How to Raise Your Fees on Long-Standing Clients

The client you've had since 2016 is probably your worst-paying one. You know it. You've known it for two years. Every January you decide this is the year you fix it, and every January something more urgent lands on your desk.

Here's the part that stings: that client isn't underpaying because they negotiated hard. They're underpaying because you quoted them once, in a different economy, for a smaller scope, and then never looked at the number again. Meanwhile they added a payroll, two more entities, and a habit of calling you on Sundays.

So: timing, how much, what to say, and a letter you can copy.

Signs you've let a legacy client drift

• Their fee hasn't moved in three or more years while your salary costs have
• Their scope has grown but the invoice hasn't
• You feel a small dip in your stomach when their name appears in your inbox
• A new client with identical work would be quoted 40% higher
• You've quietly stopped tracking time on the account because you don't want to see the number

Two or more of those and you're not raising a fee. You're correcting one.

When to send it

Send it 60 to 90 days before the next engagement period starts.

For most US firms that means late summer or early fall, ahead of the next filing cycle. You get three useful things out of that window: the client has time to budget, you have time to have the conversation properly, and nobody is making a pricing decision while a deadline is on fire.

Two windows to avoid:

• Mid-engagement. Raising a fee while you're holding their unfinished return reads as leverage whether you mean it that way or not.
• The week after bad news. If you just told them they owe more than expected, wait.

How much

Start from what the work is worth now, not from a percentage of the old fee. Percentages anchor you to a number that was already wrong.

Pick one client and do the real math: hours logged over the last twelve months, your blended cost per hour, and what you would quote a stranger for the same scope tomorrow. The gap is usually wider than you'd guess.

Most firms can't close a 60% gap in one letter, though. A pattern that works:

The one move to avoid is the 5% increase. It costs you exactly the same awkward conversation as 20% and fixes nothing, so you'll be back next year having it again.

What to actually say

Three things, in this order.

• The number and the effective date. First paragraph. Not the fourth. Clients skim, and burying the fee makes it look like you're embarrassed by it.
• What they get. Not a defense. A description. "Quarterly review calls, unlimited email through the year, and the two entities we've absorbed since 2023" lands harder than any explanation of your cost base.
• An open door. Offer a call. Most won't take it. The ones who do were going to raise it anyway, and you'd rather hear it on the phone than read it in a resignation email.

Leave out: apologies, inflation lectures, anything about your own rising costs, and the phrase "we regret to inform you." Your costs aren't the client's problem. The value of the work is.

Fee increase letter template

Copy this and cut anything that doesn't sound like you.

Two variants worth keeping on hand: one for a phased increase, where you state both years' figures up front, and one for a fixed-fee-to-scoped-package move, where the fee change is really a repackaging.

When they push back

Around one in five will respond, and most of those are asking a question rather than making a threat.

"That's a big jump."

Agree with them. "It is. It's been the same fee since 2019 and the work has grown a lot since then." Getting defensive signals the number is soft.

"Can you keep my old rate?"

Only if the scope shrinks to match. Same work at the old price teaches every client on your list that your prices are opening bids.

"I need to shop around."

Fine. Tell them you'll help with the handover either way, then leave it alone. A decent share come back once they've priced the alternative and thought about re-explaining their whole situation to a stranger.

If some of them leave

Some will. That's the part most articles skip.

Do the arithmetic before you panic. Raise 20 clients by 25%, lose two of them, and you're still up on revenue with capacity freed that you can sell at your current rate. The clients who walk over a fair increase are usually attached to your least profitable work.

Losing nobody isn't the win it feels like. It usually means you didn't raise enough.

Frequently asked questions