Hi, I'm looking to do some freelance project managing, overseeing the construction of a website for a fellow DigitalPoint member. How would I need to protect myself legally, especially in terms of making sure im not liable for any of the work carried out by the designers etc that I choose to design the website. Also, how would I make sure my client couldn't come back to me months later asking for money back because the website hadn't been as succesful as first hoped, etc Any information would be extremely useful. Regards, Will.
Will: This is similar to the topic from a few days ago: http:// forums . digitalpoint . com/showthread.php?t=1002986 (they won't let me post a "live link" so please forgive the spaces). The additional part of your question was about the "successful as first hoped" - and as I and others have stated in other answers, you simply need a good contract with a solid "statement of work" to describe the type of work you're doing and what you're really promising. If you need help finding someone to draft such an agreement for you, please let me know. ~Jeff
Thanks Jeff, very useful. It's obviously going to be very hard to find a designer on here with this type of insurance (for I will be looking to use designers from this forum). To get around this problem I could ensure that only stock photos, scripts, videos etc are used and have the designer e-mail me the links to where these have been found in order to validate that they are not infringing copyright. Would that work? About the SOW, if I were to end up project managing this project, it would be very small with limited earnings for myself. Therefore I wouldn't have much to spend on a lawyer to draft me a statement of work, any chance of a link to a place that sells a generic SOW? I've heard of and seen 'document shops' where you can buy a generic legal agreement for $20 and use it for your own use. Obviously I'd have a lawyer read over that aswell... Thanks EDIT: Better add that I'm from the UK
You're welcome. Yes, you're correct. It would be quite hard to find freelancers with that type of insurance (though, it's easier to get than one may think... personally, I called State Farm and was able to get $1M policy for what I do at a very reasonable rate - but it still doesn't cover "willful" violation of law). To get around the liability issue, sure, you could do all sorts of things. Provide them stock images, content, etc, that YOU obtained through a valid source. But this takes away some of the value of using a freelancer to do a lot of the legwork. I would think that your biggest concern is simply the wholesale copying of HTML source (if they're designing websites, for example). The code copying would be harder to prevent. As for the contracts. Well, this is, I understand, a catch-22. What you really need are two templates. You need a contract template and a SOW template (sometimes you find them combined into one document). But you need it customized for you as a template to address the specific risks you might find in your particular type of work. Without an interview, no one would know exactly how to customize something for you to make sure that something doesn't slip through the cracks. But yes, there are sites out there like nolo that sell templates. And you could take a risk and use one of them. But the cost of an attorney to review/customize the template could cost you more than having them create you a template from scratch (we never really re-invent the wheel, you understand). The funny thing about contracts is that they're not covered by copyright (they might be protected by confidentiality, though). Which means that lawyers "borrow" sections from other agreements to create you a "custom" template. In many cases, and speaking from personal experience, we already have templates that simply need minor tweaks. So if you ask me to create you a template, I know VERY QUICKLY where I need to make adjustments because I'm so familiar with my base template. Thus, it's cheaper for you. BUT, if I'm selling you a template I know you're going to use it over and over again. So like any tangible item that's reusable, I sell it at a premium because you won't have to come back to me for help in the future. Or some lawyers will help you through each transaction but only provide you PDFs of the documents so that you have to return again and again. In other words, the money flows from you to the lawyer in one way or another. Anyways, sorry for being so long winded and giving you more details than you may have wanted. Good luck in whatever you choose! ~Jeff