How do interior designers charge?

I prefer to keep things simple and have an agreed fee for my services before we start working together with a 10% deposit, so you can be confident in the price you’ll be paying from the start. The only time this might change is if the scope of the project increases beyond the reasonable limits of the original fees. 

There are other common ways for interior designers to charge: many will charge by the hour with a retainer fee, this works similar to a pay as you go contract, which can be a great way of keeping a tight rein on the cost of the design but may be slightly more expensive over all as you’ve no guarantee on how long a design will take, with multiple revisions becoming costly. 

If the design is offered free of charge then the most common way will be for the designer to be adding a percentage to every item you buy through them (In effect a commission based structure), this can be great if you get put off by upfront costs, but can create a conflict where the designer is incentivised to recommend the most expensive things over alternatives.