--- title: “Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy description: A pointed critique of clients who use cancellation threats to extract free work from designers. Covers why 'small changes' are rarely small, why scope... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3 twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: “Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy | daily.dev og:description: A pointed critique of clients who use cancellation threats to extract free work from designers. Covers why 'small changes' are rarely small, why scope... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3 og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/beuUACrK3.png og:image:alt: “Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # “Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy **[Medium](https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A pointed critique of clients who use cancellation threats to extract free work from designers. Covers why 'small changes' are rarely small, why scope agreements exist and must be respected, why promises of future work don't substitute for current payment, and why mutual respect is essential for healthy client-designer relationships. Argues that charging for out-of-scope work is standard business practice, not rudeness. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"“Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3"},"datePublished":"2026-07-26T07:30:40.741Z","dateModified":"2026-07-26T07:31:13.884Z","description":"A pointed critique of clients who use cancellation threats to extract free work from designers. Covers why 'small changes' are rarely small, why scope...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/8773b7842ce57c6174e11fb694f2e962?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/8773b7842ce57c6174e11fb694f2e962?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Medium","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Medium","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/medium","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/do-this-for-free-or-i-ll-cancel-is-not-a-business-strategy-beuuacrk3","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"","timeRequired":"PT4M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Medium","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"“Do This for Free or I’ll Cancel” Is Not a Business Strategy"}]} ```