Every few months, someone asks me for a fixed-price quote. I always say no. This essay is the long version of that answer.
I've been freelancing as a WordPress developer for eight years. In that time I've tried every pricing model that gets discussed in freelance Twitter threads: fixed quotes, value-based pricing, retainers, packages, day rates, productised services. I came out the other side charging a flat hourly rate. Not because it's fashionable, it isn't, but because it's the only model I've found that consistently makes clients and me end up on the same side.
The problem with fixed quotes
A fixed quote looks like a favour to the client. They know what they're paying. They can budget. They can compare apples to apples across three bidders. All true. All surface-level true.
Here's what's underneath. When I give you a fixed quote for a project I haven't built yet, I have to pad it. I don't know exactly how long it'll take, so I add 20 to 40% on top of my honest estimate to protect against the things I'll inevitably underestimate. That padding is real money you pay whether or not those risks materialise.
A fixed quote is an insurance premium, not a price. The freelancer is the insurer, and you're paying them to absorb scope risk that, most of the time, doesn't actually happen.
That's the best case. The worst case is that something I didn't foresee does happen mid-project, and suddenly we're negotiating instead of building. Is the new requirement 'included'? Did the original scope imply it? Who's right? Both sides end up lawyering the brief instead of focusing on the work.
What hourly actually solves
Billing hourly changes the incentive structure. You pay for work done. I bill for hours worked. There's no padding because there's no risk transfer. When scope shifts, we talk about hours and adjust, a two-minute conversation instead of a two-week negotiation.
This sounds obvious, but it has a compounding effect over long relationships. Most of my clients have been with me for five years or more. They stayed because every conversation we've ever had about money has been about the work, not about what was in scope. That trust adds up.
What you actually pay
My hourly rate is $55. I log hours in a tool you can audit any time. I invoice monthly, with a line-item breakdown of what I did each day. Nothing is hidden, nothing is bundled, and you can stop at any point.
What about the estimates?
I do give you estimates, a range, not a number. After eight years I can usually predict final hours within 10 to 15%. If I think a project will take 60 to 80 hours, it usually lands in that window. When I'm going to miss it, I tell you early, not at invoice time.
Where hourly fails
I want to be honest about the downsides. Hourly isn't the right model for everyone:
- Clients with strict budgets. If you need to know the number before you start, a fixed quote from someone else is a better fit, even if that quote is inflated.
- Clients who can't trust a log. Hourly requires a base level of trust. If you're going to scrutinise every 15-minute entry, nobody's going to enjoy the relationship.
- Tiny, well-defined jobs. If I can scope a job in under 20 minutes, I'll sometimes quote a flat price. Not because it's better for me, but because the overhead of hourly tracking isn't worth it for you.
The real argument
Underneath the logistics, this is an argument about what freelancing should be.
Fixed quotes turn projects into transactions. You hand over a brief, I hand over a price, we shake hands, and we spend the next six weeks trying to protect our respective sides of the line. It's adversarial by design, even when everyone's trying to be nice.
Hourly turns projects into partnerships. We're both looking at the same clock. If something's going to take longer than I thought, we talk about it. If you realise you need something different, we adjust. Every decision is joint, because every decision costs us both.
That's the model I want. I think it's the model most clients want too, once they've tried it.