If your friend has a skill that could help you, would you expect to pay full price?

[thisusernameismine]

Not sure if this has been talked about before - but in short, a friend of mine (known for many many years but see each other only annually as on opposite sides of the world) has become a life coach in the last couple of years. The friend does talk about it often when we meet and I'm very proud of how she's made a success of a new career.

I'm at the end of mat leave and feeling in a bit of a rut in terms of my career - I feel it's a dead end job and I'd love to completely change what I do for a living but have a big inner critic (this is my main issue and the kind of problem my friend specialises in). I shared this with my friend and asked her if she thought coaching me could work given we know each other so well. I fully expect to pay as it's her business, but my DH is outraged that I'm being charged full price for the exploratory session. The coaching packages are a little extortionate so I'm not sure if I could afford them anyway (mat leave pay!) but possibly could just about pay for the smallest programme.

Just interested in others' opinions as my Dh's is so different from mine. He said if a good friend of his had a skill, they would never charge him as it's only 1-3 hours I'm being offered so in his opinion, hardly damaging for her business. I'm not sure whether to go ahead now

Ýanbu. I got fed up with friends expecting celebration cakes for peanuts.

I'd pay full price, but then again I wouldn't do anything like life coaching, and if I did, it would not be with a friend. You need someone who's completely impartial, rather than someone who might be a bit anxious about being too 'honest' with you?

“I wouldn’t go to a friend for coaching like this, in the same way that I wouldn’t go to a counselling friend for counselling. By all means go to a life coach, but choose someone you don’t know, and who can be impartial”

This.

Also coaches are the kind of people who encourage you to see your own self worth...and usually have a high sense of self worth themselves. Which they protect with Boundaries.

Almost a third of my income comes from friends - another third from neighbours. If I gave them all mates rates I would be severely shooting myself in the foot.

For the record - I did a small coaching “pack” earlier in the year. At the time I wondered if I was being ripped off. As it turned out it was really, really helpful. Impacted my job, my mental health (positively), my family and just gave me a push to focus and act on what needed to be done. Good luck whatever you decide.

Depends on how close the friend is, what the service is and how much of a “mate’s rates” you’d be expecting.
For example: my closest friend is a successful photographer. She’s also godmother to my kids - she takes all our family photos and even though I’ve always offered her the money to cover her standard rate for the service she’s provided, but she refuses to take it.
Another friend is a massage therapist. I recently had a pregnancy massage with her, and while I did pay for it, she gave me a 20% discount on her usual price.
I’m not all that surprised that my photographer friend refuses to take my money because she’s a stubborn ox, and sees it as providing memories for the DCs. But I’d never expect the massage for free!

I think it's good your friend is being upfront about her charges but I do think it might change your friendship if the coaching is not as helpful as you hope. I'd choose a coach where the relationship was only professional.

Yes. You should expect to pay full price. I'm an artist tutor and run courses that friends sometimes attend. Sometimesvi provide reduced price or even free course places to people, but that's always at my instigation as this is my living.

Against the grain...

For a very close friend I would expect discounted ... or free! For something that's only a few hours of her time! I'd probably suggest we did it over dinner which I would cover.

And I would do the same vice verse.

For a 'friend' but not 'best/close friend' I would expect to pay full I guess.

Hah I’ve had people over the years ask me to do their accounts for free. I politely tell them my hourly rate and watch their jaw drop.

IME giving people your services for free is never appreciated anyway, people tend to become dismissive of your skill for some reason if you are helping out and do the work for free.

Also being self employed, how on earth will the friend make money ever if she’s doling out free advice to all her mates?
If you feel you don’t need advice don’t go to her, if you think she’s too expensive shop around.

@PegasusReturns 💕 best advice x

On the other hand a friend made our wedding cake and I refused to pay her the price she quoted because this was the first wedding cake she had ever made and so although she had qualified as a pattisier she had no experience or portfolio at that point to justify charging full price. So it does depend.

A friend of my dad's owned a garage. He was always giving friends discounts. He went bankrupt. And his wife (who had advised him against) left him.

Yes unless either they offered or I could do similar for them in which case I might suggest a swap.

I think if you think a career coach would be helpful, it would be better to get someone impartial and who doesn't have a personal connection with you.

