I just 'fired' one of my clients.  Well, I removed myself from their project.  There were a few problems with the project,  but my primary issue was that I was hired under an hourly contract, for a set number of hours per week, but they only ever sent me a couple of hours each week.

I tried to explain that I liked to schedule my clients into my diary and needed to plan both my workload and earnings for each week, so that I can both meet deadlines, and pay bills,  but the practice of just tossing me a few hours work here and there (that always had to be done 'as soon as you can, or we need to assign another writer') continued.

I found this highly frustrating, and not very professional.  I do have some long term clients who might drop me an email and ask for some copy or a press release, which is fair enough, (and most of them have me on retainer anyway)  but to have a client who I am supposed to be actively working for a few days per week and then repeatedly finding myself scrabbling for short term projects to pay for my down time is just not right for me.

 I wonder if I should have just toughed it out,  but I get so tired of timewasters that I am beginning to take a harder approach.

This is a very strange position to be in, and I wonder if anyone else has been in this situation? Have you ever 'fired' a client?

Angel