Pay your freelancer

Working freelance isn't all coffee shops, being there for school pick ups and daydreaming...

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Photo by Alizée Baudez on Unsplash

It has reached that time of the month where I am frequently checking my online banking app. Two payments are overdue, one by almost three months. Fortunately, this isn’t a large amount but that isn’t the point.

I went fully freelance almost two years ago now (yikes that has flown by!) and have managed to stay “afloat” for the best part. There has of course been a few moments of shuffling money from savings accounts across until one client has paid, but for the best part it hasn’t been too bad.

First up, I really do love the freedom that comes with working freelance and I finally find I have that balance of working and being a mum to three young children. I get to attend sports days, school plays, mop brows when they aren’t well and switch work days if there is a birthday. 🎉

This makes me feel SO lucky and grateful that I can be as present as possible, whilst still showing my children that women can have careers and chase their dreams.

However, here comes the dark cloud…one thing I cannot understand is why can’t people pay their freelancers on time?

I don’t go into a cafe, enjoy a delicious cooked lunch that someone has worked hard to source the ingredients, plan the menu, learn how to cook, prepare the food whilst following all the correct hygiene procedures, deliver the food to me in a timely manner, beautifully presented and then I decide not to pay them until at least thirty days have passed.

Just doesn’t happen does it?

So when it comes to sending out my invoices and then patiently waiting, (because for the most part I am very patient) for someone to pay me for all my hard work, it can quickly become very demoralising. At times I have found myself back on LinkedIn searching for salary jobs that mean I at least get some kind of consistent income.

But then I get the fear of working on someone else's terms again and close that app.

My main point here, is that all the freelancers out there, aren’t kicking their feet up and taking things slowly. We are meeting deadlines, keeping communication channels as open as possible whilst delivering, what we hope, is our best work for our clients. It then feels a bit like a slap in the face when we then have to send payment reminders, or even worse, late fees.

I have three brilliant clients who pay me very promptly and I count myself very lucky to have them. Interestingly, these clients also know what it is like to work freelance and to have to wait for payments to come through. I believe this is why they are so good themselves at paying on time. (Thanks guys 🤩)

To the rest of them who drag their feet, and more recently, send rude emails when I politely remind them that their payment is late: I love doing the work for you, honestly I do, but some appreciation for the work I am doing wouldn’t go a miss.

Pay your freelancers; they are waiting to buy new school shoes for their kids.

A couple of things I have learnt over the last two years of being fully freelance*

• Write everything down. Meetings, extra hours, passwords (oops), email addresses, important meeting notes. Everything that you will need to later refer back to. I have a stash of notebooks that are spread between clients. It may not work for some this way but it does for me.

• The months your earnings are “up”, keep some aside for the months when earnings are down. Or for when you are waiting for people to pay you 😅

• Don’t lose sight of why you started. This is a hard one I find, because it isn’t all hunky dory and as easy as you think it will be. However, remember what made you take the plunge to go freelance in the first place. Vision boards are good for this.

• During school holidays, have set work days and let your clients know this. I learnt this after feeling like I was dropping all the balls, during the summer of 2022. This year, I told everyone my work days (that needed to know) and said I wouldn’t even be checking my emails if it wasn’t a working day. I stuck to this for the best part. If it was urgent they could text me and this only happened once.

• When you receive some positive feedback, write it down somewhere. It will come in handy for those days when you are feeling a bit sluggish, unmotivated or like you are hitting your head against a brick wall.

*When I say “fully freelance”, I left my job in a preschool where I have a monthly salary to chase this freelance dream. Leading up to that point I had been doing a few freelance jobs on the side for around five years. It didn’t seem to matter as much then that people never paid on time but now I’m like “come on, I’ve got bills to pay!”.

If you are interested in finding out some more about what it is like to work freelance, perhaps you need some support or need some resources to get you started, make sure you have signed up to The Creative Book which I am going to be launching later this week.

I would also love to hear from you about whether or not you work freelance, for an employer or as a stay at home parent… how does the juggle look for you?