I am self-employed, I would offer a small reduction for a friend but not free. I can't afford to do mates rates at the expense of proper work.

DH and I run a business offering a service. Depending on the level of acquaintance/friend we would offer anything from a 10% discount to waiving our section of the fee (we often hire other people to provide the service alongside us so couldn’t cover their costs as well)

I've been on both sides of this experience, and have never charged nor paid full whack. Sometimes just charging/paying for materials, sometimes services for services (eg childcare in exchange for proofreading and typing up). It depends also on the degree of investment by the person whose services are wanted. I wouldn't expect someone to lose a week's full earnings by doing a job on the cheap for me, and wouldn't ask.

I have a friend who does a form of talking therapy. He will do a first session at a substantial discount for friends, but subsequent sessions are at full whack.

I'm self employed and my time is money for food on the table . If a friend has booked my time then they are taking the spot that a non friend would be paying for . So in short, my kids still need to eat, so I still need to charge .

If it's help like moving house, baby sitting for a few hours etc, then as a friend, I would do it for the friendship. If I had a skill which I had invested in - training, professional registration etc- then I would expect to charge. I might offer a discount depending on the friendship, but I would not expect to give up a paying customer for a friend's freebie.
I used to do a food related hobby. I always used top qualiy ingredients and it was very time consuming. Over the years, several friends asked me to do something for them and were shocked when I said I would do it at cost rather than free. We are talking about a quarter of the price compared to a full on business. I no longer do anything for anyone outside of my family and even then, I make it my gift. I think expecting mates rates is cheeky.

My ExDP & I had a business & we did parents & good friends free, as someone else said, we’d gave their kids, help them move house etc - so why would we charge them? They’d help us moving etc too.

We also did it for free for not quite such close friends, but ExDP was a people pleasing soft touch.

Here’s the thing, if all of her friends wanted a discount (or free) - how does your friend pay her bills/mortgage etc?

Errr....by being a business and having clients/customers that aren’t friends! Obviously.

Very few people annoyed me, but my friends BIL did, we did a lot of work firbthem for free, but he charged us full whack when he did a bit of electrical work for us (a fraction of the time & resources) so we were surprisingly busy when they called wanting our services after that.

Ex kept that business, but i now do something else & don’t charge friends. I think it depends on your friendship, skills/trades and if you can help them or not. For example a friend is a lawyer - she’d give me advice about something, but if I needed a lawyer to ‘take on’ something for me I’d expect to pay as it would take a lot of time.

I think you’re making a mistake seeing a friend as a life coach though.

If you do though, I think it’s massively tight of them to charge you/charge you full price.

I don't think you should expect the coaching for free, however like others I think it is entirely inappropriate to use a friend for 'life coaching'. If you genuinely feel this would be helpful, then I suggest you look for an independent life coach.

The fact it is 'life coaching' (in my opinion) puts a bit of a different slant on the situation, it's not as if your friend is making you a cake as a professional baker for example. Often good friends will have a close 'heart to heart' conversation over a meal for example, and make helpful suggestions or share ideas that have worked for them. This is what friends do.

Personally I wouldn't charge a friend for a coaching session but I would expect them to return the favour by promoting my business (as long as they were honest in their reviews). But given your friend is not local that would be of limited value to her.

Meant to add, we used to have our own business and would offer 'mates rates' to friends or sometimes provide the service free if it benefitted toe community for example.

I would expect to pay full price, yes. I think your husband is cheeky to expect that his friends will provide professional services without him having to pay in full for them.

I have a family member who works running a children’s activity club, term time and holidays. We don’t attend term time due to other activities, but DD likes to go to the holiday clubs. If the courses are fairly empty, I get a small family discount (better some income rather than an empty space) but if nearly full I pay the full price (so they don’t lose income).

Generally I would. The trouble is that there is a big crossover between our friend's profession and the normal conversations that Mums have with one another to be supportive friends.

I suspect that clients of life coaches rarely make transformative choices because they went to that life coach, but rather, the decision to see the life coach is part of a determination to make a change. Perhaps start by having a detailed conversation with your husband about what you do and don't like abut your job, what you would like to get out of a job in the future etc. You will be surprised how much you can narrow down your objectives yourself and, from there, work out what qualifications might be helpful (if any) and where to look for job opportunities.