Interesting how things have changed over the years from hourly to PWD and additional

[Sausage Surprise]

Travel from NE to/from Hertfordshire on a Monday and Friday, so it's about 6 hours Monday, 4 hours Friday but make the hours up Tue, Wed, Thu.
Bill for full week - never been a problem anywhere I've worked down south or any contract for that matter.

[vwdan]

There's obvious exceptions, but I find that once there's a good working relationship with the client then you can generally make things work out. I didn't bother billing for a few hours of overtime a few weeks back because it was more effort than it was worth, but I billed 1/2 a day for a 30 minute change last week. The change didn't even quite do what they needed

[acnm]

Day rate has its pros and cons like anything.
I had a good gig recently where day rate was payable on any activity performed irrespective of length of time - I knew that there was a good chance of being called on a weekend for advice and that in the main it would be just 30 minutes to an hours work. Kerching!

Downside is current client wants 25 hours a day out of me.

Last time I was on hourly rate we were permitted to charge traveling time as well.

[TheFaQQer]

Is Blogger too complex for you, PC?

[BolshieBastard]

Why do you sign this stuff then whine about it? Are you incapable of negotiation? No-one forces you to sign.

This.

[tractor]

...

snip....

Whine

...snip

Why do you sign this stuff then whine about it? Are you incapable of negotiation? No-one forces you to sign.

[The Spartan]

Does it even matter

It varies from client to client and depends on how much weight you carry with the client, here I finish between 2-2:30pm on a Friday to drive back, had they said no I wouldn't have taken a contract here but I was upfront about it and it's working well so far.

[northernladuk]

Too long, too much moaning, didn't read.

[psychocandy]

Years ago it was all hourly rate which seemed to work ok.
Having gone back to perm for a few years when I came back it was all Professional Working Day.

All good, except for the odd client who thought great Im paying a load for this contractor Im getting my moneys worth. Luckily, for most it was still 7.5 hours or so.
Never sure of this old, get paid a day rate even if you work for 30 mins or 10 hours. Never once seen a client willing to pay for 30 mins in a day.

Sometimes makes half day off difficult because a lot of agency self-billing systems just cant cope. In this case, hope you've got a client who doesnt mind.

More recently seen a few contracts stating less than 7.5 but more than 4 hours is half day, less than 4 hours is zero. I guess an attempt to crack down on the short days.

Current gig actually has 7.5 hours down as a standard day. On a positive note, pretty much means client aint gonna try the 10 hour thing. BUT, clause in there saying more than 7.5 hours equals no extra but any less than 7.5 hours means you lose at pro-rata rate every 15 mins short.

Must admit I much prefer the tick in box for PWD with the understanding from client that you'll approx 37.5 hrs minimum throughtout the week. Makes for a bit of flexibility on both sides then.
Where hours are required, in these sort of things, what do you all do? Make sure each day is 7.5 even though the reality is slightly different?

For instance, 8 hours mon-thu and then 6 hours friday is more than enough hours but can just see someone at agency saying yep standard days for mon-thurs but 1.5 hours short for friday.
Certainly knackers the leave early friday thing if you put down actual hours.

Pretty sure in the past when faced with similar I've just stuck 7.5 down for every day, got agreement with client re:flexibilty etc. Saves any agency side shenanigans as above.

Another thing is TOIL. NEVER keen on this. Generally like to bill for days I work and thats it. None of this work this day and take a day off some other time (and bill for it). Never ends well IMHO. Just gets too complicated at the end of the day.

Seen contractors work weekends for 12 hours and client promised 1.5 days TOIL but client says they cant pay you for it due to budget. Never happy when this happens. In this case, I always tell client no I'll bill for the days work but I promise I will take a day off in the next 3-4 weeks so its all even. But, I've worked with contractors who've 'built up' weeks worth of TOIL in their eyes. Bad idea...