Which one Hourly or Day rate

[CoolCat]

I always negotiate a day rate, but ask to bill hourly. Never bill more hours than a normal working day, will work longer some days, and expect some flexibility on Friday afternoons in return. But if your admin is setup for hourly billing it makes it much easier to get it through the system if you spend some time at the dentists one day, or similar (quite a lot of agencies systems just wont let you book sub days in such cases). Crazy seven day week projects I would negotiate extra hours.

[PurpleGorilla]

I like hourly, those 15 minutes add up, and help boost the days revenue.

[kevpuk]

Daily is my preference, but I suppose it does depend on the contract terms too.
For example, my current gig is daily rate, and the contract schedule stipulates 1-4hrs to be billed as 0.5 day rate, more than 4hrs is day rate. Now, I suspect I wouldn't last long if I disappeared each day after 4.25hrs or so, but......
Permies tend to work a 7.25hr day, I generally get in somewhere between 35 & 40hrs a week. Happy with that, but there have been times when I have needed to spend longer, and others when I have worked less.
The only exception to all this was an occasion (Good Friday) where Client was hoping I could pull extra, to help with the quarterly release. Negotiated an hourly rate for weekend/bank holiday working of 1.5x (best I could get to, unfortunately) and this is now in the most recent extension contract schedule.

[Scrag Meister]

In the good old days it was always hourly rates with weekly invoicing then clients/agents cottoned on that day rates could work out cheaper for them. I've hardly seen any contracts advertised with hourly rates over the past few years.

WBS

[TheFaQQer]

The only time I've been paid hourly was when I was working a summer job when I was 19 and we had to clock in and out.

Invoice for the day, get paid for the day.

[simplicity]

Daily - as long as you sit at your desk you get paid for the day!

[speling bee]

On a similar note, I spend a lot of time waiting for others to sort their tulip. I turned up on site the other week to find another team had done some serious damage and basically forced me to sit on my hands for a day. If that was hourly, they could have told me to go home at 9:15 and bill an hour. Considering it was a 3 hour round trip, I'd not have been happy!

What do hourly rate people do? Have a minimum charge when on site?

[vwdan]

The one problem with an hourly rate is what to do if you have a fairly unproductive day. On a day rate if you take a long lunch or get distracted watching the cricket scores you bill a day, no second thought. On an hourly rate, you can worry about working out how many actual hours of work you really did

On a similar note, I spend a lot of time waiting for others to sort their tulip. I turned up on site the other week to find another team had done some serious damage and basically forced me to sit on my hands for a day. If that was hourly, they could have told me to go home at 9:15 and bill an hour. Considering it was a 3 hour round trip, I'd not have been happy!

[d000hg]

The one problem with an hourly rate is what to do if you have a fairly unproductive day. On a day rate if you take a long lunch or get distracted watching the cricket scores you bill a day, no second thought. On an hourly rate, you can worry about working out how many actual hours of work you really did

[northernladuk]

Sounds like you might be in with a chance of making a useful contribution.

Always daily for me. I've been (unusually) working long days this week, so I'll take the time back over the next few Friday afternoons.

Possibly but it will still be wrong. If I had to pick one then I would go with this as well.

[Batcher]

In the good old days it was always hourly rates with weekly invoicing then clients/agents cottoned on that day rates could work out cheaper for them. I've hardly seen any contracts advertised with hourly rates over the past few years.

[speling bee]

Surely this is a bit of simplistic question.

Sounds like you might be in with a chance of making a useful contribution.

Always daily for me. I've been (unusually) working long days this week, so I'll take the time back over the next few Friday afternoons.

[northernladuk]

Surely this is a bit of simplistic question. Why not have an option titled 'Depends a number of circumstances'. The choice will vary depending on the conditions at the client.

[d000hg]

I like to work multiple contracts and be free to work evenings and weekends if I choose, or work only a few hours in a day, so hourly is good.

[chappers]

which one do ppl prefer?