Question about Day Rates w/ Travel Etc.

H

Hurley

Active member
Just getting some professional advice here.

I got a call about a gig that requires travel for about a week and a half. (There will also possibly be another week and a half shoot as well as editing this project.) Anyways, he wants to know my rates. While I offer both day and hourly rates on occasion, I don't know what to offer in this case. I'm afraid if I offer a day rate, what if I'm gone a week and a half but only shoot 4 days, do I charge the 4 days of shooting and thats it, or do I somehow get compensation for the travel time as well? (They're paying for all travel, etc.) Or should I guess suggest a flat charge of $______, to travel and shoot for the estimated week and a half, that way I know I'm coming out OK in the long run.

Thanks!
 
Any day myself and my equipment needs to be somewhere other than at my house drinking labatt's, there is a charge.

Saying that, for 1-3 weeks of work, I'd be willing to negotiate quite a bit.

If you only have to shoot for 3 out of 7 days, why be there for a week would be my question...

OR you can offer to get a rate for yourself for EVERY DAY you are there, and only charge for equipment on the day it is used.

Does that help?
 
That makes sense & helps. I agree, if I'm gone, I should be making money. I like the idea of a seperate rate for myself and my equipment. At this point, I don't know the exact amount of days I'll be filming, it could be all 10 days or it could be less. With a seperate rate, it should equal out to a fair charge for both myself and the client.
Thanks.
 
If you aren't back home making money, then you need to get something when on location.

I agree with the price of you and the price of the equipment. You can't just sit there for free when you can be making money at home. Not fair to you.
 
I agree, you charge for every day you are on the trip, as well as a rental on the gear for all those days. Travel days to and from the location are billed at half your day rate. You can negotiate from there, but that is pretty standard. Be sure to mention whether your day rate is 8 or 10 hours, and what your OT rate is. Also, it is standard to get a per diem for M&IE (meals and incidental expenses) of around $40- 75 a day.
Check here for acceptable per diem:
http://www.gsa.gov/Portal/gsa/ep/contentView.do?contentId=17943&contentType=GSA_BASIC

So basically you can say, "my day rate is $x a day for 10hours and $x for the gear. Time and half for OT, with standard $55 per diem. Travel days to and from the location are half the day rate."
 
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It's a good question and one we just ran into as well, on a 20-day corporate road trip. We filmed 16 days and drove 4 days, all day, because it was across 7 states and about 4,000 miles round trip. I charged essentially for the number of days of shooting for the equipment rentals, though I gave a ridiculously good rate because of the size of the project and the client. I think it amounted to basically $333 per day for two HVX200s, usually just using one but one as backup that was used several times, a porta-jib, three lighting kits, an indie-systems dolly, various grip equipment, reference monitor that was only used several times, boom mic and pole, etc., four P2 cards, several laptops capable of logging and capturing, several hard drives for backup of the footage, etc. There was basically no way they would get that much equipment for the price I offered but it was acceptable to me because the equipment was under my care and I was reasonably sure nothing would be broken. We had a few accidents and a few damaged equipment parts, but nothing at all serious. A light dropped, no breakage, the 0.75 wide angle converter dropped twice, ugg, but neither time was there any damage, very lucky. A few porta-jib parts are sorta dented a bit but that's heavy machinery and those parts are the small ones, easily replaceable.

As for my time if anything it should be billed at a higher rate when I'm on the road and indeed will be in the future. This time I just billed per day, regardless of whether it was shooting or travel, because we weren't staying in 5-star hotels taking a plane to and from locations. We were driving 350 miles one day (not bad), then 650, 498, and 592, so usually all-day hauls. I much preferred shooting than the driving and we saved them money doing it this way, instead of demanding we be flown or something, which would have ruined the budget. In the future if I have to leave L.A. for corporate work, i.e. not glamorous work but just jobs, I want more compensation for staying in hotels and eating bad food and having my workout schedule messed up, etc. It's only fair. Otherwise I'm find with letting those jobs fall to someone else unless I'm properly compensated because it's not worth it to me.
 
It's the normt o charge a half day rate for travel.
That said, I don't. As a one man band, my time is what is purchased and I don't want to charge 250 bucks for sitting on a plane when I could have charged 500 and made it home by 5. I want to stess that my billing method is not the norm here and if you charge full rate for travel, you should clear that before travelling.
When travelling, I prefer to do it on their dime but it's not a big deal to put the room on my card and add it to the invoice.... usually. Once stuck in Florida at the Ritz, it was a problem as that moola did not exist in my debit account. If he'd a run it that night, I'd a been sleepin in the rent a car. lol
Some have a hard time billing on the road as a full day of work may have meant 2 hours of shooting. Again, I don't confuse the issue here. If my trip pulls me from my family 5 daze, thats how manys get billed. There is no such thing as a half day on the road to me.
 
