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"Asking for partial payment sends a bunch of signals regarding your level of professionalism and need to see this check. Those signals are not helpful in gettin
by edanm 13y ago
"Asking for partial payment sends a bunch of signals regarding your level of professionalism and need to see this check. Those signals are not helpful in getting you paid in a timely fashion."
Out of curiosity, do you think this also applies to asking for a downpayment for large contracts? Because the same logic seems to apply, but I usually see asking for downpayments talked about in a very positive light.
- barry-cotter 13y agoAsking for a down payment is a test of seriousness and someone's ability to pay the actual, real, full price. It is also an utterly normal business practice. Asking for partial payment because you are broke tells people you are broke. This gives people information about both your business acumen and negotiating position, not information that will redound to your advantage.
- reeses 13y agoI expect milestone payments based on deliverables if the project is fixed bid. My schedule for invoicing is usually 1) retainer at start of project 2 & 3) milestones 1 and 2, which can be "tech design approval" and "dev complete" or whatever 4) launch or end-of-warranty closeout. As more of our projects are integration of our software with client systems, 2 and 3 are usually agreement on integration design and entry into integration testing. I've reduced fixed bid work due to some challenging client circumstances that drove too many change orders (I like about one per week) and have focused more on T&M with a not-to-exceed.