A client asks for something new halfway through a project. You know it's extra. You also know that if you don't answer today, you'll end up doing it for free. The whole thing is decided in the next few minutes, so it helps to have a way of pricing it that takes one minute, not one evening.
The moment that matters
Change requests rarely arrive as formal requests. They arrive as "could you also…", "one small thing…" or "I assumed this was included". The longer you wait to put a price on it, the more it starts to feel included. So the goal is simple: reply the same day, with a number.
The formula
A fair price for a change has three parts:
- The work itself. How long the change takes on its own.
- The knock-on work. What else it touches: re-testing, re-exporting, updating other pages, re-checking the layout, another round of client review. This is the part people forget, and it's often as big as the change.
- Timing. If they need it sooner than the plan allows, you're reshuffling other work. It's fair to charge for that.
So the price is: (hours for the change + knock-on hours) × your hourly rate, plus a rush premium if it has to jump the queue.
Run it
Put in your numbers. The calculator also writes the reply for you: copy it, adjust the wording to sound like you, and send.
(hours + knock-on) × rate
What a good reply does
Look at the reply the calculator writes. It's short on purpose, and every sentence has a job:
- It starts with yes. "Happy to do this" keeps the tone friendly. You're not refusing; you're pricing.
- It names it as extra. "Outside what we agreed" refers to the agreement, not to your feelings. There's nothing to argue with.
- It gives the price and the time. Hours, money, and what happens to the delivery date. Clients often care about the date more than the money.
- It makes yes easy. One word ("yes") and it's done.
- It makes no easy too. Keeping to the original scope is a perfectly good answer, and saying so takes the pressure off.
When to do it for free
Sometimes a free change is the right call: a five-minute fix for a long-standing client, or a small gesture after a delay that was your fault. That's fine, as long as it's a decision and the client can see it:
No charge for this one. Normally it would be 1 hour, $75.
That one sentence stops a favour from becoming the new normal.
Get the yes in writing
A "sure, go ahead" on a call is easy to forget by invoice day. Before you start, make sure the agreement exists somewhere you can both see it: a reply to your email, a signed change request, or a line added to the project plan. Then add it to the next invoice while it's fresh.
If changes keep coming on the same project, step back and look at the bigger picture: what small requests cost you over a year is usually more than any single one suggests.