The Arsehole Clause

How many times have you heard of clients being absolute, total arseholes? For me it’s a daily thing.  

Client sending short, abrupt and accusing emails to their contractors?

Calling out of regular business hours?

Expecting a return call straight away forgetting that other people have LIVES, and other commitments other than THEM?

Clients taking forever to pay their bills?

Constantly negotiating rates and questioning every minute spent on a task.

I’m sick of it.

I’m guessing they have at some stage graduated from kindergarten (or pre-school depending on where they live) and they’ve been informed that there is a world outside of themselves.

I’m also guessing that they’ve hired people to support them because either they haven’t got the time, the inclination or the skills required to do the task. So they NEED them. 

The time is well overdue for contractors to kick these clients to the curb. I’ve decided, there should be an arsehole clause in any contract from this moment forth.

Ie. If you behave like an arsehole* this contract becomes null and void immediately. No notice needs to be provided by (contractor) before complete cease of service. In fact you may receive notification of this clause being applied via text message at 2am – who’s to say? All amounts owing still remain due (and will be followed up aggressively should you continue being an arsehole and avoid paying). No replacement contractor will be sourced nor will any handover be provided because I refuse to inflict YOU on anyone else. Feel free not to have a nice day.

*Definition of arsehole client:

• Passive aggressive behaviour
• General aggressive behaviour
• Repeatedly not responding to urgent calls for feedback or information which results in delays
• Arguing with your team or those around you constantly
• Changing your mind or project scope and believing this is an excuse not to pay for work done
• Asking for advice for free and then paying peanuts for someone else to implement
• Saying things like ‘no offence but…’ or ‘my old VA used to do it this (better/cheaper) way…’
• Behaving like a petulant baby

NOTE: I’m sure there are many more points we can add to the definition above. Tell me below what an arsehole client definition sounds like for you.

Most service providers I know have a ‘PITA rate’ which is a higher rate for ‘pain in the arse’ clients. It makes it more financially rewarding when dealing with twats. Really, it’s simply an ‘arsehole rate’. The thing that concerns me is that that is NORMAL these days. Most people use it. Because there are so many PITA clients out there who just don’t know how to conduct themselves as respectable humans. 

There used to be an expression which was thrown around with reckless abandon which said ‘the customer is always right’. Well we know how that turned out. The arsehole clients/customers decided to run with it and amp up their arsehole meters to take advantage of this idiotic concept.. So I’m here to change the expression from ‘the customer is always right’ to…

‘The customer is always at risk of triggering the arsehole clause.’

What do you think? Have you got clients who should suffer the arsehole clause?

Cheers!

Rosie

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P.S

If you want to learn more about outsourcing and not being an arsehole while you’re at it, then check out this new book, The Outsourcing Secret!