Cost of writing a program

[^^vampire^^]

Yeah I know 5-6 hours a day for probably what will be a week.


Well I`m not sure what the industry norm is...
I don`t have a day job,I`m a student.

Yoh thats a lot of money.

Yeah

I see a couple of red lights!!
1. Owner doesnt know if he`s making a profit or a loss = He might not be able to pay me

2. Owner told me to 'whip something up and go from there' :erm:, How am I supposed to know what he wants if he doesn`t know what he wants :erm:
He said he`l pay for the prototype model but again I doubt it

3.He says he wants me because I live nearby and they can just call me when something goes wrong
= I`l have to be free tech support(he`l probably throw an excuse to not pay me) :erm:

4. He claims to know people in high places who can get me a lot of work and stuff
also he seems to be leaning towards non monetary compensation(fame,cupcakes,spaza stock)
:erm:

5. He`s well versed in terms of Free POS/Stock systems & Excel spreadsheet stuff but he still wants a custom program,yet a free program can fulfill his requirements :wtf:

I`m 95% sure that accepting the job is a bad idea...

Don't worry... I'll be 100% sure for you You will get screwed, you will waste your time, you won't get paid.

Every developer gets one project like this; no defined scope, no contract, no agreements on tasks or deliverables, no clear direction - "just throw it together and we'll see from there.". You wind up delivering a ****ty product because it ultimately isn't actually what the clients wants/needs (or dreamt of in their mind and didn't know how to explain it) and therefore you get no pay.

You go to the client and tell him you charge x per hour. Tell him he will be paying the inital 8 hours for you to plan a spec. With a clear spec, screen mockups on paper etc - plan it thoroughly and show to the client; make sure you receive initial payment for this planning phase. Also make sure you have set deliverables in the plan and that at the end of each phase he pays you.

No doubt, however, that this potential client will look at just the planning cost, realise it won't cost 3 chappies and a powerade and tell you to "nevermind" or "he'll think about it and get back to" - which he won't.

You may now thank me...

 

[krycor]

And worse yet, we haven't even gotten to to the liability part.. i.e. if there is a bug that costs him RX per month.. who will he blame? Most likely you..

 

[nakedpeanut]

As much as I mirror the sentiment of many posters here. Doing this project would be good experience and provide a nice reference on the CV. If you have spare time you don't mind "donating" it could be good.

I'd definitely go with an open source piece of software that you can customise to meet his needs. That way a lot of the grunt work is done.