Deadline for orders

[lynweber]

Do you charge a late fee or "penalty" if a client does order in a timely fashion? What are your opinions?

[Jim Bryant]

You can tell your clients that after 30 days the galleries will be taken down or password protected.

[lynweber]

Originally Posted by Jim Bryant

You can tell your clients that after 30 days the galleries will be taken down or password protected.

Something needs to happen it's been over a month for one of my clients and I'm kind of getting annoyed by it all.

[prince]

Depending on the contract, you can either say the prices will increase by 50% if prints are not ordered in 30 days. However, that might be negative if clients didn't know about it. Best thing is to give them time from the date of notification, if they weren't told before.

[Jim Poor]

"This gallery expires on xx/xx/xxxx [pick your own time-frame]. Once a gallery expires, I require a pre-paid minimum order of $xxx.xx to reactivate it. The payment will be credited towards your order, but is otherwise non-refundable."

EDIT: Also, "Early Bird Special" Order prints from this gallery before xx/xx/xxxx and recieve xx% off your order.

[mandyatm]

I used to charge a deposit and it would go towards prints if they order within 2 weeks. Now I require my session fee to be paid upfront, so I dropped the extra deposit, and they get a 10% discount on prints for ordering in 2 weeks. I plan to adjust my prices accordingly.

[BCampbell]

What kind of work are you doing? Most of the answers sound like they're assuming studio sessions; things could be a bit different if you're doing on-location shooting.

It's extremely common to have late fees of between 5 and 20%. 30, 45, 60, and 90 days are all common periods. The larger your client, generally the longer period they'll request. An option I've heard of is to mark up the services and then offer an equal discount if paid before the late fee. The reasoning behind this is that a firm may send you a check for the original invoice amount, sans late fee, even if they're late, and getting that fee out of them can be more work than getting the original check -- in the meantime, you can't cash the check because it's an implicit agreement that they're fulfilled their obligation.

In any case, anyone who's hired out photography services before should be familiar with a late fee term. Just write it into your invoice and contract.

[Jim Poor]

The blurb I listed is what I use for my event / dog sport photography.

Originally Posted by BCampbell

What kind of work are you doing? Most of the answers sound like they're assuming studio sessions; things could be a bit different if you're doing on-location shooting.

It's extremely common to have late fees of between 5 and 20%. 30, 45, 60, and 90 days are all common periods. The larger your client, generally the longer period they'll request. An option I've heard of is to mark up the services and then offer an equal discount if paid before the late fee. The reasoning behind this is that a firm may send you a check for the original invoice amount, sans late fee, even if they're late, and getting that fee out of them can be more work than getting the original check -- in the meantime, you can't cash the check because it's an implicit agreement that they're fulfilled their obligation.

In any case, anyone who's hired out photography services before should be familiar with a late fee term. Just write it into your invoice and contract.

[candleman]

Originally Posted by jim poor

edit: Also, "early bird special" order prints from this gallery before xx/xx/xxxx and recieve xx% off your order.

+1

you need to make it a positive thing.. You need to motivate them in a way that doesnt pis them off, or make them feel like they're getting shafted.

[lynweber]

Originally Posted by BCampbell

What kind of work are you doing? Most of the answers sound like they're assuming studio sessions; things could be a bit different if you're doing on-location shooting.
.

This was on location for a baby shoot.