The Project I Rebuilt From Scratch Twice

I built it twice before I billed for it once.

The first version got rejected because they changed direction mid-project. The second version got rejected because a new stakeholder came in and had different opinions. The third version shipped. The client was happy. I was exhausted and quietly furious.

I had no tracking on any of it. So when I sent the invoice, I charged for what I'd originally quoted. Because I had no proof of what it actually took.

How It Started

The project was a full brand messaging package. Copy for a website, positioning doc, taglines, the whole thing. We agreed on a flat rate upfront. I thought I knew the scope. I had done similar work before.

What I didn't account for was how they made decisions.

They didn't make decisions. They asked everyone's opinion and then made a different decision. By the time the work was done, I had three separate complete drafts, dozens of revision rounds, and more strategy calls than I'd had on projects twice this size.

Where It Went Wrong

I didn't start tracking time until the third draft. By then I had about six weeks of work I couldn't account for. I tried to reconstruct it but I'd been doing too many things at once. The hours had blurred together.

The only thing I knew for certain was that this project had eaten my quarter.

When I finally did add up what I could account for in those last few weeks, my effective hourly rate was somewhere around $18. For a project that should have paid me well.

What Tracking Would Have Changed

If I had been running a timer from day one, I would have seen the bleed happening in real time.

After the first rebuild I would have had data. I could have gone back to the client and said: we are now at 2.3x the originally estimated hours. Here is what that looks like. Here is how we proceed.

Instead I had nothing. Just a feeling that this was taking too long, and no way to prove it to myself let alone to them.

Automatic screenshots would have helped too. Not to spy on myself but to confirm that the hours logged were real and billable. When you're doing revision work on a complex project, it can feel unstructured. Screenshots make it concrete. You can look back and see that yes, you were actually working on this at 9pm on a Tuesday.

The Conversation I Couldn't Have

At one point I tried to bring up the scope creep. I said something vague about the project running longer than expected. The client was confused. They felt like we'd been in the normal revision process.

I didn't have numbers to push back with. So the conversation died.

That's the other thing tracking does. It gives you a language. When you can say "this is now at 47 hours against a 20-hour estimate," you are having a different conversation than when you say "this feels like a lot."

Feelings lose that argument every time.

After

I rewrote my contracts after this project. Added a clause about rebuilds constituting a new scope. Added explicit revision round limits. Added language about what happens when stakeholders change mid-project.

But more than the contract changes, I started running a timer on every project from the first hour. Not at the end of the week when I tried to remember what happened. From the first hour. Every day.

I also started sending informal mid-project time summaries to clients on longer engagements. Not as warnings. Just as updates. "Here's where we are against the estimate." It keeps everyone honest and it keeps the surprises small.

The Number That Stays With Me

I rebuilt that project twice. The extra work was probably 60 hours. At my real rate, that's money I just gave away. Not because I was generous. Because I wasn't paying attention.

Track everything from the start. The timer is not just for billing. It's for your own protection.

Track your time, bill every minute.

Time-Trak is a native Mac and Windows time tracker with a floating timer, automatic screenshots, and one-click invoicing.

Free during beta.

macOS + Windows · Floating widget · Auto screenshots