Contract - how to deal with client delays?

[itrainu]

Any ideas for clauses to build into a contract that state something along the lines of "any delays caused by the client shall not slow the billing process".

I was hired a month ago to do some SEO for a site that was being created by anther designer. I accepted based on several things: the designer will heed my instructions, I get access to the site and traffic logs... I haven't received anything yet :-) I did get paid for my keyword research which was 50% of the entire contract :-)

I would normally go ahead and bill, but the contract was provided by a colleague that I recently met - she was hired by this company. She is still learning the business end of things even more than I am ;-)

Any ideas or suggestions? I just don't want to be in a position of being broke because 10 clients are slow in getting their work to me to complete...

itrainu

[Travoli]

I dont have specific language for it, but I have seen this mentioned many times.

Check out this thread [webmasterworld.com]. Asking for 50% up front and another 50% before the website is turned over is a smart clause.

[itrainu]

Yes I saw this thread and do make sure to get a down payment up front (usually 50%). However, I prefer not to wait 6 months for the second down payment because the client is taking their time to approve changes, etc.

I am thinking of building in a milestone summary with tasks and dates and then a clause that if milestones are not met due to client delays, this will not cause a delay in the billing task :-)

itrainu

[digitalghost]

>>Any ideas for clauses to build into a contract that state something along the lines of "any delays caused by the client shall not slow the billing process".

Yep. 50% due at start-up, 50% due in 30 days. Barring that, 50% due at start-up, the remainder paid in 6 equal installments. Phone calls billed at $7.50 a minute. That will cut down on the "free advice" and "brain picking" phone calls.

[webwoman]

Are you being held up by the designer? or by the client? I had a similar situation where the designer was purposely sabotaging me - I told the client that I would withdraw from the gig unless I got full control over the website project. I won.

Recently the client has held me up on some pages he must approve. I showed him how well his competition was doing for his keywords and he suddenly got very active on the website project. I think sometimes it's just a matter of finding the right 'go-button'. This person is extremely competitive and so I was able to use that to speed things up :)
-webwoman