This is a difficult thing, it's like being a doctor, you shouldn't be emotionally involved with the patient/client as then you are more likely to allow things to happen that you may otherwise disagree with.

Payment/amount of work you do for family/friend may not be appreciated.  You might be inclined to do more than normal…..will it be appreciated?

Also criticism from friends/family regarding work/design might be problematic.

--Waleed

That's a rather tricky aspect of many jobs. When you are a professional in a given field (medicine, law, architecture, etc.) it is always going to be difficult to provide competent advice to people with whom you have a close personal relationship.

Firstly you need to deal with the issue of payment. I do not necessarily mean whether you get paid by your friends or relatives (in theory you should, but in practice every situation is different), but taking on any extra project will eat into your working day, which in turn will reduce the amount of time you have available for paid work. In other words, if you don’t get paid for this extra project you may end up losing money on other potential work.

This aspect is much less important if you are just starting out your own business. In fact some people consider almost natural working for little or even for free at the beginning and yes, there is such a thing as “friends and family” discount although there are differing views as to its benefits.

There is also the risk of potentially damaging your personal relationship with the other party. When you have a professional relationship with somebody you are inevitably  going to disagree with them sooner or later, that is just the nature of the beast. But it is one thing to disagree with your client or boss during work hours and then move on with your life. It is quite another to disagree with your close friend or sister (say) knowing there may be some lingering resentment caused by a differing approach on the project.

Another thing to keep in mind is, if you need to deal with a major issue with the project, being close to the person to whom you are providing your services may affect your ability to give impartial advice.

The irony is that many people think they can handle it. But there is a case to be made as to why in several  TV dramas (for example the ones about law firms or hospitals) you often get the obligatory episodes where some of the main characters have a hard time providing an objective assessment of the case because this time their case has something to do with their family. I know, that’s fiction. And yet, there is a fundamental truth to it.

Posted by: @ascott

This aspect is much less important if you are just starting out your own business. In fact some people consider almost natural working for little or even for free at the beginning and yes, there is such a thing as “friends and family” discount although there are differing views as to its benefits.

Hi AScott,

Thank you for the points that you have made, and I have been deliberating on them myself.  The issue comes up of the payment and this is where I have to disagree with you as this is where everything goes wrong in architecture. Just because you are starting out doesn't mean that you should work for less than, no other profession would work for less than the rate of pay, why else would anyone work?  I don't want to be giving any advice for free as it's not how I mean to go on in my profession. I have trained hard and long to do something that I love and to be reduced to giving my knowledge away for pittance is just saying that all my training in the field is worthless.

Naz

Hi, I don't think it's such a huge problem to work for people you know. I did some work for my brother-in-law, he part owns a restaurant. I did consulting for almost nothing but I can go eat there for free whenever I want 😀 

Hello @nazart

If I gave the impression I was diminishing the many hours of study or hard work that you or any other professional have put in, that was not my intent. In fact, I stressed there is such a thing as “friends and family” discount although there are differing views as to its benefits.

That is also why I said that working for people with whom you have a personal relationship was always going to be tricky and you did the right thing in asking the initial question.

Going about that question comes down to several different things, such as where you are in your career (are you starting out or have you already got a track record), what your starting capital is (if starting out) or how big your list of clients is (if established already), what perception you want people such as family and friends to have of you in your professional capacity. Each of these aspects is going to weigh on the decisions you make as to whether you are going to take on this extra work or not.

In your specific case, it may help if you had some more information on:

1. What kind of work is this friend’s friend having done on her property, exactly?
2. Do you know who is responsible for this work? For example, is there a Principal Designer appointed?
3. What exactly has she asked your opinion about?
4. Did you get a sense that she was not happy with how the work was proceeding?

@seabea

I am aware that there are different schools of thought about working for friends and family. Like I said, if one is starting out, for example, it can be a great way to boost your initial work. Other people simply don’t mind. It comes down to personal preference.

When I consider things from an ethical point of view though, I cannot help but treating these matters carefully. A few examples:

This article mentions why doctors should not treat their own family members.

https://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/01/09/why-doctors-shouldnt-treat-family-members/

It is quite insightful because it also provides data from a survey where most doctors were asked to give medical advice to family members, although ethically speaking this is wrong, according to the article.

