Freelance Discount Calculator

Why a discount hurts more than it looks

A discount comes off the top of your price. Your costs stay exactly where they were. So the money that disappears comes out of the only part of the invoice you were going to keep, and the percentage you lose from your profit comes out bigger than the percentage you took off the price.

Take a project quoted at 4,000 with 600 of direct costs that takes you 40 hours. Before any discount you keep 3,400, which is 85 an hour. Give the client 15 percent off and the invoice becomes 3,400, but the 600 of costs has not moved, so you keep 2,800. That is 70 an hour. The price fell by 15 percent and your profit fell by almost 18 percent.

The gap widens as costs rise. On a job where half the price goes straight back out to a subcontractor, a 15 percent discount cuts your profit by 30 percent. Run your own numbers above before you agree to anything.

Work out how much more you would have to sell

The "extra work to earn the same" figure asks a harder question. If you discount every job at this level, how much more work do you have to win to end the year with the same money? At 15 percent off the example above, the answer is about 21 percent more projects. That is close to an extra month of selling and delivering for no additional income.

It is also the honest way to judge the argument that a discount buys future work. A cheaper client has to send you a lot more volume before the discount pays for itself, and most of them never do.

Answers that are better than yes or no

A flat no ends the conversation, and a flat yes teaches the client that your first price was padded. Most of the time you can keep the price and change something else, or keep the budget and change the scope.

• Cut the scope to fit the budget. The cleanest option. Take out a deliverable, a round of revisions, or a phase, and hold your hourly rate steady. The calculator shows how many hours you would need to remove.
• Trade the discount for terms. Full price with 50 percent up front, or payment within seven days instead of thirty. Money now is worth more than money later, so this can be a genuine concession without cutting your rate.
• Trade it for volume. A lower rate is defensible on a booked block of three projects or a monthly retainer, because you save the sales time. Price that properly with the retainer calculator.
• Trade it for something you need. A named case study, a testimonial with numbers in it, or an introduction to two similar companies. Ask for it in writing, in the same message where you agree the discount.
• Offer a smaller first piece. If the budget is genuinely fixed, a paid discovery session or a single deliverable at full rate beats the whole project at a cut rate.

When a discount is the right call

Sometimes it is. A quiet month with no pipeline, a client you want on your portfolio, a project that will teach you something you can charge for later, or a long-standing client going through a bad quarter. In those cases, discount on purpose and say so plainly: name the normal price on the invoice, show the reduction as its own line, and put an expiry date on it. A discount the client can see stays a one-off favour. One that disappears into a lower total becomes your new price the next time they call.

Whatever you decide, write the agreed figure into the paperwork the same day. The quote builder shows the discount as its own line, and the scope of work generator pins down what the reduced scope covers, so the work you removed does not creep back in later.

Frequently asked questions