A designer delivers a scheme, specifies everything and hands drawings to the client's builder. Six weeks later the client calls because the tiler has set out the floor differently, the electrician has put sockets where the drawings show a cabinet, and nobody on site has seen the lighting plan.
The designer assumed the builder was managing it. The client assumed the designer was.
The teardown: where the gap opens
Design and construction are different disciplines with different fees. Clients hire a designer, see them as the person in charge of how it turns out, and assume that extends to the site. Designers price for design and then get called about a tiler.
Failure one: the proposal does not say
One paragraph defining whether project management is included, excluded or available as an option resolves this entirely, and it is missing from most proposals.
Failure two: site visits are undefined
How many, at what stages, what happens at them and what they cost. Designers absorb these until the eleventh one, and clients assume they are unlimited.
Failure three: nobody coordinates the trades
Somebody must sequence the work, brief each trade on the scheme and resolve the conflicts between them. If the client is not paying for that, the client is doing it.
Failure four: queries have no route
A tiler with a question at eight in the morning asks whoever answers. Establishing who fields site queries, and within what hours, prevents decisions being made on site by whoever was standing there.
Failure five: variations are not priced
Changes on site cost money and somebody has to approve them. Without a process, a designer becomes the person authorising spend they have no authority over.
Failure six: the builder was appointed by the client
Which means the designer has no contractual relationship with the person doing the work, and no authority to direct them. Explaining that plainly, early, manages the expectation.
Failure seven: snagging is nobody's job
At the end, someone must list what is not right and chase it. Clients assume the designer does this and designers rarely price for it.
Failure eight: the timeline is treated as the designer's
Delays caused by trades, deliveries and the client's own decisions all affect the programme, which is the pressure described in timeline questions from clients who needed it yesterday.
What to publish
Whether project management is offered, what it includes, how it is priced, how many site visits are included in the design fee, who fields site queries and what happens with variations.
Offer it as a priced option
Many clients want it and do not know it exists as a service. Publishing it with a fee converts a resented expectation into paid work.
Say who you will not work alongside
Where a client appoints a contractor you have concerns about, being honest early is better than a project that goes wrong with your name on the scheme.
Procurement sits alongside all of this
It is covered in furniture sourcing and procurement questions clients ask.
Briefs and budgets come first
They are covered in interior design enquiries without a budget or brief, and knowing where an assistant must stop is covered in how financial advisors use chatbots to answer client questions.
Getting started
Publish whether you manage projects, what is included in the design fee and how site visits are charged, then capture project details at any hour. SpideyChat for interior designers answers from your published pages. Try SpideyChat on your own site, or read about capture on the features page.