Re: what's a GOOD starting HOURLY rate for a PHP/MYSQL job?

many thanks, this may sound totally dumb but where do you find your work ? is it via word of mouth or do you advertise etc ? Steve "Tim Foster" <tfoster@pdxinc.com> wrote in message news:NCBBKDJBKIPDAOEDLDNECEIPEHAA.tfoster@pdxinc.com... > >I'd also be interested in what people are charging as I'm thinking of > >setting up as a contractor myself and it would be nice to have a 'ball park' > >figure of what the going rate is ... > > > >Pls mail replies to stevebrett@ntlworld.com. > > Feel free to post your responses to the list. I'm curious about it too. > > On the ASP/VBScript side, rates can run anywhere from $40 to $125 per hour. Heck of a > ballpark, true, but I guess it's better than nothing. I'm curious if PHP/MySQL rates are > in the same "ballpark". Quite frankly (IMHO), it boils down to your portfolio, your > professionalism and your negotiation skills. > > Per page vs per job: > I find that when taking on a job, usually the client doesn't truly understand the medium > and therefore doesn't exactly know what s/he wants. I'm usually better off getting paid by > the hour since the project grows when the client realizes what can be done. This can be a > turnoff for some clients because there's no upper limit to the cost in sight, but by > listening to the client, I can get an idea of how many hours it'll take and give them some > comfort that way. The last thing you want to do is bid a fixed cost for the project and > then have "scope creep" break you. You can try to keep scope creep under control by > getting the client to commit (in writing) to your proposal (and revised proposals), but my > experience is that there's always scope creep and/or enhancements that the client wants > (or that the project demands). > > TIM > -The primary function of the design engineer is to make things > difficult for the fabricator and impossible for the serviceman. >