I bill hourly, and now only do prepaid work. Shameless promotion, but invoice issues are the reason I wrote Planscope ( https://twitter.com/brennandunn/statuses/226414132566585344). The more I can drill into client's heads that time == money, the less likely I am to get into invoice troubles.
I haven't had ANY issues since I made it clear that I'm selling my time and not a certain product, and that clients can see their current budget usage at any time. My current 6 month contract pays me in advance for 80 hours, and when he's about 20 hours from needing to fill up the tank again, I invoice him.
Over the last few years, I've spent WAY too much time chasing after money. I'm tired of it.
Have you had any clients not work with you because of the full up front payment requirement? Though I guess that would be a good indicator for problems in the future. I am thinking of switching to this for one of my current clients.
I've only had issues with one client, who is a national non-profit with procurement, etc.
The risk for the client is that you'll flake out. If you have a track record of being reliable (When I'm subbing out work, reliability and professionalism > technical capacity in most cases) then there's really no reason you shouldn't be getting prepaid work.
You're the one at risk. You risk losing the time spent working, which is non-renewable.
One time I had a potential client balk at my $50 late fee (applied instantly, then 10% per month interest on unpaid balances) during initial contract negotiation. It wasn't the interest that bothered them, but the $50.
I haven't had ANY issues since I made it clear that I'm selling my time and not a certain product, and that clients can see their current budget usage at any time. My current 6 month contract pays me in advance for 80 hours, and when he's about 20 hours from needing to fill up the tank again, I invoice him.
Over the last few years, I've spent WAY too much time chasing after money. I'm tired of it.