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Comment by zerr | Hacker News Reader

> day rate

Didn't the clients expect holy 8 hours in this case?

Another class of freelancers/consultants which are missed out from this discussion (hourly rate vs other): long-term/indefinite flex-time workers. No estimations or promises, just pay-as-you-go for several years or more. With the hourly rate, in this setup, one can work 5 hours one week, 0 hours second week, 35 another week... So a kind of very flexible employment arrangement disguised as consulting.

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Clients expect the work they plan to get done. They don't care about the hours you spend unless you demand they care about it, by running an hourly meter.

One thing I’ve always been curious about is why law firms so aggressively meter. Wouldn’t most arguments you’d apply to software consultants apply to them as well?

It's a good question, and I really believe the answer is just that they've been given social permission to gouge (at least, if you're not big or savvy enough to work out a fixed-fee arrangement) that other professions don't really have. Everyone expects a law firm to nickel-and-dime. And, of course, you're really wary of that when you take calls with your lawyer.

> Everyone expects a law firm to nickel-and-dime.

It's something they are expected to do for their clients, so within reasonable limits doing it to their clients is expected and shows a serious professional attitude.

Not all do.

For example a defense Attorney defending a DUI charge will likely be a flat fee. They will also charge according to what it is worth to you.

e.g. If you were Palo Alto's most successful real estate agent, and were at risk of losing your drivers license, you will be charged accordingly when you show up at the doorstep of a prominent defense Attorney.

^tptacek speaks wisdom here. If you have a client giving you a hard time about your time units, that's probably a client who will be more trouble than they are worth. When I was still doing consulting, I got to a point where I steered every client toward monthly retainer billing because I was tired of the ones who wanted to count every hour rather than focus on outcomes.

>Didn't the clients expect holy 8 hours in this case?

It's your day, not theirs. Accounting for number of hours spent in a day on client work is just getting back to hourly charging.

That is when agreeing on some fixed nbr of days, i.e. fixed price. In case it is indefinite contract without upfront estimations, day would be expected to be a full day, i.e. back to hourly.

I'm not really sure what the discussion here is about. If you sell someone 5 days of your time, starting Monday, and Wednesday is a billable day, then, yes, you need to spend Wednesday working on that project. In the sense that you can't spend half the day billing on someone else's project (you'd be double-booked, which is a no-no), sure. But nobody is looking to make sure exactly which hours you worked on a given billable day; that's just not how it works.

For the most part, this stuff is honor system.

Consider a rolling yearly renewable contract, with no upfront estimations whatsoever. Just a continuous stream of work. The hourly billing allows "guilt-free" flexibility. I can work 2 hours one day, 0 another day, 6 yet another day, etc...

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