Hggdjessica, post: 227445, member: 64136 a écrit : Hello freelancers,
How do you protect yourself from an early termination of a contract especially when you have invested significant work and energy into an agreed project timeline?
There are cases where the company could unfairly take freelancer's ideas and take their work in-house at certain phase of a project where there is no breach of contract from the freelancer side.
I wonder is anyone has good ideas to protect freelancers' rights? I found the following research online:
4. Termination
Finally, you need to set out what happens if you or the client want out of your arrangement.
The obvious scenario is one where you have a long-term contract for ongoing work and the client no longer needs your services, or you’re no longer available. A simple sentence requiring the party who wishes to terminate to give x amount of notice should work fine.
Unfortunately, it’s not always this clear cut. This is where things can get sticky.
You’ll want to include a kill-fee, which will cover you in case the client decides to cancel the project after you’ve invested a significant amount of time. This can be either a flat fee or a percentage of the final amount due. You should also set out what will happen in case of a professional dispute which makes it impossible to carry on with the work.
Round the contract out with an arbitration or mediation clause. Arbitration and mediation are faster, more flexible and a lot cheaper than taking a dispute to court.
In my experience, this following is pretty much a standard clause in freelance contracts:
"Intellectual Property. The Consultant assigns to the Company, without any further payment, all rights known as ‘intellectual property rights’ (such as copyrights, or rights in designs) which arise in relation to any work prepared by the Consultant in the course of carrying out the Services (called ‘Works’) and any ideas or inventions or innovations (called ‘Inventions’) they come up with in the course of carrying out the Services. This applies whatever form those Works or those Inventions take. The Consultant agrees that if they are prevented by law from transferring these things to the Company, they will hold them on the Company’s behalf, on the basis that the law calls ‘on trust’."
Even if you have a term (brief or long-term) of freelance employment sans-contract, it's implicit in your 'verbal' agreement (to engage in the paid work) that you agree to the client using your work as they see fit. Good luck arguing the opposite, especially if you have been paid for the work.
As to termination clauses, from a client perspective they run counter to the attractiveness of employing a freelancer in the first place, unless you are a 'special' talent that warrants them going the extra mile to secure you, and lets be honest most freelancers are not in that category.
AFAIK if it isn't signed, it isn't binding.....which makes giving good advice on your exit strategy a little complicated. If you're convinced that upsetting the applecart will mean not getting paid at all, perhaps work until the next paycheck is made & then be prepared to walk the same day.
which reminds me:
"I see it all perfectly; there are two possible situations - one can either do this or that. My honest opinion and my friendly advice is this: do it or do not do it - you will regret both."
Soren Kierkegaard
Always be looking for a new job. Gifting clients is a bad idea unless there's some quantifiable benefit to you, seems like there is none in this case......keep 'em close & work for them on evenings/weekends. Can you afford to walk away from this job? If not, tread carefully on those egg-shells & begin to repair the damage.....Smile, be competent in your responsibilities & avoid flashpoints -at least until you have an exit strategy.
Dcmtr - You are not alone, there's a lot of it about right now.
I've recently had a number of invoices stretching back six to eight months, all one can do is keep politely asking & reminding.....even that, in the current climate, makes you look like 'a pain' when all you want is the money you rightly earned. Even this softly-softly approach can make the client go elsewhere, which seems to be happening to quite a few small design Co.s at the moment.
Difficult times, but if you follow the markets, that 'light at the end of the tunnel' is a freight train with your name on it.
jf - Getty have their t&c's clearly stated on their website, if I were you I'd check there first, pull the works in question from your website, then contact Getty to see if they are willing to come to an arrangement.
Alternatively, you could replace the offending images with others & re-host?
However, does this mean you have 'variable' fees for different clients?
This is a hard one to justify, it smacks of 'charging according to the size of your wallet'.....no-one likes to be on the recieving end of that.
I'm used to seeing some pretty unbelieveable jobs on this batsh*t crazy site, but this takes the effing biscuit:
_________
"I am designing a website for a fishing bait company. They would like a stylish animation featured on their home page, which will be embedded into the websites design. The animation needs to be pretty short - it is an opening intro to the website.
The animation is to look real life, as if you are looking down into a lake, with a rippling effect in the water and boilies (fishing bait) positioned at the bottom of the lake. A carp swims along and eats the bait - leaving an smooth imprint of the companies logo at the bottom of the lake."
Budget Range : £50 - £100
Budget Type : Fixed Fee
...within two hours it even has a clutch of bids!
___________
WIPs urgh.....I had forgotten those...pet hate of a Monday morn'!
Another: Not having to endure co-worker's 4hr house-mix mpgs all day....& I'm sure they'd say 'not having to endure bach all afternoon'...swing & roundabouts. :fight
Your past work [quality] is what gets you future work.....you can make a living without qualifications [if you have skill] but without a portfolio it's a big ask.....
If they've paid for the work & you've accepted the money [& day-rate], then you've effectively given your client an 'open licence' to use the works produced for their commercial purposes.
You retain artistic copyright of your designs, so unless you've signed a NDA you can use them in your portfolio.
I disagree with 'Ansar' having any low-quality connotations whatsoever, the quality of work on your portfolio will show the quality one-way or another.
I get a steady trickle of RP projects over time but outsource final stage production from my models........plenty of good firms out there that will help you.
:rollin
Globetrotting mid-project in my birkenstocks?......oh boy........I hope they don't need any freelance help in the near future.........they might find it hard to get some after that!
I know some very talented freelance PPT specialists......they would be way pissed to read that.......
Mr Smith's gotta defend his business & do what he can to retain clients.....but in my professional life I've never met a freelance who disrespected another to win a job......
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