My client doesn’t give me access to his server: how common is this?

[supperman]

I made a 20 page project with over 200 images for this guy. Now he calls me sometimes to add a gallery or two to his page which is totaly fine with me.

Problem is that sudenly, he gives me no direct access to server. So everytime i have to do an upload i have to contact his buddy (who manages his hosting) to do this for me. So it takes me 10x longer to do this 5min upload (there are allways some bugs you have to fix).

It really bugs me and im even considering letting go this client because of this.

Is this common and its me beeing to nitpicking or should i let go this guy?

Please reply those who had some similar experience. Thanks.

Cheers!

[Johnnyb]

Hey,

I usually insist that clients either give me direct access via FTP, or that I host the site myself. My advice to you though would be to bill the client according to how much time it takes. If a 5 minute edit is now taking you an hour because of having to go back and forth between a 3rd party then I’d bill him for an hour. You could explain to him that if he chooses to host the site with you (if you offer that as part of your services) then the time it would take to make edits would greatly decrease, then that might persuade him to do so.

Cheers!

John

[TheDoc]

It’s his choice, really. Though I do have it in my contract that while I’m maintaining a website I have full access to the server and that I am the only person making changes.

But Johnny is right, just charge him for the extra time it takes you.

[kblake]

I too have it my contract that I must have full access to their hosting account. I’d also charge for the extra time.

I did have a potential client that wanted me to pass along the Web files (which if requested, I don’t have any problems doing so) and they’d take care of getting them on the server so I made it clear that any issues that occur on the server I would not be able to support since I would not have full access in order to troubleshoot.

[karlpcrowley]

Always get 50% upfront
Some good tips here http://www.topwebdesignschools.org/design-clients/

[supperman]

Couldn’t reply sooner. Your’e all great for replying and thanks for tips. The chart is great karlpcrowley. Marked as solved.

Cheers!

[Author]

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