often goes far beyond the dollar amounts 
in question, but that's a decision each company/individual needs to make 
on their own.

Good luck with this -- it's a draining and frustrating situation. I hope 
it works out, quickly, and as cleanly as possible.

Henri Poole wrote:

>It's quite difficult to recover after the fact. I've found that the
>negative energy (and impact on the organization and other clients) is
>almost not worth the trouble.
>
>In the future, you might require upfront retainer that covers your
>intended billings. At CivicActions, we require all of our clients to pay
>a retainer that covers our estimated billings for the coming month.
>
>We also provide weekly reports that indicate where we are in hitting our
>estimates, so that they are not suprised if we have mis-calculated how
>much time something will take.
>
>We also have setup our billing rates so that we have some wiggle room
>for discounts after the fact, which is occasionally necessary in order
>to maintain positive client relationships. 
>
>I'm not sure how much help this is, after the fact, but I certainly
>empathize with you. It sucks when this happens.
>
>-Henri
>
>On Wed, 2006-08-16 at 10:48 -0400, Michael Haggerty wrote:
>  
>
>>I have a question for other members of this list about how they handle
>>collections.
>>
>>I have a complicated matter with a client and their delinquent invoices.
>>They are refusing to make payment on fairly large bill after they have
>>received a lot of custom code and already launched the site on their own
>>servers. The justification they cite is cost overruns in the development
>>process, most of which were for features not included in the original spec
>>but which they themselves requested. The overruns were within 15% of the
>>total project price.
>>
>>I have tried dealing with them reasonably for several weeks and received
>>multiple payment promises that were broken. The bill is now quite a bit
>>overdue and it's taking a huge amount of time dealing with all the craziness
>>around their tab (they keep requesting further clarification about things
>>that were done months ago and it's eating up my team's time). They are
>>dealing with other Drupal shops at this point and there is no way for me to
>>cut off services. What really burns me is the site was for a third party who
>>has already paid them and the cost of development was less than 1/8 of what
>>the third party paid.
>>
>>Anyone have any ideas? 
>>
>>M
>>
>>
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-- 
Bill Fitzgerald
http://www.funnymonkey.com
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