I hate quotes/estimates so damn much

Quote too high and we don't win the work
Quote too low and I screw myself/other devs over

And then there's the fact that most initial quotes for an entire project are based off nothing but a few marketing slides from the potential client; we do re-estimate after winning the work and nailing down what the client actually wants, but obviously it can't be too far from the initial quote

And then there are other people on the company (not devs, obviously) who like to casually expand the scope without checking how much time it'll add

sounds like you guys (and your clients) could use something like Scrum. Helps eleviate part of the pain on both sides.

@fuyukine scrum (and other forms of agile) don't work in an agency setting in my experience

The client wants a set list of features, we tell them how long it'll take (and the cost of the project is based off of that), and then we have to hit that deadline. There's no concept of MoSCoW or anything - every item on the backlog is a must-have

Even if the client doesn't mind if we run over, they're obviously not going to pay more money on top of what we've already agreed, which means that any extra time we spend on the project just cuts into the company's profits (and also delays other work that's lined up)

Comes with experience I suppose. I got to learn a fuck ton from just observing my senior's decision making.

Teaches you a lot about what sign to look for to go for a high ball. When to squash a spicy feature request just because it doesn't justify the price they're paying.

But again requirements for your work might not be that static or predictable.

Usually, you make a low initial bid and then get into the profit zone with change requests because then you have a vendor lock-in situation.

Even when the source code is delivered, it would take another company too much time (hence cost) to get up to speed with that.