My old employer recently asked me to freelance consult on some software I built for them...

My old employer recently asked me to freelance consult on some software I built for them. I'm unfortunately the only person with an intimate knowledge of the code base since I wrote it and they've churned through my replacements. How do I even go about deciding on an hourly rate to charge them?

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>How do I even go about deciding on an hourly rate to charge them?
you built it. how are you clueless on what to charge them? anyway, ask them what their offer on payment is and if what they say is silly then proceed to offer a rebuttal. negotiate you dingus, if the offer sucks then you don't have to take it

you should be getting paid seeing as they continue to benefit from something you did. that's just the way i see it.

How much money would you like, OP?

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What did you get paid before, if you work it to hourly? Add 15% to that

300-400%, more like. Not even exaggerating.

>old employer
Never work again for your old employer. Never.

Likewise never accept a counteroffer.

At least 200% of your current hourly pay.

>Never work again for your old employer.
y tho

>never accept a counteroffer
this is good advice

Amount of money it would cost them to build another system with the same functionalities - ~20% so that you’re in the clear

Any time you spend there is basically like overtime for your current job. If your time is worthless, just value for time and a half, if you have stuff in your life that's worthwhile, value it accordingly.
Or just work out a lump price for said modification/project.

Avoid if you can. Unless you are a NEET at the moment and really need the bucks.

Question was why, not what

because user is bitter and got jerked around most likely

anyway good luck on your decision OP

Some of y'all don't appreciate the difference between stable employment and consulting. You're not considering all the idle time, uncertainty, lack of benefits, etc.

If Jow Forums ran a hotel, you'd say "Well, as an apartment this would fetch $1000/month which is $32 per day, so let's add 15% and charge people $36 per night"

So how would you calculate it?

For the hotel (and for OP's issue), you can always check what others are charging for the same.

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Because you left for a reason.

Chances are that you left your old job for better conditions (money, maturity in development process, better management, etc). Coming back to a worst environment and having to argue about money with them will not be a pleasant experience. Consulting is not like being an employee. You might even have to tell them to gtfo again at the mid of the project. In that case you better not start.
On top of this, wasting your free time working on some old project is probably not going to motivate you much, specially if you already have a better job. You might get lazy and miss deadlines.

This user gets it.
OP you've won and can charge them out the ass. $500 a day or $50 an hour are reasonable starting points. If there's more on the line for the company then up from there. Do expect to put in the work if you're going to charge that much though.

This, only I charge $75/h

So if you live in a high CoL area and your current jobs FTE salary is inflated you'd charge $250/hr?!

Charge them more until they don't accept it anymore. Milk them as much as possible.

Yeah 50$/h is what I normally charge my clients. This is not high at all.

My salary when working for them when broken up hourly was around $75/hr. Should I just 3x that and call it a day?

>$75/hr.
>Should I just 3x that and call it a day?
Yes, this honestly is a good idea and works out to a nice round number