Hi Don, That's all good info. I won't argue with you Don. It's definitely given me something to think about before my first visit to the accountant
On Nov 26, 9:11 pm, Don Gould <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Kent Parker wrote: > > Interesting costing system Don, but hardly of much relevance to a > > student. > > It's all relevant and especially to students. > > As as student, if you one day want to move on to doing programming as a > full time job, you'll want to understand this stuff. > > > It's of very little relevance to me either and I've been > > full time freelancer for 8 months. Because I'm not charging $70 an > > hour I spend 40 hours a week on billable work. It's been several > > months since I've had to seek work and I am full up until February at > > least. > > Ok, that comment just suggests to me that you didn't understand the > purpose of the template, hence I've updated it with some colour and more > info. > > In your case you should put your own numbers in. If you can get 40 > hours billable and still put some time back in to FLOSS development and > community support that's great! > > > If you are spending 20 hours a week seeking potential work then that > > is a sure sign you are charging too much. > > It could also suggest that you want a better quality of work life. You > don't want to have to code hard out all day every day for 8 hours a day > but still want to make a reasonable wage - would you call $55k unreasonable? > > > > > Because I work from home, petrol and rent are irrelevant. > > Wrong. > > Petrol to visit your clients and suppliers is relevant. > > Rent is tax deductable. > > >IRD > > wouldn't let me even if I tried to include rent as a business > > expense. > > Wrong - we claimed 30% last year alone. > > > At least half those items are totally irrelevant to > > freelancers and apply only to software houses. > > Wrong - other than the data projector, I claimed all of those last year. > > > > > The normal market process is that freelancer starts off with a > > competitive rate because they have less overheads. If freelancer > > succeeds and gets reputation then freelancer becomes established > > business, employs staff and charges more on the basis of reputation/ > > brand. > > Perhaps on your moon :) I've spent years doing freelance stuff and > don't currently have plans to employ staff though I do use contractors. > > > Don't want to spoil your fun > > No fun spoiled at all. :) > > You're views are very welcomed here... though I don't agree with you, > think you're just wrong on some counts, you've raised some really good > points and highlighted that I failed to explain my point well in the > first instance. > > Spoiling the fun would have been to just ignore my error! > > > but this costing is too much too soon for > > any newbie. > > If this costing is to much for a newbi who is wanting to be a good PHP > programmer then, with respect, I suggest they go off and get a job at KMart. > > You may not recall, but the orginal post was about how much to charge. > Most people responded with comments centered around charging a market > rate so as not to disturb the market. > > I responded by saying that answer is unacceptable. It's, in part, not > ok because the current market rate may be being set by a large player > who has a reason to drive market prices down. > > The correct answer to the question is to cost out what you should be > charging then work from there. > > Cheers Don --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ NZ PHP Users Group: http://groups.google.com/group/nzphpug To post, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
