Real Words

I recently got myself into an unfortunate situation with one of my previous writing gigs due to my own failure to read a freelance contract before I signed it. The end result didn’t turn out so bad but I felt foolish because I know better than to read anything without signing it. And I know better than to faily to review my freelance writing contracts; after all, I’ve been in the writing business in some form or another for almost ten years. Heck, I ran a freelance writing company for awhile that relied heavily on the proper use of multiple forms of  writing contracts.

So, what happened? I’d been working for a blog network for several months under a contract (which I did read before signing). Then two things happened. First, I began to find that the time the site was taking was much longer than I’d anticipated and I was getting less and less inclined to work for the site. Second, a bunch of changes were made in the way that the network was going to be operated. As a result of those changes, all of the bloggers were asked to sign new writing contracts.

When I received the electronic version of my contract, I skimmed it. My excuse is the typical excuse that I was busy with other things. Additionally, I thought that I knew what the major change to the contract was which was that we were going to start receiving payments in a different manner and time frame than in the past. I was comfortable with that change so I went ahead and signed the contract without further review. I then promptly forgot about it.

Over the course of the next couple of months, I found that it was too much of a drain to keep my writing commitment to that site and I resigned from the position. I still have a few payments coming in from the old work. To my surprise, the most recent payment was lower than I’d expected. Long story short, the contract had changed not only the terms of payment but also the amount. Moreover, it had changed the number of posts I was required to write. Since I hadn’t read it, I’d been almost twice the amount of work that I needed to do - and of course I didn’t get paid for the extra.

The situation was bad for a number of reasons. First of all, it’s disappointing to do work and not get paid for it (through no fault of the network; I have only myself to blame there). Second, I’m a little bummed because if I knew that the requirements for the site had changed, I probably could have kep my commitment and not quit the job. And third, I just feel ridiculous about the fact that I didn’t read that contract in full before I signed it. What an amateur error!

But it’s good because it serves as a reminder that we should always read every word of a writing contract and make sure that we know what it says. Additionally, I would encourage you to consider amending three standard parts of each new freelance writing contract that you sign:

• Late payment fee. Every freelance writing contract should specify not only the amount of compensation but when it is due (for example, the contract may say that payment is due within 30 days of the date on the freelancer’s invoice). Additionally, the contract should specify what the late fee is (such as ten percent) for failure to pay within that time frame. Most freelance writing contracts will not have this written in to them but you should negotiate a change with the client before signing the contract. This is a way to protect you from non-payment by clients (a problem which happens all too frequently in the freelance world); even if you don’t end up suing, the threat of the legal problem can suffice to motivate people to pay you in full and on time.
• Length of contract. Make sure that the contract specifies something about how long it lasts and/or how to make changes to it. This is so that you can properly negotiate raises to your pay over time. For example, the contract may state that it requires renewal after one year. At that time, you are in a position to negotiate a better rate. It also puts a time limit on other terms of the contract so that you have wiggle room if you find out after a period of time that there are certain terms you agreed to that you don’t like.
• Rights. Your contract will say somewhere in it who retains the rights to anything that you write for others. You should read this part carefully and try to retain as many rights as possible to your work. In many cases, this will mean amending the contract. Most clients are open to amending the contract within reason because they realize (or can be shown) that typical contracts in the world of publishing allow the author to retain certain reprint rights or to gain rights to the work after a certain amount of time passes. Read up on this area of copyright law so that you can protect yourself.

And read those contracts. Every time. No matter what!

Question of the Day: What stories can you share about problems and successes related to signing your freelance writing contracts?

[Tags] freelance, writing, contract, rights, legal, blogging [/Tags]