Not Getting Paid: Beginner Mistakes

I was reading about a young computer technician on the Technibble forums who had encountered some issues during his first paid computer repair job. This computer technician was asked to do some virus removal work, he quoted $50 USD and the client accepted.

Later that night, the computer technician arrives as the clients house, removes the virus and even fixes the clients other computer which was having problems. When the time came for client to pay, some problems arose.

The first problem was that the client asked why he should pay the Technician since the software that was used is freely available on the internet and that the client could have done it himself.
The second problem was that the client said that his wife has the money and she is currently “out”. The client said he would bring the money to him later that night but never showed up for that appointment.
Now that computer technician is having problems getting paid.

These are mistakes that any new computer technician could encounter and this is what he should have done (and you can do) to have protected himself.


The first issue was that the client said that he could have done the work himself. To me, this sounds like the technician didn’t deliver value-for-money in the eyes of the client – even though he did do the job correctly.

“Value for Money” is an interesting view because it is differs from person to person. The fact that he fixed the problem at the price he said he would should have been enough for most people. However, this particular client knows a little bit about computers and felt what the technician did was within his capabilities. When the client said “everything you used, you downloaded for free and I could have done it myself”, the technician replied with “why didn’t do you do it yourself?” making the client realize he didn’t do it because he didn’t know how to.

The best response to such a question is to tell the client that they arent for paying you to press buttons, they are paying you to know which buttons to press. Sometimes that is enough for them to get the idea but if they are still not getting it, I sometimes go onto say that they are paying for my education to get to this point. They are paying for the years of me working on computers without getting paid so when I do come to work on their computers, I know exactly what to do. There are also other factors that they are paying for such as fuel, insurance, hardware and other business overheads.

If I am onsite at a residential client’s house and I fixed the problem fairly quickly, I still need to charge for the full hour so I can cover driving time and petrol. So what I usually do is ask the client whether they would like me to check the Windows updates, look for viruses or show them how to do something on the computer. If the client is a business client and they need the computer I am working on, I usually just leave. Letting them get back to work is usually more important to a business client. I have written an article on this subject some time ago if you want to know more.

The next mistake was letting a residential client pay later. If the client is a residential client and I haven’t done any work for them before, then I will only accept cash and it must be done when work is completed. If I have done work for them before and know them to be good clients, I will accept checks too.

Unfortunately, the client in this story sprung the payment issue on the technician only after the work was done so the technician couldnt accept cash or check then and there. However, he should have had a signed work order saying that the client is happy with the work that was completed. This would have been proof that the work was done to satisfaction and that he should be paid. This is great to have if the technician wants to take it to small claims court. There is also a psychological element of having something in writing since the client knows that it is all documented and it will be difficult to debate. Therefore there is less of a chance of ever needing to bring it to small claims since they know they are provably in the wrong.

In the same forum post, the technician said that he learned to not judge a book by its cover since the client looked fairly wealthy. He was in a nice neighbourhood with dual 28″ HDTV’s setup as monitors on the wall and a Quad Core system.

It is a not a good idea to assume that you will have no problems getting paid by wealthy customers. In fact, the most money I ever lost to a single client was the wealthiest one of them all. Unfortunately, this was a long time ago when I was first starting out so I didn’t have the right paperwork in place at the time either.

Another thing to keep in mind is that someone can be “wealthy” and “cheap” at the same time. In fact, many of them get there by keeping their money close to them and saving where ever possible – including negotiating the price with you.

Last but not least, this technician charged $50 USD for the job which is a good price for a beginner if it was hourly. However, it was a fixed price which is actually cheap. Remember, cheap prices attract cheap customers, even if they are the wealthy kind.

In conclusion, always provide value, only accept cash from new residential clients, have the right paperwork in place and don’t judged a book by a cover. If you follow all of this you would have significantly reduced your chances of not getting paid.