Should you offer free consultations? When to charge for a discovery call

The question isn't really free or paid. It's which calls are sales and which are work. This post is part of the scheduling hub; for the first call's agenda, see the discovery call questions, and for the payment setup, the guide to taking payment when clients book.

Free call, paid session or credited session?

What free calls cost you

Free calls feel free because nobody sends an invoice. They still use billable hours. Count the calls you took last month and multiply by the time each one took, including prep and the follow-up email. The meeting cost calculator turns that into a yearly figure at your rate.

The credited strategy session, with numbers

A credited session is a paid consultation whose fee comes off the project price if the client hires you within a set time. It keeps the incentive clean: a client who was going to hire you pays nothing extra, and one who only wanted free advice pays for the hour they used.

Two rules make it work. Put a deadline on the credit (30 or 60 days), so it doesn't hang over a project that starts a year later. And refund only on cancellations inside your window: Stripe does not return its processing fee when you refund a payment (Stripe Support), so every refunded $250 session costs you the $7.55 fee. Check the fee on your own price with the payment fee calculator; Stripe's standard US card rate is listed on its pricing page.

Booking page copy for each option

Intro call (15 minutes, free)

A short call to see if we're a good fit for your project. We'll go over what you need, your timeline and budget range, and I'll tell you how I'd approach it. If it's a fit, I'll send a written proposal within two business days.

This call isn't a strategy session; I'll save the detailed recommendations for the proposal.

Strategy session (90 minutes, $250)

We'll review your current [site / funnel / process], find the three changes with the most impact, and you'll leave with a written action plan you can use with or without me.

If you hire me for the project within 30 days, the $250 is credited to your first invoice.

Cancel or reschedule for free up to 48 hours before. Later cancellations keep the fee.

First coaching session (60 minutes, $150)

A full session, not a sales call: we'll set your goal for the next three months and agree on the first steps. If you continue with a package, the session counts as the first one in it.

You can reschedule for free up to 24 hours before.

How to charge at booking in SoloWOS

1. Connect your Stripe account in Settings > Client payments.
2. Create a meeting type for the paid session and set Charge to book to Full price or Deposit, with the amount and currency.
3. Set the refund window in hours to match your policy, and leave "Refund the client when I cancel" on.
4. Pick how long the slot is held while the client pays: 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours or 24 hours.
5. Keep a second, free meeting type for referrals and existing clients. Turn a type off to hide it from your booking page without deleting it.
6. When a client hires you, add a line with a negative price on the first invoice in Invoicing to apply the credit.

For a paid session you offer to one person after a free call, send a single-use link: it works for one booking only and can carry an expiration date, so it can't be passed around. The coaches page and the freelancers and consultants page show both setups. To share a booking page clients can schedule from, Solo is $15/month with 300 bookings a month; SoloWOS adds no fee on top of Stripe's.