Hello, Many factors are to be taken into account to establish a base line.
As you say, experience is one. It determines the experience you will provide your client with: your ability to solve their problems, to meet their requirements, to react to constraints, be technical or not, to innovate, etc... Let's say that one developper, say A, charges 100USD/hour, but accomplishes in an hour what requires 3 hours for developper B. Add to that that solutions developped by A are truly innovative - thus providing its clients with the ability to communicate about their high tech profile - and always offer a smooth ride, compared to B solutions that turn to be always about right. Let's say that B charges 35 USD an hour. What's going to happen ? At first, clients not knowing A and B, being sollicited by B will go for B, I guess. But as soon as they know about A, they may reconsider their choice. Don't you think so ? So I thing it all narrows down to finding if your ratio Client-Experience-Satisfaction/cost (cost being f(rate)) is right. Some Open Source programmer, aboard the Bayonne project, one proposed to charge my company USD100 an hour. But this programmer had a high tech profile that allowed him to quicky meet my requirements. So it was just fine for us. My company also charges about USD100 an hour, for high tech services. Fellows doing the job all have Ph.D., deep field involvement and understanding, and have been providing innovative developpement for more than 10 years. Hope this will help you set up your baseline. Franck -------------------- Franck PORCHER, Ph.D. Essential Software [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.esoft.pf/ Tél: (689) 56 23 95