Make sure that their insurance is covering the travel of your equipment as well (even though i highly recommend that you always try to take your camera as a carry on)

A good friend of mine did not bring his cannon as a carry on while flying to san fran this past weekend. When he landed it was missing (out of its case, however they left everything else) and the whole production had to cancel one day (as he had to rent an HVX from someone in SF).

As weird as it seems, Delta nor any Airline, takes responsibility for missing or stolen items that you check in.
 
Wow that's really a load of crap. I hate airlines. They are really bloodsuckers, and they are terrible at business. I have no sympathy for any of them. Southwest is there making a killing and doing well in the business consistently while the rest of them are all too stupid to do anything but go bankrupt. Like dumb creatures in the distant evolutionary past they should all perish and make way for better companies.
 
JonathanLB said:
Wow that's really a load of crap. I hate airlines. They are really bloodsuckers, and they are terrible at business. I have no sympathy for any of them. Southwest is there making a killing and doing well in the business consistently while the rest of them are all too stupid to do anything but go bankrupt. Like dumb creatures in the distant evolutionary past they should all perish and make way for better companies.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I had lunch with a person from Southwest a few weeks ago. Since 2000 other airlines break even from domestic travel, their big money comes from the Japan to US flights.

I wish the government would begin to take over the airlines... we go through so much government interrogation at the airport they might as well be one in the same.
 
haha, basically true. I don't agree with big government or having the government run much, but the airlines are so pathetic and we're constantly bailing them out anyway, it's almost like they are a government organization. It's a disaster.
 
I like grinner's idea about full day rate for travel days..I will do that from now on and see it flies. (I am sending a proposal out today, I will add that) Also, if you need to drive your own car for travel gigs, be sure to charge for mileage (.50 to .75 a mile)
 
Travel day or Dark day = half day rate

Dark days are OK if you're in a big city where you can go out and have some fun while getting paid. But if you're stuck in Iowa where there's nothing to see except for corn, it's no fun for anyone. Unless you're really into corn.
 
Yeah in our case we obviously weren't going to charge a half-day for travel when we were, on average, stuck in a car for 10-12 hours on the travel days, driving ourselves, sorry but if that's what we're doing to save the client money on airfare and all of that, they're going to pay me not only a full day rate, whatever that may be (I don't even have a day rate), but they'll be paying extra on top of everything for my inconvenience. If you have a job in Arizona and you want professionals from Hollywood to do it, expect to pay a premium. Otherwise hire locals, see if I care. I'm not desperate enough to work for $250/day on stupid crap like corporate work that's far away and alters my lifestyle, eating habits, health, etc. It's just not worth it to me. I'm sure there are people who would like that type of work. I don't have any problem with it if I'm being paid fairly but to me fair pay has to be pretty high to justify that again. It was mentally and physically exhausting to be in 7 states in 20 days, filming during 16 of those days, traveling the other 4, with no off days at all. Next time I'm going to schedule off days into a trip like that, if there is a next time, and I don't expect to be paid for off days but they will have to pay for hotel arrangements on off days, etc. I'm even fine with 6 days on, 1 off, 6 on, 1 off, etc. I'm a hard working guy but 20 days on the road in a row, followed by the same company's training video for 2 days after that, so 22 days of work in a row in production and traveling was too much. You learn from mistakes like that, haha.
 
Oh boy, and now with the fact that airlines are losing money because of high fuel costs, they are charging for checking luggage! so lame...
 
I'm on a trip right now and just got through the PHX airport.
We had 4 extra bags - they charged $25 per bag plus an extra $50 for 6 pounds overweight for the camera. they also charged $2 per package for curbside bag checking and expected a tip. ugh

I've always heard half day for travel as well, but it depends on the client and your relationship with them.
 
what gets tricky sometimes is when travel days turn into shoot days. For this reason i try to charge my full rate as much as i can.

Now lets say i'm flying into boston (from philly) later at night for a shoot the next day, then i'll settle for a half day rate. But if i'm flying across the country and its taking up my whole day, then i try to get a full day rate.

Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesnt. I just dealt with a production company that had already set standards for travel days, scouting days and shoot days, which worked nicely.

But if you are gone for 7 days, and shooting for only 3 days, you should still be getting some kind of rate for the non-shooting days, even if you are just sitting in a hotel for an entire day killing time.
 
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