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Why you should never use Upwork
- dvcrn 10y agoDamn, that's rough. Hard to believe customer support is this ignorant, but if it really directly comes from the CEO, I doubt they can do anything. I hope this gets some traction through HN to bring it to the attention of the right people. I am currently looking for a Freelancing platform and also looked at upwork. Thanks for that, will avoid them!
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoI mean, it's being handled by 3 different customer support staff, so I don't know what that actually entails. My advice, get a blog. Write about your experience within industry. My best example would be a man called Simo Ahava, whom writes about GTM and GA. Join Slack groups and communities and just network. I highly doubt he knows the CEO and even if he did, would said CEO actually act on such an inconsequential thing. I mean, imagine the PR meltdown from such an act. Anyway, time for some tea and a chillout. Have a good Sunday :)
- RonanTheGrey 10y agoOK so I have spent the last month trying to make it on Upwork after seeing some of the "$1000 a month income on my side project!" posts here on HN and decided to start doing some side projects while building a rep on Upwork to try to get some outside clients. I have had absolutely no success with Upwork at all and had been reaching the point of walking away from it and what should I see but this post. I want, actually desperately need, to be working outside my day job. I'm out of my element. I realized I had to start a blog and have done so and am writing a series of articles relevant to my knowledge and experience. Aside from that, how might you recommend I make contacts to have long term work with good clients? Your comment is the first I've ever seen about "join Slack groups" - where would I go to get started doing that? A million thanks if you bother to read this, a million more if you reply :)
- milankragujevic 10y agoAbsolutely disgusting behavior by Kevin. I'm kinda hoping that it's just incompetence at UpWork that caused this, and not that Kevin actually knows someone at UpWork, but in all cases that's why I stopped freelancing through UpWork and similar, and started building a solid client base which know that I'm always there to help, for the right price of course. Plus I write somewhat technical and topical blog posts about the technologies I work with (mainly video encoding, processing, P2P CDNs, etc.) and that seems to pull clients in easier than it would be using UpWork.
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoBuilding a solid client based has to be the way forward. I was very hesitant to actually make this post, as I don't know how it'll reflect to future employers of any kind. I think your way of doing things is far better and something I've actually been working. Appreciate the comment buddy, have a good Sunday
- shabda 10y agoAbsolutely disgusting behavior by Kevin. But thats par for the course - some people are pathetic. More interesting, is the behaviour of Upwork. With such a clear trail of abusive behaviour from the said "Client", Upwork still decides to terminate the guy's account. If you use Upwork, you are a sharecropper. And the landlords are capricious and have no loyalty to the replaceable tenants.
- erklik 10y agoSorry to hear about this Shadi. Kevin is one hell of a asshole. I try to refrain from using profanity but this man utterly deserved it. Will do my best to let every other freelancer know of this and recommend them to stay away as they can from Upwork.
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoI also tried to refrain, but, as Medium seems to be the only effective medium for myself to vent my frustration, I had to let a couple pop. Yes, it really is one of those things which you say to yourself 'Oh, it'll never happen to me', then actually it does. I'm the 3rd person I personally know of that's had this happen to them. So I think it's more prolific than it seems. Hope you're having a good Sunday Erklik
- dageshi 10y agoUseful to know, will steer clear of Upwork in future, thank you.
- dewyatt 10y agoConvinced me, just closed my upwork account.
- deckar01 10y agoTo make it easier for others: > Click Accounts menu, choose Settings, then Contact Info You may have to add a missing security question before it shows the form with the "delete my account" link.
- jeffmould 10y agoLooking at some of their responses to reviews on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/wiperecord/reviews/ https://www.facebook.com/wiperecord/reviews/) it would appear the attitude is part of their company culture. Amazing, for a company that bills itself as trying to help people overcome their past, it appears they are simply in the business of taking advantage of a vulnerable group.
- HillRat 10y agoAlso, if Kevin is an attorney, he's remarkably free with what is arguably libelous speech to third parties.
