Does the essay deadline determine the essay price? Small survey for writers.

I have a question to essay writers. Assume you are to be assigned a 10-page essay. And you have an option about the deadline:

a) 1 week (100%)
b) 2 weeks
c) 3 weeks
d) 4 weeks

How much would you charge in the above scenarios? Let's assume option a) has 100%. And just put how many less percent (if any less) you would charge if given more time. Something like:

a) 100%, b) 95%, c) 90%, d) 90%

I try to get an idea that if a writer has more time he would charge less or if he would charge the same. Because I heard that for a writer it doesnt' matter if he has more time because he would still start writing 'at the last day/hour he feels comfortable to finish the essay.' And either he can do it or not.

Now when I think about it I (being a student) start doing my homework at the last day I can :). If I had one year to do my homework I would still start doing it a day before it's due (as long as I know I would finish it within a day). Opinions please?

I would say:

a) 100%
b) 95%
c) 95%
d) 95%

That means it doesn't matter to me if I have 2, 3, or 4 additional weeks; I would only charge 5% more if I was allowed 2-4 weeks more.

In my experience, commercial sites usually charge a set price per page based on the due date. My private fees are based more on how difficult the paper will be for me and how long it will take me than on the due date except that I charge more for papers due in 24 hours or less. Beyond that, the extra time doesn't really help me because I usually write everything pretty close to the due date unless it's a particularly long or difficult project.

I have to twist one of my employer's arms to get them to give me more per page for rush orders. they are very tight. the other current one, rush orders are automatically scaled up about 25%.

in terms of ex employers, the one I quit was about the same, scaled up 25%, but sometimes more. one had a base per page rate of $20+, so I never demanded more for rush orders from them, to avoid spooking the goose. unfortunately, they went out of business.

[Moved from]:

How do you price rush writing jobs?

Hey, I hope everyone is having a good Labor Day and is well-rested for the upcoming busy season.

Today I have a question about rush jobs. What is usually considered a reasonable premium, say for 24 hour turnaround?

For my company work, I generally bid with a ~30% premium when difficult projects are due the same day or will require an all-nighter. So if I might normally bid $12 PP, I would hike it to around $15.50. For some research heavy projects, I have even bid as high as $18 PP, but most companies seem reluctant to go that high even for extremely urgent/difficult orders.

What are your rules of thumb? Say you get a basic history paper, 8 pages, 10 sources to do overnight (from a reputable American company). About how much do you think you could get?

Feel free to comment on private work as well, but I am personally more interested in how to bid fairly w/ companies, maximizing earnings without losing the project to someone else.

It's not always a simple decision because a rush job for you may be a regular job for other writers (especially if they are based in a different time zone than yours). But 20-25% is probably a good figure.

Why? Get some private clients.

Working on it, and have gotten a couple private jobs so far. Gotta pay the bills in the meantime, though! :-)

It is a good time for a thread about exactly that, though. Will post my thoughts and experiences so far.

Major, thanks for the input. Good point.

How can I get more direct clients? I only have one and jobs are far in between.

@sheila89 do you work for a writing company at the moment or are you one of those who have struck out on their own from the very start? If you are with a writing company, then you should be seeing an increase in your client base depending upon the quality of your work and the repeat clients coming your way. You may still have to bid on regular orders but, provided you always deliver exemplary papers to your clients, they should turn into regular clients for yourself in no time at all. With any luck, the company may even turn you into one of their "go-to" writers whom they will opt to approach for certain "special orders" just hang in there and keep improving your writing and research skills. The client should follow soon.

If you are an independent writer, then sign up for those independent work companies like UpWork. You will need to bid on jobs individually there as well but without the middle man who gets a cut of the pay per page, you should be able to create a steady client base with a better earnings target for yourself per order or per month.

For me, the deadlines will factor into the price of the essay more than anything else. The longer I have to work on the essay, the less I would be charging. I charged less during my time as a freelance writer for horizon deadlines because there as no stress factor involved in the research and writing process. If I had time to relax while doing the work, the more my client would get out of me. When it is a short turn around paper and I will be required to adjust my schedule and complete the paper with the client breathing down my neck, I definitely charge more. What students don't realize is that when they procrastinate, it affects the order value of the paper. Nobody will be willing to handle stressful deadlines in exchange for peanuts. Either may it worth my while or go find someone else to do the work for you. Even when I worked for a company, I had the same policy. You pay me to handle the stress for you. Nuff said.

I charge a 15 or 20% surcharge for anything under 48 hours. Other than that, every paper is priced based on its difficulty/time consumption.

@Smiley73, there is a problem with horizon charging. The client could change the deadline on you at any given time and ruin your horizon pricing. I have had experiences with clients who give me a long deadline to get a cheaper price, only to change the deadline on me the next day, still demanding the horizon price. I do not think horizon pricing is the right way to price a paper. Always assume the client will change the deadline on you and charge the most premium that you can to ensure that any sudden changes will be worth your effort and also, prevent you from having to haggle a new price with the student, who will most likely not budge on the horizon price that you gave.

Clients can't ever just "change" the deadline on the writer to one that is earlier than the deadline that was originally quoted by the writer any more than writers can ever just "change" the agreed-upon deadline on the client to delay delivery. If the deadline is already a very long one, writers might allow it, strictly it as a courtesy, because it may not matter to them. However, clients can't ever just demand an earlier deadline; they can ask for an earlier deadline and they should be fully prepared to issue additional payment for anything that deviates from the exact specs (including deadline) that was originally quoted by the writer and agreed to at the time of the original transaction. This is equally true for clients of essay companies. Suggesting otherwise is completely ridiculous and isn't doing writers or inexperienced clients who read your posts any favors, because it promotes ridiculous expectations that are contrary to both common sense and long-standing norms in this industry. As a matter of fact, it contradicts the norms of every industry in which deadlines or completion dates are issues, not to mention the most basic law (and rationale) of contracts.

No client would ever expect or be OK with a writer emailing to say "Hi. So, I know we agreed on a due date of the 10th, but it turns out that my I misread my schedule and won't be able to deliver this until the 15th. Hope you don't mind" Same goes for clients changing specs on writers after payment. Everybody sometimes makes mistakes; but if it's your mistake, you have no right to make that someone else's problem. The most you can do in that situation is communicate your changed deadline ASAP and understand that it will probably affect the price. Earlier deadline requests can usually be accommodated, but that's something that requires a negotiation and only the most basic understanding of what it means to to make an agreement with someone else about almost anything, even without getting into any technicalities of contract law.

There are several factors that should be considered when pricing an essay. The difficulty of the topic involved, the types of sources required, the number of pages, the number of words, the possibility for revisions, the need to create a plagiarism report, the travel time and expenses (should the essay require a visit to the museum, going to the movies, etc.) should all be part of the computation when sending a price quote. It should not be based on the page count or word count alone. These are the considerations that come into play along with the deadline chosen by the client. The sooner the deadline, the more premium the price.

To be perfectly honest, I might also factor in whether particular clients are likely to be easy or difficult to work with, based on their initial communications. For example, if it's obvious to me that someone hasn't even bothered to read my FAQs before asking me some of the specific questions that I very deliberately included in my FAQs so that I wouldn't have to type out answers to them for every new inquiry, that's often a fairly reliable indicator of how things are going to go with those clients, more generally, if I take their projects.