Freelancer Q&A: How Do I Approach This Retainer?

It’s time for another hard-hitting freelancer Q&A! This time, I have a question about how to structure the scope of a retainer. Meaning how you decide what services to offer and how you prevent the client from taking up too much of your time.

(Note: this is different from my Landlord Retainer — which focuses on your payment terms, and comes up again towards the end of this email.)

And in case you missed it, last time I answered a question about how to handle a client that won’t pay on time.

Okay, here’s today’s question…

Now this is a GREAT question. Because it shows that this Pro-Lancer understands that when you’re only paid for your time, scope-creep can become a big problem.

So here are a few ways I’ve been able to make retainers my bread-and-butter — without driving myself crazy and fighting against scope-creep all the time.

Set An Upper Limit On Your Time — But Not A Lower Limit

First, in my contract, I spell out that the client has access to my time up to a fixed number of hours. But beyond that, we both mutually have to agree to any overages:

Here’s exactly what my retainer agreement says. (Remember though, I’m not a lawyer and don’t play one online — so get your own legal advice.)

This takes care of a few things:

First, it clearly defines that there is no MINIMUM amount of work I have to deliver in order to get paid. 

Which means even if the client doesn’t use my services for a full month, I still get paid for that month. (Since I have to set aside time in my calendar to be available for them and turn down other work to hold that space — whether they use it or not.)

Plus it also says that we mutually need to agree to any overages. So I have the power if necessary to turn down a project if it’s going to exceed the bandwidth I have in a given month.

But then in my conversations with my clients, I tell them that as long as they’re cool about it, I’ll always get them what they need. (In other words, I’ll always “agree in advance” to go over the retainer — provided the client doesn’t take advantage of it.)

And if a client is regularly going over the scope of their retainer, I have a mechanism in the contract to raise my rates based on the larger-than-expected workload. Or to enforce boundaries with the client about how much I can handle for them in a given week.

How to Manage the Day-to-Day of Your Retainers

Now once the contract is in place, I also do a few things during the day-to-day of the retainer to manage the workload and help prevent scope creep.

• I have a call with my clients once every week (or sometimes once every two weeks). And on the call, I will commit to a certain set of deliverables between then and the next call.
  
• After that, it’s my responsibility to deliver everything I promise. And if I underestimate the time it takes, in most cases I’ll eat that time and take responsibility for the fact I did a bad job estimating how long the projects would take.
  
• But if the client asks for new projects or a change in scope between calls, I can tell them that they have to remove one or more of the projects I originally agreed to deliver if they want to fit in a new project.

So basically, it’s an ongoing balance where I take responsibility for estimating how long things will take, telling the client what I can deliver, and then delivering that work no matter what.

Which also means I have to set boundaries and let them know if they’re asking for more in a given week than I can deliver.

And if that happens over and over again, it means we need to expand the retainer.

Never Miss A Payment Again With My “Landlord Retainer”

When it comes to actually getting paid on retainer, I’ve already written in detail about the two biggest mistakes freelancers make with their billing terms. And how you can fix them by using my Landlord Retainer to collect your last month’s payment upfront (among other things).

On top of that, I also created a copy-and-paste Landlord Retainer contract template. It gives you the exact payment terms I use in my retainer contract, which has generated over a quarter million dollars in the last two-plus years.

I only share my Landlord Retainer contract template with people on the Freelance Like A Pro email list, though.

So to grab your copy of the Landlord Retainer contract template, enter your first name and best email below to join the Freelance Like A Pro email list.

When you do, I’ll send you your own copy-and-paste-ready contract template — including all seven paragraphs of my Landlord Retainer billing terms — along with other members-only emails and resources to help you run a more profitable and stress-free freelance business.

Grab the copy-and-paste-ready Landlord Retainer contract template now