- jeffmould 10y agoTrue. I was curious and did look at their site and didn't see a Kevin in the attorney list. Not to say he isn't one, just he wasn't listed on the site. I would have ventured to bet he was a rogue IT employee, but with some of the responses to complaints on Facebook, it does somewhat appear that if you question them they get defensive and argumentative. I run a site that helps ex-offenders find jobs, resources, etc.. and it is always frustrating to see companies that take advantage of a vulnerable group. Not to dismiss the OP and the evidence against them is pretty overwhelming, but there are always two-sides to every story. I have removed the link and references to them and their parent firm as a resource from our site. While we aren't a huge player in the industry, we are growing fast simply because we provide personal help if we can and try to treat everyone fair. I refuse to risk that reputation on a potential bad apple. It's easier just to remove them now, and if down the road this comes out as a simple misunderstanding or whatever, I am happy to add them back. But for now, to me at least, it is better to be safe than sorry and not risk my users paying some greedy company to be treated poorly.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jeffmould 10y ago
- desireco42 10y agoI am really sorry you are wasting your talent on marketplace like this. Wish I could help you get better work. Behavior like this, from this dude Kevin, well that is normal on marketplaces like this. If you are experienced, you should always steer clear when you see people talk random stuff.
- joelennon 10y agoJust so you know, you inadvertently included Kevin's email address in one of the screenshots. You blurred it out from the "from" section, but it's also showing in a "flagged as spam" yellow box. I'm sure this wasn't your intention.
- pronik 10y agoHis surname is also visible in one of the screencaps.
- pearjuice 10y agoA freelance marketplace is very much against the idea of freelancing. You are basically working for the marketplace with little freedom to design the actual work processes your way. Everything is geared towards getting positive reviews and thus getting more work through the marketplace. A vicious, underpaid circle. Sure it works great for building contacts when you are not really visible yet. After you land a few gigs and have work, references and talent to show for, you should really abandon it asap. Better even, not start with it because the gamified nature will lure you in to do more gigs.
- Hoasi 10y ago> A freelance marketplace is very much against the idea of freelancing. Exactly. The point of freelancing is working for yourself, not as a vassal of a third party. That is why etymology is important, even when the initial meaning of a word has changed. A "freelance platform" or "marketplace" only makes sense for you as a freelancer if you own it (i.e. your self hosted site, portfolio or blog, etc.)
- mrsheen 10y agoI had similar feelings about Upwork. I am closing my account very soon as well.
- infodroid 10y agoWhat I learned from this is not to ignore the warning signs of a psychopath client. Because you can easily get sucked in to a bad situation regardless of your good intentions, and you can't rely on the marketplace to resolve these disputes in your favor. This scenario can also play out on other freelancing sites, and it can also happen if you solicit clients directly and they turn out to be well-connected.
- novaleaf 10y agoyes, and always stay courteous even when they are total asses
- ftrflyr 10y agoI have to disagree. This is not how the business world works. If a client is being an ass, you have the right to fire them. Upwork doesn't afford you this opportunity unless you want to see your JSS drop by dozens of points.
- novaleaf 10y agoyes fire them! just act like it's your fault, not theirs
- asoskm 10y agoTotally agree with the article, and I am more than certain that such acts and extortionate behaviour are widespread on the platform. It seems it is part of their business model to allow clients in developed countries to find people in developing countries (all with weak legal systems and corruption) to commit illegal acts (both violations of public and private law). Just look at how many jobs involve rewriting, scraping, penetration testing (really a guise for hacking others sites) modifying existing copyrighted content to circumvent laws. Upwork as middleman profits -- and takes a blind eye to all this corruption - since cross border police investigations are so difficult to manage when dealing with corrupt countries. In my case, I had my competitors procuring hackers off Upwork to take down my site. We found out because one person who was contacted on Upwork to bring my site down actually contacted me via my site and provided screenshots and other evidence. There was literally a job posted requesting contractors to take my site down. We raised this with Upwork. They did nothing. Guess what they said? Their customer support asked if I had proof that my site had been hacked by the specific person who posted the job on Upwork and that if had suffered financial loss as a result of the hacking! It wasn't merely enough for their client to procure contractors on the platform to commit an illegal act. They wanted proof that I suffered financial loss!! However, I can say that we are considering a civil suit against them. It would be interesting to see how this impacts their brand. Note: Please forgive the messy and unstructured writing. I've been writing it while walking the streets of Central London shopping for X-mas gifts.
