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In The News… Back to Archive
Working From Home Makes You Better Off!
According to recent research conducted by Homefinder UK, having an office in a your home can add up to £28,000 to the value of your property. In addition the AA estimates that the average commuter could make travel savings of around £2000 a year by working from home and save between one and two hours a day in travelling time - that adds up to nearly a whole extra day per week! Time that could easily be spent with the family or building a new business.
President of The AA Edmund King comments: “Our figures show you can save £8.40 per day by working from home. That adds up to more than £2,000 per year and if you can do without a second car, that leads to annual savings of in excess of £6,000. These are cost savings that any family would be pleased to see. What we like to see is that not only are homeworkers saving costs, they are also saving the environment.”
So is this time of recession the right time to be starting a business? With job uncertainty higher than ever and everyone interested in saving on everyday costs, there's never been a better time to make the leap into working for yourself from home. The opportunity to make and save more money, and spend more quality time with family or friends instead of simply commuting to and from your workplace makes more sense than ever.
Copyright 2009 by Justine Curtis
About the author
Justine Curtis is the Director of My Virtual Assistant and the founder of the UK Association of Virtual Assistants. Justine is the author of Setting Yourself Up As A Virtual Assistant and is co-founder of the VA Success Group along with Emma Walker of CKPA Office Solutions.
In The Spotlight
The Legal Stuff - What You Need and Why
There’s been a bit of chat in the virtual assistant world lately regarding contracts versus terms and conditions and whether the formal approach of issuing contracts actually puts off potential clients. Some hold the opinion that published terms and conditions are enough and that displaying these on your web site or issuing them to new clients should be sufficient. To an extent I agree that issuing a 10 page contract to a new client who is only looking to work with you for a few hours on a one-off project can seem a little over doing it. Of course in this instance you should ask for payment up front. But when it comes to long term clients, a word of caution...
Several years ago I had my first non-payer. We had worked together for several months and he had always paid on time. Then, over a period of a few months things slipped and he ended up owing me a couple of thousand pounds. When I had the audacity to ask when my invoices would be paid, his response proved that actually he no longer needed my services and was simply looking to get as much work as possible from me for free before the penny dropped with me that he was actually not intending to pay. The long and short of it was that I eventually got the money but it was after a lengthy court process and a lot of stress.
Lessons learned? I immediately took advice on what should be included in my contract because, although I had one at the time, it was nowhere near watertight enough and I hadn’t included things I could charge for such as penalties for late payment and interest. If at the time I could have produced his signed contract accepting these clauses, I could have been much more effective in collecting the debt before it went through the whole legal process. After all, if you were presented in an option of pay the invoiced amount today, or in 7 days it will cost you 15% more in penalties plus interest, wouldn’t you pay now?
I also now only accept clients on a pay up front basis and have never had any prospect or client comment or complain about this way of working. This in itself wont cover you completely as there are always the extra hours you may work over and above what has been prepaid, and then of course there are the expenses which can mount up. But, in general, it does prevent a similar situation from occurring again.
In summary I would suggest you do both, get a proper, legally binding contract in place AND charge your clients up front for the hours you will work for them. Contracts for both short term ‘Pay As You Go’ clients and those on more long term ’Retainer’ arrangements can be found at the VA Success Group.
To find out more about Legal Document Packs, CLICK HERE
Copyright 2009 by Justine Curtis
About the author
Justine Curtis is the Director of My Virtual Assistant and the founder of the UK Association of Virtual Assistants. Justine is the author of Setting Yourself Up As A Virtual Assistant and is co-founder of the VA Success Group along with Emma Walker of CKPA Office Solutions.
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