Invoicing / costing questions

[FruitBasedDrinkForALady]

Just wondering if anyone can offer advice or experience on 3 things...

1. I recently did some work for a client (I'm a freelance) which started off last minute and grew over the following 10 days. I have a very good relationship with him so I fit in this work to get it done and he was very appreciative. I invoiced him when the work was done, he replied thinking the invoice was lower than expected, I replied saying it was correct. I've just realised that it wasn't correct, I've nearly a day of work I didn't invoice for. As this was entirely my fault, I just have to suck it up now, don't I?

2. By co-incidence, same client, asked me ages ago to go to a meeting this afternoon. It would have been 2.5hrs at the meeting plus 1.5hrs travel time. I got an email at 11pm last night saying the meeting was changed to a 1 hour conference call this afternoon. I don't like "penalising" clients, but there's a massive difference between 1 and 4 hours' work. What is your policy on last minute cancellations? I've worked for this client in different capacities over the years (hence the good relationship) so I our contract is more an understanding and we never put anything on paper (I have a cancellation fee laid out as standard for other projects). Would it be fair to charge him for 2 hours and call it quits at that?

3. A separate client has asked me to attend a conference overseas on their behalf. It would be 5 days away, including travel time. I don't usually do this, so I'm not sure how to price it for the quote. Would a 12 hour charge per day (so in this case 60 hours) be about the norm? There are only probably 2 sessions (4 hours) each day which I would have to attend and they would be covering all expenses.

Thanks!

With 1) go back to him and say you've made a mistake - a long term relationship should be able to cope.

With 2) did you keep yourself free for this, turning down other work? Because if you did then I think it's reasonable to charge for the agreed amount.

With the third, are you staying away overnight?

Thanks for the replies Mum.

No, I didn't turn down other work, but I rearranged some work around it. The only fee I'm losing is the 3 hours based on the last minute rescheduling.

Yes, the conference is in Germany (I'm in Ireland) so it would be travelling day 1, conference day 1 pm, days 2,3,4 and travel day 5.

For your trip away, I would just cone up with a daily fee, don't complicate things with the hours (although sometimes it's a good idea to set out maximum hours that constitute a day) and charge 5 daily fees.

So, with the second, contractually he made you an offer of 4 hours work, you accepted it and you relied on to (you have moved your days around) - so I do not think you would be unreasonable for him to charge him 4 hours. However, you may decide in the interests of the ongoing relationship to go down to 2 hours - but make sure you. Do something nice with your unexpected free time!

Sorry for the delay responding Mum. Thanks for the advice, it's great to have a sounding board!