I love being a freelance illustrator. While it is challenging in many respects the work is interesting and the deadlines intense, and it’s seldom boring. I don’t punch a time clock every day, collect my paycheck every other Friday and have to conform to anyone’s routine but my own. As I have said many time, financially it is a little more exciting that it needs to be, what with the constant uncertainty about the next job, and how much income will be forthcoming in a given month (or week, or year for that matter). I have been very lucky in that I have other resources to fall back on if the freelance work has been slim, but there is no denying that when the work is plentiful the checking account is a happier place. Making a living as a freelancer is hard enough when you are only worrying about marketing yourself, finding new clients and pursuing and securing new jobs and projects… let alone when you may run across the occasional problem of doing jobs for clients that take a long time to pay, or never pay. Deadbeat clients are a serious risk to your financial well being, because they not only can cost you money but also very valuable time in both doing the project itself and in efforts to collect payment.

In this matter I again have been very lucky. I can count on one hand the number of jobs I have done that ended up being a serious problem in getting paid. Actually luck is only part of it. Mostly it’s because I follow a number of guidelines and policies that minimize exposure to potential problems and maximize the likelihood that any issues will be favorably resolved. Here are my guidelines for preventing problems with and dealing with deadbeat clients:

Preventing Problems-

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, as they say. Doing what you can to prevent having a problem in the first place is always the best policy. There are many things you can do to prevent having collection problems.

1. Use a good invoicing/accounting system- This is by far the most important thing you can do to prevent losing money or having problems with invoicing, billing or payments. It can be as complex and all-encompassing as a serious accounting software program like Quickbooks Pro, or as simple as a tray labeled “Outstanding Invoices” on your desk that uses gravity as it’s aging system (invoices at the bottom of the pile are the oldest). The bottom line is that you have some way of keeping track of who you have billed, when you have billed them and when things are getting late.

I use Quickbooks Pro but mainly because I have other accounting needs that require a full accounting program. There are lots of other programs out there that will do the job, including some designed specifically for freelancers. For years I used the “tray” method. Keeping notes in a datebook also works well. All you really need is a system for quickly identifying outstanding invoices and tracking the dates involved. This information is important when it comes to identifying and resolving issues that might arise. (more…)