Likewise, an excerpt from one of therules from the American Bar Association, called “Client-Lawyer Sexual Relationship” (the title is a bit extreme but the same concept applies to people who are close family members) states:

“In addition, such a relationship presents a significant danger that, because of the lawyer's emotional involvement, the lawyer will be unable to represent the client without impairment of the exercise of independent professional judgment.”

In other words, these sources point to the risk that mixing business and family may cloud one’s judgement and affect one’s ability to make impartial choices.

I want to put the stress on the word “may” because this is clearly not always the case. It may vary from profession to profession and from person to person. In your case it seems like it has worked well (although I do wonder, will you always be able to eat for free at your brother-in-laws restaurant?).

Sally McGraw, a US-based writer and blogger discusses the conundrum of Friends & Family discount here

https://www.godaddy.com/garage/the-friends-and-family-discount-conundrum/

She says that when she started, she did so with friends and family. But she also says that “Offering a consistent discount to a subset of people can subtly devalue your services or goods.”, much like what @nazart mentioned earlier.

So, again, the decision whether to get involved in providing services to relatives and friends is a personal decision. But it should be made by being fully aware of the potential ramifications, in my view.

Hi @ascott,

I am newly qualified and only have a few small projects under my belt, but have had very good responses from my clients. I am dubious about taking on this work as from what I gathered from the conversation and the walk-around was that the client was worried about certain aspects of the build and even the design that she thought would be different. I was asked about layout and what I could see was very simple removal of internal walls and an extension that was currently on the foundation stage.

I had done some research after the visit and there was a planning application (permitted development) for an extension and the drawings were done by a small building company. I assumed from this that she had not consulted an architect and was reliant on the building company for everything.

From the original drawing it's an extension like so many out there with permitted development. At the moment there is little work done and it seems that the actual building works seems to be going ok, building control have approved foundations and walls will be started soon.

I have since been asked to have a look at the design and how it can be improved prior to anymore work being done. I have given two options:
1. I have quoted for an hour face to face for ideas that she can relay to the builder
2. I will only be responsible for quick drawings within the approved permitted development requirement, not detailed drawings. It's a few hours of work and I have quoted the client (with discount) but I will not be liasing with the builders.

This keeps my presence minimal as the work is ongoing and she doesn't need to alienate the builder with complications.

@nazart has the client accepted either proposal?

@jwhite nothing as yet, but I'm not holding my breath.  I think that it is better left alone, it's always difficult when you have to pick up someone else's work... 

Naz

Stumbled onto this thread while looking for something else. I don't believe it's a big deal. My friends ask me for advice all the time. Can you imagine how awkward it would be if I said to them to please go hire a professional!

I mean, if I have work experience that can be applied outside of my office, my natural instict is to help out. A bit of a personal related story but when one of my friends told me he was considering doing an extension I gave him some planning advice which turned out to be beneficial (in the end he decided against it, but that’s a different story 🤣).

So moral of the story is, providing people I know with some advice is fine for me.

Ok, that brought back some memories, it seems like so long ago.  @foundational I think giving simple advice like planning is not something that they couldn’t go to the planning portal and find out themselves, but in general I think you have to be very careful about the type of advice you give and in what capacity you are giving it.  I think that @ascott might strongly disagree on this matter....

@nazart

Thank you for the mention.

Interesting how you are reading all this old material. This is a definite blast from the past.

To clarify: essentially I’m not against providing advice to friends, family, acquaintances, etc.

My earlier posts were intended to make sure one thinks about the potential ramifications. Of course everyone is free to act however they see fit. Just ensure you understand the risks.

In the Court Cases section there is a case about an architect working for some friends, for free. I have not yet had the time available to read it fully, but it strikes me as something that may be relevant here.

I understand your concern, but I believe that as long as you're making cllear that you are not providing professional services and that you are just offering an opinion, there is very little risk involved.

@foundational I disagree. Everything you say will seem harmless when you give advice to friends and family, it can actually be risky because you do not have that mental distance of architectect/client. If something goes wrong, you could be held responsible, and it could damage your professional reputation and more importantly your personal one.

It's not always as simple as “yeah you can do this no problem”, even if you were only offering an opinion, it could still be seen as professional advice, because you are after all, an architect.