Freebie

Early on in my career as a marine carver, I learned a vital lesson about free work.

I was eager to get work and had taken on a client from whom I should have run screaming rather than accept his job. Every day, it seemed there was something he wanted to change. Because I had given a fixed price for the job, it seemed like I was working for free on each change. It was frustrating.

I sought advice from a more experienced sign carver who was a friendly competitor. He’d been in the business for over thirty years, and there was little he had not seen. I explained my troubles to him. He reached over and grabbed a small sign on the other side of the counter. It read, “All change orders must be written. They may change the cost estimate for your job.“

He mentioned that accepting limitless changes led to confusion, lost time, and resentment and made any written cost estimate irrelevant. “Lou, you may as well crumble up your estimate, light it with a match, and watch it turn to ash because it is meaningless. Requiring a written change order makes the client think about the change when they see the altered estimate. It also provides a paper trail of changes in case the client denies they requested them. You save lost time, wasted material, and frustration. Down the line, you might want to avoid repeat business with that client or charge them a premium.”

In this world of email and text messages, it’s easy for a crafter or artist to keep track of changes. And it would seem obvious that you’d require changes in writing. But I know people who never put this wording into their estimates.

Of course, no one minds doing an occasional freebie. But when a client abuses our goodwill, a requirement for written requests for changes will prevent abuse.