I had a conversation with a new client recently. He was hiring his first VA and was asking questions about how we worked, trying to understand the process.
“I’ve got enough in my budget to do part-time, maybe 10 hours a week. Can we schedule someone for two hours a day to start?”
When I dug deeper about the type of work he wanted completed in the 2 hours per day, he was thinking of a VA as a traditional part-time employee who has a set schedule and is paid for their hours whether there is work or not. I explained that the great thing about VAs is that there are no pre-determined timetables. He never has to pay for someone to wait around for something to do; he only pays for the time his VA works on a task or project.
He went on with his questioning.
“What about adding an additional person to the project? I have a lot of work coming up and I don’t want to bog anyone down. Is there an extra charge for adding another VA to my team?”
My answer? “No.”
When you use our services, you only pay for actual “time-on-task.” Let me explain this a little more… Let’s say your project takes twenty hours to complete. It doesn’t matter whether that work is accomplished by one VA in twenty hours, or ten VA’s who work two hours each; you’re billed for twenty hours. Period.
If you haven’t used a virtual assistant before, it can be a new concept to get used to. The way we work with our clients is that they can purchase a set amount of hours and as the work is completed, the hours are deducted. You don’t pay for us to sit around and wait for emails to come in. And, there’s never an extra charge for having a second (or third, or fourth) person come on board. We keep track of the cumulative time it takes to complete projects or tasks.
To keep you in the loop with how much time we’ve spent on the work delegated, we update you weekly with your available hours, hours used and remaining hours. This allows you to allocate more work or change your priorities based on hours remaining. Our clients can also purchase additional hours if they have a larger project than normal. Often if all hours are not used, we will roll them into the next month so you’re never paying for hours not used.
Our minimum monthly retainer package is 10 hours and depending on how we are supporting you, that could be 15 mins per day to manage your diary or 2.5 hours one day and 2.5 another on a particular project. Working this way is beneficial for business owners because we can accommodate you no matter what your workload is. It’s natural for businesses to ebb and flow. Some months there is a lot going on, and at other times the workload decreases. Regardless of how much or how little work you have, the Bauhinia team is available (within our working hours) when you need them.
One email or phone call can kick start your support and when you’re ready, another one can turn it off. You can set parameters ahead of time or simply have us work until the project’s finished. It’s all up to you!
Once work is delegated, we will schedule it into our working week, advising when you can expect the tasks to be completed. If something is urgent, we will try to accommodate as much as we can and if unable, will contact you immediately. We believe open communication is one of the keys to a successful working relationship, another is flexibility of support. If in doubt, please do not hesitate to ask – we have an open door policy and no question is silly.
If you’re overwhelmed, struggling to get things done, or recognise you need some assistance, organise a call with me to discuss your business support needs.