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoThe worst thing about what you wrote is, as I was reading it, not a trace of shock or surprise passed through me. It's like it's just now the norm for these things to happen. If you'd like to, i'd be happy to post your story in an edit below mine. I know this isn't the first time it's happened. If you want to contact me, it's shad @ the domain in my twitter bio. Good luck!
- dankohn1 10y agoYou want to add you contact info to your HN bio. I thought you did a reasonable writeup and would consider contracting with you for this sort of work. I will avoid Upwork based on their appalling behavior here and lack of willingness to engage and accept their mistakes.
- asoskm 10y agoTotally agree with the article. I had my competitors procuring hackers off upwork to take down my site. We found out because one person who was contacted on upwork to bring my site down actually contacted me and provided screenshots and other evidence. We raised this with upwork. They did nothing. They allow illegal conduct.
- zachruss92 10y agoI think that the freelance marketplace is not good for the freelance economy as a whole. A lot of the time, it creates a race to the bottom as far as pricing, and you have to compete with workers overseas undercutting you at every corner. When I first got started freelancing, I used eLance (which is now UpWork). I had a similar experience with a client, they suspended my account for 2+ months, and I won the dispute at the end. If I didn't have my own clients outside of eLance, I would have been screwed and not even able to pay my rent. After that, I stopped using the service and haven't looked back 4 years later. I have a friend who actually does know someone on the executive leadership team at UpWork, I just emailed him with your article - hopefully something positive can come of that. I really hate it when all around bad human beings go around and try to make people's lives harder.
- user5994461 10y agoI'll slightly disagree with the view about "the race to the bottom". Most of the market is always in the bottom, whatever the market is. Upwork/elance/whatever just make it stand out. Most of the work is low paying shit by shit clients who have no clue what they are doing. (Nothing special. It's the same with physical companies to physically work at :D). As a decent freelancer who wanna do decent work for a decent client, you've gotta filter aggressively.
- didgeoridoo 10y agoNever, ever give a price break without a scope change. Apart from the obvious $/hr benefits, it's great way to figure out if the person on the other end of the line is an abusive psychopath. A professional will understand that you're trying to help them achieve a realistic value for their budget. A psychopath will take it as a personal affront and become transparently manipulative and/or abusive. This is a great time to cut off contact before it escalates to the level shown here.
- scardine 10y agoThe real problem is: the conflict resolution process at Upwork is utterly Kafkaesque. Even if you have a perfect five stars reputation for two years, all it takes is one upset jerk and you are done at Upwork. Eventually you will step on someones having a bad day if you stay there enough. After you make a good reputation in those market places you can command a higher fee - perhaps they want you out at this point so they can get work for other skilled professionals that are undercharging in order to build reputation.
- dangle 10y agoSorry this happened. Closing my account now -
- kapauldo 10y agoI've heard this complaint many times about upwork. They step all over freelancers and you are presumed guilty. Thanks for taking the time to write this up and I hope people will heed your warning.
- anovikov 10y agoSounds terrible. Absolutely disgusting. Still, Upwork is an excellent mechanism for building professional network with both customers and freelancers and should just be used wisely.
- polotics 10y agoI disagree. My conclusion is that Upwork must be avoided at all costs. Anyway discoverability is reached on Github and by blogging in this day and age, Upwork is the remnant of a bygone era IMHO.
- anovikov 10y agoSuch a massive opinion against Upwork makes me also worry. It almost sounds like i have to build other ways of reaching my customers as if too many people feel like this, Upwork may go under. Sorry you feel so bad guys. I made over a million bucks on Upwork and my customers are happy, many work with me over years, and the only time i got in serious trouble was actually the only time when i tried to trick my customer myself, so i was entirely at fault.
- stanislavb 10y agoI think UpWork deserves the negative PR now... They will be more careful from now on..
- atrilumen 10y agoI don't know; they get bad reviews pretty much daily on r/freelance, but who knows; maybe the front page of HN will be more persuasive.
