Avoiding Deadbeats In Your Web Design Business

Working as a web designer can prove to be an incredibly, very tough job. There are those clients which are always seeking something for nothing and even though you fulfill your end of the bargain, these clients do not pay. Everybody knows there are a lot of these people. So, how exactly does a web designer deal with them and better yet, avoid them?

First it has seemed to me that they always have some twist on the same story. It goes something like my last web designer did this too me for no reason. Obviously, we are all smart enough to know that web designers just don’t do things for no reason. The truth is that these clients almost always have trouble because they tried to run some con or scam on the last person handling their website. When ever you hear about what some other web designer did to a client it should be a red flag that you are possibly dealing with a deadbeat.

Therefore, the first thing you should do is try to avoid these people altogether. Talk to your client before taking on a job. If there has been some issue with a previous web designer then you can all but be assured the problem wasn’t solely with the last web designer but the client did something.

The best way to avoid non-payment of services is to always use a signed contract and always get payment for that contract in advance. This one bit of advice will avoid deadbeats like  the plague. Honestly speaking most of these people are trying to get something for nothing and their claimed apprehension in paying for the things they order should be nothing other then a red flag.

There are also those people who want you to finance their projects. The story here is similar to the web designer did this and typically is something like oh I don’t want to pay anything upfront because I’ve been scammed.  This is such BS. You need to go back to our first tip and ask find out what they did. Because the fact is that web designers are in business to do web design. Web designers are in business to make web sites.

Anybody that tells you a person in a particular business to provide a specific service is not doing what it pays to look a little deeper. We ll understand there are companies that can’t or won’t do what they say. But 99 times out of 100 a business does what it advertises itself to do. I’ve been doing this on my own for 8 years and during that time I’ve seen all sorts of stuff. I’ve seen that about 80% of people with either of these claims are not telling the truth.

Financing doesn’t make a whole lot of sense for most web designers. You don’t have the ability to carry large amounts of debts profitably. There is really no reason for you to try that because services like Paypal and Google Checkout give you the ability to take credit cards that afford your clients the opportunity to make small monthly payments. Credit cards also provide protection that you will do what you promise in the contract. Anyone really worried about non-delivery of service and is credit worthy will have a credit card and will use it in such a situation. Get a credit card, don’t finance.
Now there are those times when a non-paying customer will try to steal your work. Maybe you built the site on their server and they lock you out trying to keep the work without paying. There are a couple of things you can do that will insure that you always have control over your programming. First, use a contract. Within the contract have a couple of terms. The first, should make clear that you hold copyright. The second, should include that your website  programming is software and you are granting a limited license to the client.

Just like Microsoft you can take illegally used software down with a DMCA notice. Just like Microsoft you can sue for six figures if someone violates your copyright even once. So, making sure your code is identifiable is important. Use watermarks on images and meta tags to include you as the copyright holder. Also, when starting a project print the source code that exist before you do any work. When you finish the project print the source code. You can also use code recording services that will keep a copy of the code and identify you as the copyright holder.

The biggest reason web designers get beat out of their time is not being prepared. Don’t give people the chance to rip you off. Get your money upfront, use a contract and protect your programming and your profits will improve. It’s always better too not to take risky clients on. If a client doesn’t wan to pay you now, what good is it to do 20 hours of work and not get paid just to say you have a client?