I want to be clear about something. Getting paid when the job’s finished isn’t a privilege I should feel honoured about. It’s the trade. That’s it.

I’ve had customers tell me, I’ll pay when I get home, after I’ve had a look. No. You didn’t ask me to come inspect and report back. You contacted me. You had me in your house, working, unsupervised in a lot of cases. And now, after all that, you don’t trust me enough to check the work before I’m even out the door?

You had me in your house. That already means you trusted me. So telling me you need to “have a look” first is a strange kind of double standard. It’s a power trip, whether people realise it or not.

So no. You’ll pay when I’ve called it in over the phone with a card, or I’ll send a payment link if that’s easier. If neither of those work for you, I don’t do the job. Simple as that.

People get it pretty quickly, once you’re clear.

And I’ll say this — I know I’m resting on reputation to be able to hold that line. I haven’t just sat back and demanded this stuff from nowhere. I’ve done the cuts, done the yards, got the scars to prove it. I think I’ve built enough of a reputation that you can trust me. And honestly, if you didn’t trust that, you shouldn’t have called me in the first place.

I don’t say any of this directly to customers. But it’s the attitude underneath how I run things. You saw what you were getting. You knew what you were getting. Don’t flip that on me after the fact.

Getting paid for finished work isn’t a favour, and it isn’t a privilege. It’s a prerequisite. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.