- dexterdog 10y agoUntil it mysteriously fell off
- khattam 10y agoAny publicity is good publicity so I don't think it will help. We need more people like Peter Thiel. With these many years of work, there must be a few dozen lawsuits that could be funded to take these shitheads down.
- atrilumen 10y agoWith so many tales of "terminated my account; KEPT MY EARNINGS", I can't help but wonder if a class action lawsuit isn't appropriate.
- drivingmenuts 10y agoWell, shit. And I was about to try out some freelance work just to get some income going. Best of luck. You got a raw deal on that one.
- tptacek 10y agoApropos nothing: "$100 an hour is more than our CEO makes so I'm not sure we can budget $1500 for this". Don't bill hourly! I know this sounds like a very silly example (it's not even logically coherent) but reasoning like this gets deployed all the time, even with sophisticated clients. People have anchoring price points for hourly rates that they don't have for other billing structures. Fixing this to make more money is literally as simple as "switch to daily billing".
- yawz 10y agoWell... coming up with the hourly rate is easy when one knows the price tag and the time it takes to finish the job.
- dozzie 10y ago>> "$100 an hour is more than our CEO makes so I'm not sure we can budget $1500 for this". > Don't bill hourly! Also, it's not $100 per hour, it's likely $100 per two hours or more. It's not like a freelancer has constant work inflow at 40 hours per week.
- afro88 10y agoJust thinking out loud here (haven't tried this) but maybe a better approach would be to not mention time. Simply ask for project specs and break it down into priced components if need be. $1500 at $100 an hour sounds expensive if you're comparing to the CEO's salary. But $1500 for a piece of sales lead infrastructure that has to be built but can't be off the shelf bought. That sounds reasonable.
- tptacek 10y agoHeading off the objections you'll get to this: the downside to fixed-price billing is that it maximally exposes the worker both to errors in their own estimation and also to errors in specifications provided by client, and to scope changes. Fixed-price bidding forces the consultant to shoulder a lot of risk. That's fine, if you're sophisticated. Certainly I think fixed-price bids are smarter than hourly billing. In a fixed-price bid, you get to describe the business impact of what you're doing, which can be huge even if the task is relatively simple, and then put a dollar figure next to that impact. Almost any number you come up with is going to at least sound sane in that context. It's the more favorable setting in which to present the comparison of value and price. What I like better though is the hybrid approach. I still remember someone on HN saying that this was the first original approach they had heard to pricing consulting work --- which blew my mind, since it was simply the way I was taught by my partners to bid projects, and presumably the way they were taught as well. The approach is this: Come up with a fixed price for the work you want to do, and simultaneously an estimate of the number of days you believe that work will take. You can divide the former by the latter to arrive at a daily rate. In your bid, focus on the total price of the engagement, but "show your work" in terms of the number of billable days and your day rate. Include a clause stating that overages will be billed at that daily rate as well. To most clients, this is the moral equivalent of a fixed-price bid, and they'll treat it like one. But it de-risks the project for you. As you do more projects, you'll get a better sense of what your real daily rate is (it's higher than you think it is now). You can tune your bids so that you keep a fixed daily rate but still value-price your engagements. By the time you're routinely employing this kind of finesse, you'll have enough traction to easily figure these kinds of things out for yourself.
- atrilumen 10y agoShadi, please also post this on https://reddit.com/r/freelance https://reddit.com/r/freelance.
- seirim 10y agoVery sorry to hear it. I've employed many on oDesk then Upwork over the years and almost always have great experiences with freelancers. In a rare case when I did have an issue, customer support wasn't very good from the hiring side either, fyi. Also I think they shot themselves in the foot with the big price hike. Previously freelancers and I would just keep using their platform throughout working relationships. Now we use it like a dating app, meet a freelancer, work a project or two to build trust, and then leave the platform to handle payments on our own.
