When a Good Client Goes Missing
Finding good clients is a goal of every freelance writer. These clients pay on time, are easy to get along with, and always have more work. But what happens when a good client goes missing? This is something that has happened to me in the past. While it was not a huge deal it still made me think about what was going on.
A good client can go missing just as easily as a bad one. In my situation, I had been working for the client for roughly one year providing blog posts. Every month, on time, they sent my money. To go along with this, we had a good working relationship and often times spoke about other topics as well. All in all, they seemed to be the perfect client even though the pay was not the highest.
But guess what? All of a sudden the client stopped answering my emails and phone calls. For many months I attempted to make contact with the people I knew within the company, but had no such luck. If they didn’t owe me money I probably would have walked away without much fuss. But with a few hundred dollars owed I felt that it was worth my time to try to collect.
Believe or not, I have yet to hear back from this client. It is amazing how somebody who was so easy to work with could disappear without paying what is owed.
Instead of letting this client sour my relationship with others I simply wrote them off as a “bad apple.†You never know when somebody is going to get what they want from you, and then decide that the relationship is over. I have no issue with a client telling me that things are not working out, paying what they owe, and parting ways. It is those that don’t communicate and don’t pay that can be frustrating to deal with.
This is not meant to scare you into thinking that all your good clients are going to take off on you. In fact, this has only happened to me a handful of times in all my years as a freelance writer. Nonetheless, you should always be careful about who you do business with.
