How to write a professional price quote

Adrian Simpson has been writing quotes for small web and IT jobs for more than 20 years. Published 2 August 2026, last touched up on 14 August 2026.

A good quote does two jobs. It tells the client what they're getting for the money, and it tells them what they aren't. The second one is what saves you three weeks of unpaid work later.

What goes in it

Scope is the whole game

Most quote disputes aren't about the price. They're about what the price covered. The client thought two rounds of changes were included. You thought one. Neither of you wrote it down.

Write the scope as things you will do, with numbers attached wherever a number exists. Rounds of revisions, number of pages, hours on site, how many designs, what happens to materials left over.

Say what's excluded

This feels awkward the first time and then you never skip it again. A short "not included" list stops the slow drift where a job quietly grows by ten small favours.

Copywriting, stock photography, ongoing hosting, training, content migration from the old site, work on pages beyond the five listed. None of that is you being difficult. It's you and the client agreeing on the same job.

Put an expiry on it

Thirty days is the normal window. It protects you from material and rate changes, and it gives a client sitting on the fence a reason to decide.

Write it as a date rather than a duration, same as with invoice due dates. "Valid until 1 September 2026" needs no interpretation.

Assumptions

One short section listing what you've assumed to be true. The client provides copy by a date. Access to the site during working hours. The existing system is the version they told you about.

If an assumption turns out wrong, you now have a shared document that says so, and the conversation about extra cost becomes a normal one instead of an argument.

Price it as lines, not a lump

A single number invites one response: is that the best you can do. Broken into lines, a client who needs to trim can take something out instead of asking you to shave the total.

It also makes optional extras easy to show. List them separately with their own prices and let the client add them. Plenty of jobs get bigger this way, not smaller.

Give them options, not one number

A single price is a yes or no question, and no is always the easier answer. Three options change what the client is deciding. Instead of whether to hire you, they're choosing which version they want.

Keep the differences real rather than cosmetic. A middle option that's the same job with a nicer name fools nobody.

Most people pick the middle one, which is why the middle one should be the job you actually want. The top option isn't there to be sold, though it sells more often than you'd expect. It's there to make the middle look sensible, and to catch the client whose budget was never the problem.

The bottom option matters too, as long as it's genuinely stripped back. It gives a price-sensitive client somewhere to go that isn't away, and it makes clear that a lower number buys less rather than the same thing cheaper.

When they say it's too expensive

Sometimes that means the budget is smaller than the job. Often it means the value isn't obvious yet, and occasionally it's just the thing people say when a number lands.

The reflex is to knock something off. Don't. A discount offered the moment somebody pushes tells them the first number was invented, and every price you quote from then on gets the same treatment.

Ask what they had in mind instead. If they say $3,000 against your $4,500, that's a real conversation about scope. Take out a page, drop a revision round, have them supply the copy, and quote the smaller job properly. The price came down because the work did.

If there's no version of the job that fits their budget, saying so plainly is fine. "I can't do this well for $1,500, and I'd rather tell you that than take it on and disappoint you" ends things in a way that gets you called back next year.

Getting the yes in writing

A verbal yes on a call is not an accepted quote, and the gap between the two is where jobs go wrong. Six weeks later, nobody remembers whether training was included.

You don't need a signature for most work. An email saying "approved, please go ahead" that quotes the number and the quote reference does the job, and it's easy to ask for: reply to the quote and ask them to confirm in writing so you can book the time in. That's a scheduling request, not a legal one, and it gets answered.

Keep that confirmation with the quote. If a question comes up later, you have one document that both of you agreed to, and the conversation stays about the work.

Following up

Send it, then check in once after about a week if you've heard nothing. Keep it short and give them something easy to reply to. A question works better than a nudge, because "did you want the training day included or left out?" is easier to answer than "just checking in".

Silence after two follow-ups usually means the answer is no, or it means the budget went elsewhere. Either way, the expiry date closes it off without either of you having to say so.

Build one

The price quote calculator works out the total from your base rate, quantity, add-ons, discount, and tax. When the client accepts, the invoice generator takes it from there. If you're unsure whether this should be a quote at all, see quote vs estimate vs invoice.

General guidance only, not legal or accounting advice. What's enforceable in a quote varies by country, so check local rules before you rely on any of this.