What do you charge family?

I took on a job for an extended family member designing his Web site. I really wish I had not taken the job because of my lack of time but it is to late and I am half way done the site. I never design sites for money (I only design my own e-commerce sites or fun charity sites for friends) so I do not know what or how to charge.

I would like to be able to show some formula on how I come up with a total charge. For instance $10 per page + $5 per image = total charge.

Does anyone have any idea on what would be a reasonable charge for a Web site for their uncle would be?

The approximate site details are as follows...
no e-commerce capabilities
50 static pages
300 dynamic pages (jsp)
400 images (some were manually scanned in, about half were simple digital edits like thumbnails, and a few were complex digital edits)
10 custom graphics (page design images)
4 custom forms (jsp)

I never charge family at all, but then no family member ever needed a site of that size. For something as huge as that you'd have to charge something. I would figure my usual charges, and then cut them by at LEAST half., if not 60%

I worked on a site for my mother and didn't charge a cent (part of the reason is I owed her a lot anyway so it was a barter deal, really). $5 per image sounds very high to me, although I guess that depends on how much work goes into them. For my tech consulting, I usually don't charge family for help. But, a large job like that, I'd settle for a couple grand, maybe a bit more.

I agree with you guys, I usually wouldn't charge family at all but this is a little different

My uncle who I am creating the site for has an established company that I am building the site for. They can afford to hire a professional designer but he went with me because he could work really well me and get exactly the site he wants. This site is more than a favor for a family member.


Another side note, when I asked other family members what they thought I should charge him they said "Full Price" because when they use his company they do not get a discount! Now I do not want to charge full price but I do not know how much of a discount I should give.

So far I collected a grand to get started and I am considering asking for more once I hit my next milestone.

Understood. Other factors are, how close are you to this family member. The relative I built for was a 1st cousin and also my godfather. He's been like my older brother all my life. And his site was about 7 static HTML pages with some javascripting. Nothing like what you're doing there. You have to charge. I stick with my last post; calc your normal fee, cut it in half.

I tried coming up with different forumlas for calculating fees. By the page, by the product, by the image and finnally what I have settled on by the hour. I do all project work based on an hourly rate plus expenses. honestly every other way of caluclating fees seems to be arbitrary where time spent is very easily tracked.

As a rule I do not do work for family. I guess its more like guidlines becuase I have done some jobs for friends and family and honestly I regret ever single one.

If you build a commercial site for someone and you invest your time and effort like you would for any customer, you have to charge your rate. ask yourself this, If you were not working on your friend / relatives website, would you be working on a customers website? If the answer is yes then you need to charge your normal fees.

Its bad business not to get your rate for work you complete. Its a lesson that you learn and as you start paying staff to work by the hour you will begin to see that they are focused on profitable work. It would upset you if staff was working on their friends website while you were paying them.

Hence the rule. Dont work for family and if they insist that you work for them charge them your full rate.

Call me mean, but also call me profitable.

Brian

That is great advice bpjsurf. I also end up regretting the work I take on from family. I just have a hard time saying no. But this is it! For now on I will no longer take on any work for family!

Well.... after the couple projects I’m involved in already :(

Well to each his own, where something like this is concerned. In my family the only one who's asked and for whom I've built a site, is a very close cousin, who's also my godfather, and who also takes very good care of my parents. He lives 1/4 mile from them on LI and I'm in NYC, so he sees them a good deal more than I do. I about to revamp his whole site, again, no charge. That's just the way my family is.

Personally, I charge family members differently then my regular clients. When I am repairing a computer for an immediately family member I just charge for the cost of parts and not my time. For the rest of the family members I only charge 50% of my time and the cost of parts. My family understands that I am running a business and that they are getting a better deal from me then if they goto someone else. At least with my family they are very supportive of my business and refer friends and businesses over to me.

It would have been better if you had discussed fees before you started the project - but as you are further down the line you should consider having a meeting with your relative as soon as you can to discuss this issue. Take the advice of forum members about the rate, and then talk to your relative - the key is to be flexible. Best of luck.

Regards,

My brother does all of my work for my sites- like shopping cart, and anything in php that I need.
He is a big computer geek that sells nothing.
I have to pay him a lot.
I don't think I should have to pay him cause he is my brother, but he loves getting paypal payments and I love the results:)
It is ok to have your family memebers pay;;;;;

I tell them my going rate for standard clients, and after they say... WHOA!, then I tell them to give me a resonable price to charge them. Then I see if I'm willing to do it for that price, or if we need to negotiate a little bit more.

Lol, actually doing that right now with a family member of mine :)

I give my brother 25 dollars an hour to work on my shopping cart and any work that I need done.
He is exspensive, but worth it:)

ALWAYS GET PAID

Your time is valuable. Charge at least something - I can't count on my fingers how many times I was screwed by freebies. If someone is giving you nothing..... they are not going to give you their time either. Your going to need their involvement down the line, your not going to get it - hours and hours of waisted time. For example...

freeloader: I need pictures for my cart?
you: What kind of pictures would you like?

freeloader: Oh just pick some ( transaltion: doesnt want to be bothered- you work for it- figure it out, I'm watching the game.)
you: okay

2 weeks later...

freeloader: Why are there a bunch of lame pictures of ducks on my cart?
you: I spent alot of time researching,coding,graphic design searching for the best images for your store.

freeloader: Well, I can't have that... we are definitely going to need a new option?
you: ? <---- S C R E W E D, you're a jerk , blah blah blah ...

This is just one good example. If people aren't putting the money in, their not putting the time in .... you suffer.


Trust me, from experience. CHARGE EVERYONE

Chances are, since you didn't discuss fees prior to taking the job, they think they're getting it for free. This is especially true since, as you said, you
don't get paid for web design and they know it.

When I teach web classes, I tell students to figure $100-$150 a page with them supplying the text and no forms.

If you are that good, go into business. And don't do any more sites for relatives or friends. Burnt is the only thing that happens to those who do.

All in all, I would state that family and business don't mix, but I had to take a job similar to what you are going through. Maybe not to the exact scale you are going through, but close. I ddn't charge a thing, but they insisted on paying me something for my "trouble"

They ended up paying me about half of what I would have charged anyone else. I think 50% is a perfect figure.

You may have a point. I never charge family anything but that's backfired a couple times.

i never charge family no matter what they need

Business and family dont mix and usually result in problems. But since your project is well underway I have found that in the general freelance market programmers charge $5 - $10 per page so since it is family I would charge $2 - $3 per page so you are charging more for the work and not for the time.