How to write a fee proposal for design work

The sections, in order

1. Project and client. Site address, client names, a one-line description of the project.
2. Scope of services. What you will do, written as deliverables: “planning drawings for a single-storey rear extension”, not “design services”.
3. Exclusions. What you won’t do: engineering, surveys, council fees, certifier fees, interior selections, project management. Exclusions prevent more disputes than any other section.
4. Stages and fees. Each stage, its deliverables, its fee and its payment trigger.
5. Consultants. Each consultant, their scope, their fee, the stage it sits in and whether they supply the client directly or through you.
6. Assumptions. The information you are relying on: an existing survey, no heritage overlay, a standard soil class. If an assumption proves wrong, the fee may change.
7. Revisions and variations. Rounds included per stage, and how extra work is priced and approved.
8. Payment terms. Due dates, payment methods and what happens if a stage isn’t paid.
9. Validity and acceptance. How long the price holds, and how the client accepts.

Writing scope people understand

Homeowners read proposals literally. Name the drawings and reports they will receive, at what scale and in what format, and the meetings included. If a stage includes lodging a planning application, say so, and say that council fees are separate.

Use the same stage names in the proposal, the invoices and your emails. Consistency is what makes a staged schedule easy to follow.

Pricing the stages

Price each stage on the effort it takes, not as an even split of the total. Early stages carry more uncertainty, so many practices keep concept work smaller and front-load the measure-up so it is paid on acceptance.

Where a consultant’s fee is only an estimate, say so and give a range, or list it as “to be confirmed before Stage 2 starts”.

A worked example

Mistakes that cause fee disputes

• Scope written as activities (“design”) rather than deliverables.
• No exclusions section, so the client assumes the engineer is included.
• Unlimited revisions, by omission.
• Payment triggers that depend on a council decision.
• Consultant fees mentioned in an email but missing from the accepted document.
• No statement of how long the price is valid.

From proposal to payment

Once the client accepts, the stages and fees become your invoicing schedule; see staged invoicing. If consultants are on the job, the consultant section becomes your split.

DrafterShare is planned to build the proposal, take the client’s acceptance and turn it straight into stage invoices. It is pre-launch; the live demo shows a sample proposal. Architects will find more on multi-stage fees on the architects page.