- alucab 10y agopay attention, this is against the agreement. you are free after two years from the start of the relationship just for your info to avoid possible bad things
- base1996 10y agoThank you for sharing your experience, I am closing my account. But do you have any similar (or not) service you recommend me to use ? As a student I work with a company through this platform. Thanks by advance
- josephjrobison 10y agoI think going through a more niche platform that has better quality clients and respect for both sides is the way to go. For example, for WordPress development, Codeable.com is really good - they take care of both clients and developers For writing, TextBroker or CopyWriterToday might pay more to writers with a better quality control and escrow system. Designers - if you can get contracted out by Lightboard or others, you'll do much better
- base1996 10y agoIt clearly seems better for both sides. Here is a recent thread talking about similar options you gave me https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12775983 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12775983
- base1996 10y agoThank you for sharing your experience, I am closing my account. But do you have any similar (or not) service you recommend me to use ? As a student I work with a company through this platform. Thanks by advance
- jacobhenry2 10y agoThis is really unfair. Post the twitter account of Kevin or any online account. Just need to ask explanation in public.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- rrggrr 10y agoI use Upwork for projects and after reading this I wouldn't mind moving away from them. What are the best alternatives to Upwork for python and data science assistance?
- traviswingo 10y agoI think the worst part about this is that I wasn't even surprised throughout the entire story. Anyone who has been a freelancer has dealt with the random, uncalled for threats from clients to give you a bad review or try to suspend your account. It's the reason I gave up on working on platforms like Upwork and Freelancer almost immediately. Building a personal network is way easier to find contract work and you'll make more money in the end while creating real relationships that will help you foster your career. I'm sorry this happened to you, and I'm super glad you revealed this persons name publicly. Good form.
- forgetsusername 10y ago>Anyone who has been a freelancer has dealt with the random, uncalled for threats from clients to give you a bad review or try to suspend your account. It's amazing, isn't it? These are people who require outside expertise (they're hiring you after all) and yet do everything they can to make you feel small and worthless. It's utterly backwards. I wonder how many of these abusive people are "idea" guys? Regardless, utterly embarrassing on the part of Upwork. Glad they're being called out. I hope the internet has its way with them.
- negamax 10y agoThis has more to do with low barrier to entry in any online platform. For any job there could be zillions of bids, going down spiral. All claiming they can do the job. It creates a sort of situation where people don't realise that their task is to find needle in a haystack As someone who has worked on oDesk and made good money. You also need to do client filtering. 1. Check their total expense 2. Number of people hired, on hire 3. How much are they paying them 4. Feedback given All this information is available.
- davemel37 10y ago>do everything they can to make you feel small and worthless. It's utterly backwards. Backwards? That's a bizarre word to use to describe behavior that is NEVER appropriate. Are you implying that the freelancers should be making the employers feel small and worthless? > I wonder how many of these abusive people are "idea" guys? Honestly, I have no idea what you mean by "idea guys" and the implied correlation to "abusive people"? From reading your comment, it sounds like you missed the point completely. This is not a freelancer vs. employer or developer vs. idea guy situation, this is a simple case of narcissist vs. victim. The situation can be reversed and be just as abusive and horrible. An outside expert doing everything they can to make an "idea guy" feel small and worthless! The point is not whether the employer has the right to push around the freelancer, or the respect you think an employer should have when needing outside expertise. The point is everyone is a human being that deserves to be treated with respect. It is too easy to not consider the other person when working through a platform like Upwork or on the internet at large...This is a cautionary tale about the importance of remembering that there is a human being on the other side of the screen!
- 1_over_n 10y agoYeah this is pretty grim - also shows someones true character when they are willing to act like this from behind the safety of a screen miles away from the person they are interacting with. Not sure if you have posted on data tau but it might be worth posting there too @shadi.... http://www.datatau.com/ http://www.datatau.com/
- rikkipitt 10y agoHere's the link to close your account if anyone is interested: https://www.upwork.com/UserSettings/profile/close-account https://www.upwork.com/UserSettings/profile/close-account
- peterholcomb 10y agoDone. Thanks for posting. Can't believe this guy's experience. I used UpWork for a few gigs earlier this year but stopped browsing for gigs when the new fee structure was implemented. This is enough for me to say no thanks to ever using it again.
- holtalanm 10y agoeven funnier is that link doesn't take me to anything resembling a page where I can close my account. Almost like they don't want me to or something. Literally no button or link anywhere within the profile settings that I can see obviously leads to closing my account.
