Due to all of the uneducated design, development, and pricing (AKA baggage) associated with the professional web design/development world, the only way to be on the same page with a client is to establish expectations before the work begins. Something in writing should clearly identify the expectations, deliverables, and compensation for a given project. You can also specify (or minimally, discuss) what additional work (scope creep) will cost (in terms of time and money). The point is - make sure that expectations on both sides are clear.

Why? What are the benefits? Primarily, there are no surprises for either party. They are not surprised in what they are getting; you are not surprised in what you are getting. It is my experience that such disputes/disagreements come from initially wrong expectations rather than from a client who is trying to weasel more work out of you than he originally thought fair. Secondarily, if the relationship goes sour, such a document puts the law on your side if the client tries to screw you 3/4 of the way through the project (at least in Idaho).

In a sentence, *clearly set expectations before the work begins*. Be somewhat flexible (sell yourself, your service, and your reputation), but never let yourself get screwed. By the way, beyond agreed upon deliverables, *you* determine what it is to be screwed.

Clients have probably never seen HTML or CSS, and they assume that making a site is simple drag-and-drop. They don’t realize how much work goes into the whole process. If clients actually saw what it takes to build a good site…

Also, since I’m 14 years old, I think I should address the issue of young, cheap designers stealing business. My rates are low ($10 - $15/hour), but I am only doing small stuff. If there’s something I know I won’t be able to do well, I tell the client this and refer them to a more experienced designer who can handle it.

It’s true you know… offline you can go to kinkos and print out the Annual Report the admin person put together in MSWord. Heck, they will even bind it for you and it will look decent.

But it won’t be designed.

So go to your local business card mom and pop print shop. They’ll offer you multiple colors even and it’ll look decent. It may even have a small hint of design.

The next step is the professional designer with a professional marketing message all printed in four color process for your shareholders.

Anyways, I would have just done the work I think. I’m a pretty easy-going guy, so I’d do it if I were going to get some referrals later on from the company.

or better yet, “Do you get free refills on your favorite wine as long as you sit at the table?”… it’s all from the same liquid… it’s already made up… it’s just a copy and paste, oh… excuse me an extra pour from the bottle.

PS. thanks for the good read.

You do need to stand together though. It’s the only way to get changes made.

Well said. Actually this is why I’ve been wondering why a group of developers haven’t gotten together to educate clients in a simple easily understandable way (via a website). With it, every developer who agrees with the same principles, could point to it and tell their clients “Why am I asking you to trust me? This is why.”

As many have said so far, clients seem to be out to touch with the realities of web design. I’m seeing a lot of great work by web developers communicating to other web developers about web standards and such. Change is occurring and it’s great to see but why hasn’t a group gotten together to try to create a site focused towards clients to help them understand and realize the important aspect of web design as well (i.e. scope creep, etc)?

Maybe there should be unions or something. No wait, I hate unions. You do need to stand together though. It’s the only way to get changes made.

As for your answer, I would say is this job going to lead to more work with them? If so, then if you give in, they will step all over you in the future. Guaranteed. I’ve experienced it myself working for a web firm in the past. Therefore, if you don’t like being stepped all over, I would stand behind your beliefs.

The thing is though, while these clients may be assholes for expecting more work for nothing, this type of thing is commonplace in web design so you have to be prepared for it. More often than not, everyone hopes things will go smoothly and work out. Well, as we both know, RealLife doesn’t work that way. Being prepared for the inevitable and educating people about it prepares you both for it. The first time this happened to me at this web firm that I worked for, I asked those who were in contact with the clients something to the effect of, “Did you tell them at the start that modifications outside the approved scope is extra billable work?” “No” came the response. Well, if you don’t set guidelines or boundaries from the start, then the client can do whatever the hell they want.

More often than not, I find people get upset about something when they are surprised about it (doesn’t matter if they are being unrealistic or not). The thing to do is to tell the client this up front in a nice, polite, and, most important of all, easily understandable way. Make them see your logic up front. If they seem happy with your process, get them to approve it. No it doesn’t have to be a sign on the dotted line thing but just a quick email saying does my process sound acceptable to you. Once you get that reply saying “Yes”, you can refer back to it down the road. If they don’t agree with certain aspects of it at the start though, then at least you won’t be wasting your time getting frustrated later. You decide before the work starts how much leeway they can have. Define it.

An extra step I would have taken here for this incident would have been to make them realize that it isn’t just a simple cut-n-paste solution. Cutting and pasting takes like not even a few seconds to do, at worse an hour maybe. Adding site sections adds on not seconds, but hours or even days to a project. Explain the details of what actually goes into adding those extra sections and even more so, explain the impact those extra sections will have on the site (i.e. navigational structure, extended timeline, delayed launch, etc). Explain we are talking hours/days, not seconds or minutes (and then start calcuting the cost to you for this extra work, since someone has to pay for it).

As I said above, this will happen again, therefore be prepared for it. Memorize that response you know you will have to use again. Even better, inform them before you even begin. Tell them scope creep is normal and this is how we deal with it. Show them your scope creep form and explain the impact to the timeline and cost of the project. Once they are informed, it is their option to choose that path or not. At least being informed ahead of time, they will know the consequences of their actions (i.e. increased timeline and costs).

Now if you did all of the above, let them know ahead of time about scope creep, showed them the form, explained the consequences and they still turned around and screwed you, well then they are assholes. Do you want to work with assholes who will probably screw you again in the future? I wouldn’t.

BTW for a good book that talks about these realities, check out Web Redesign: Workflow That Works. It’s probably the only book that I’ve come across that contains most of my process beliefs.