Of course, these measures cannot guarantee that you will be fairly treated but they show client that you have a professional attitude not just to your work, but to way you operate. If you still find yourself victim of a non-paying client what can you do? First, you can find out what system exists in country where client does business for collection of bad debts. In UK Small Claims Court hears claims for bad debts up to £5 000. It is possible to obtain assistance with such claims online through a website: http://www.small-claims.co.uk/ . France also has an equivalent of Small Claims system in huissier de justice (www.huissier-justice.fr). Often mere mention of huissier is enough to make French debtors pay up.

Spain is testing out similar legislation but you have to live in country to take advantage of it. 'Spain does now have a new small-claims system in place,' explains Valerie Collins, based in Barcelona; 'You can go straight to court and file a claim for non payment without having to hire a solicitor. You have to have issued a formal invoice, and have proof that you have rendered service invoiced for (in our case, proof of publication). If you're owed money by a Spanish company but are not resident in Spain, you would have to give power of attorney to someone domiciled here if you wanted to file for payment, as they won't send legal notifications outside Spain.'

The disadvantage of these systems is that claimant sometimes incurs costs, so even if money is eventually recovered, part of it will have been eaten away by charges. So, poor writer suffers yet again as, no doubt, fees payable are already liable to outrageously high charges made by banks when they transfer funds from one country to another.

Other routes are to join journalists' and writers' unions and associations. These, however, may provide little more than moral support unless claim is really big and they think it worth supporting a claimant for benefit of membership as a whole. As a last resort, I suppose freelance writers could co-operate by sharing names of clients who do not pay. It might be unwise to publish such a list openly in case publisher became liable to libel charges, but I imagine it would be possible to set up an email list through which writers could distribute names on basis of 'caution is advised before working with X'.

(4) "I'll do it tomorrow". Tomorrow never arrives. Give yourself a deadline. Imagine that your article must be finished within next 12 hours - you’ll be surprised how much you get done!

(5) "My article will be a flop". This is a big one - fear of failure. It's much safer to never try. But remember, with every article you write you are one step closer to developing your own unique style, your "voice". In that sense, you can never fail.

(6) "I can't get it right". Some times you simply can't find right words. Turn off your inner critic and just write. When you have something down on paper, you have something to work with. But you can't work with something that remains an idea in your head.

(7) "I can’t sort out my ideas". The easiest way to organize your article ideas is to use a technique that mirrors way mind works. This technique is called Mind Mapping. We are taught in school to use lists to organize our ideas. But lists are linear and mind doesn't think in a linear fashion. You can find out more about Mind Mapping at: http://www.mind-map.com/

Good luck with your articles! And remember - writing teaches writing.

(c) 2003 by Michael Southon