- amelius 10y agoI guess it doesn't help if your name is "Shadi" :)
- praptak 10y agoSadly, that might be the case not because of the pun.
- edoceo 10y agoI purchase talent from upWork on occasion. But less and less. On the buy-side I think the personal network works better. And, with so many jerks on the buy-side it scares the talent away. Death Spiral. Is it possible to have a community like this without the BS? How to stop it?
- alucab 10y agoTerrible story, all my support to you. It is completely true that the protection we have is very limited and that we must be VERY VERY selective with clients. Also if this means to reject offers. Also if this means to not earn money. I try to give qualified answers and i ask for qualified customers able to communicate and competent to discuss requirements. Otherwise i let them go away “Too busy on other projects thanks” is my mantra on Upwork It needs discipline and will but to be entangled in a poisonous relation with someone who can harm you… far worse. Push this story around, it is the best vengeance
- Down_n_Out 10y agoHmmm, interesting: "Thank you for using Upwork. At this time we are unable to close your account. Please call our concierge team at 1-866-676-3375, select option 3, and we will help you close your account. Please note: For security purposes, you will not be able to change your username, or open a new account with the same email address. If you need help, please contact Support Services."
- smhg 10y agoGot the same message but somewhere I read it was due to the fact multiple users where present in my account (long time since I last used it). I was able to remove the other user (under Settings - Permissions) and, subsequently, close the whole account.
- Down_n_Out 10y agoNo multiple users for me though. Will give it another try later on. I was already fed up with how Upwork works and this article just pushed me over the edge.
- martinko 10y agoFYI, despite the fact that you attempted to censure the guy's personal info, you managed to leak both his full name and email address.
- almata 10y agoFrom the Upwork FAQ: "You'll need to download and use the Upwork Team App—this tool includes the Work Diary, which ensures you are guaranteed payment. By taking work-in-progress screenshots every 10 minutes, it provides proof to your clients that you are hard at work." Screenshots every 10 minutes? You mean... screenshots of MY SCREEN every 10 minutes? That was what made me close their website and totally forget it until I've seen this submission on HN today.
- cygned 10y agoThis. Not only that this approach does not really fit remote development work, you are basically forced to install spyware on your machine. What a crazy idea.
- Whachadoo 10y agoIt has pluses and minuses. I moved from Freelancer to Upwork and my initial thoughts were that the freelancers (and thus clients) on Upwork were better because of the tracking software that basically guaranteed your worker was doing what was necessary. But in hindsight the clients are basically just as bad and the tracking software just makes remote workers feel spied on and untrusted. I've moved on now and have repeat clients as well as Toptal where there's mutual trust involved. (Toptal: https://www.toptal.com/#employ-only-on-the-ball-software-freelancers-now https://www.toptal.com/#employ-only-on-the-ball-software-fre...)
- cygned 10y agoIt's just that I know how I work and it would not fit my model. If I have a problem to be solved I sometimes just go for a walk with my dog thinking about solutions. The client knows about that and is fine with it. > TopTal I had my bad experience with their application process as a developer. I also have the other perspective as I have hired some devs from their and they do great work!
- andmon2 10y agoIt is bad from a client data perspective as well. If the freelancer has more than one client and they are "multi-tasking" by working on multiple projects and have apps like email, chat screens , web pages open etc and forget to shut them dowm before the automatic screenshot is taken, information will "leak" between one client and another.
- city41 10y agoWhy did he censor Kevin's name in all exchanges except for one? Was that an intentional "slip"? Or was revealing his last name an accident?
- kodfodrasz 10y agoProbably at the beginning Shadi didn't want to disclose the name, or wasn't sure in himself (possibly because of thinking about the possible legal consequences?), but as he was writing the article he pissed himself off so much, that he decided to disclose it anyway.
- city41 10y agoA major theme of the story is using third parties means you have less control. So why post it on Medium?
- imjustsaying 10y agoClosed my account. Interestingly there's very few reasons for closing you can select from the closure page. You can't even choose an 'other' category to write in the reason.
- peterholcomb 10y agoI noticed that. They should at least add an option that mentions their fee structure changes. I stopped using upwork the day those were announced. This story was enough motivation to officially close my account.
- 0xmohit 10y agoAlthough sites like Upwork make money from both sides (probably more from freelancers), they are likely to support those offering work. Perhaps their line of thought goes like: Freelancers would always outnumber those offering work. Even if some walk away or are forced out, it doesn't matter as long as we manage to keep those offering work on board.
- coolgoose 10y agoIt's so sad to see that. 1. People that try to hire freelancers don't have the decency of considering that freelances have to pay: fees, taxes and other markups (transfer fees for eg). 2. The usual you quote me X but my budget is X/2 tops, and the failure to realize that an Z for hour = x, or i can give you z/2 and double the number of hours and still get X. When an experienced developer in his field gives you a 15 hour quote, it doesn't mean that it's an easy job that can be done by anybody in that time frame, since if that's the case you would have done it yourself already.
- delegate 10y agoI once interviewed for Upwork pro. They sent me an Xcode project and I had to make some changes to it. However, the required changes referenced features and files which weren't in the project and made absolutely no sense. Even worse, the project they sent me was the "Photomania" project from Stanford's CS193p class: http://web.stanford.edu/class/cs193p/cgi-bin/drupal/node/289 http://web.stanford.edu/class/cs193p/cgi-bin/drupal/node/289 But the copyright information (Copyright by Stanford University) has been ripped off from all the files and replaced with "Copyright (c) 2015 Upwork". No reference to stanford CS or anything like that, just copy and paste. Which is very wrong in my book. I wrote them a message and after some fruitless exchanges with 4 or 5 different support people, I've decided to just let it go. The incompetence of the interview assignment, coupled with robotic support answers quickly convinced me not to waste any more time with this bunch.
- babaganoosh223 10y agoSounds like what'd you expect from Upwork clients
- esalman 10y agoIt is not Upwork clients he is talking about, it is Upwork themselves ;)
- noonespecial 10y agoAnother fine example of when you should ask yourself, "Am I the customer in this deal or am I the raw material that gets rendered into the 'product'?" With upwork, not only are freelancers raw material, they are so plentiful that waste is free for upwork.
- MarkMc 10y agoWhat's the alternative to UpWork for a skilled computer programmer who has fairly good English but has no formal education and lives in a poor country?
- drinchev 10y agoMake a trip to the nearest capital of a country where there are tech events. Don't forget your business cards. Stay there for a week and come back wit projects.
- slinger 10y agoI'm sorry to hear that this happened to you. I just closed my upwork account and I will spread the word.
- ftrflyr 10y agoLong time user of Elance and then Upwork here. I can attest, what occurred in this story is common. The problem that Upwork doesn't realize is that without an active and happy freelancing demographic, clients will go elsewhere. Historically, Upwork has made it a priority of catering to the client. This is evident given their JSS. For those of you who are not familiar with JSS, it is a score that companies / clients use to hire freelancers. Now, one would assume the score is based on past work with clients. This is not all the score accounts for. Timeliness is responding to invites, the number of long-term clients you maintain, the number of clients you hassle (yes, Upwork actively goes out and tells it's freelancers to hassle their clients to leave them feedback - the responsibility falls on the freelancer and only the freelancer), etc. Thus, when clients don't leave feedback (for whatever reason), you are dinged. Upwork won't tell you by how much exactly so let me give you an example. 12 months ago, my score was 92% (Top Rated). A client hired me. We went over the terms of the contract (# of revisions, not working on the weekends, etc.). 2 weeks into the project, the client started to deviate from the terms of the contract. I let them know and they began to get pissy. This happens all the time as Upwork has created a platform where the clients hold all of the power, and they know this. A week later the contract wrapped up, and I managed to make the client happy as they left me a 4.7/5 on my profile and a positive review. Clients are able to leave private feedback the freelancer can never see. When the JSS score updated (every two weeks I believe-mind you, I had not worked any other jobs since that job) my score went from 92% to 71%! A 21% drop. Suffice to say, for the past 12 months, dozens and dozens of clients later (most with positive reviews); I am now only sitting in the low 80's for my JSS. In conclusion, Upwork is the worst example of an online marketplace for freelancers who have a backbone and are not afraid to tell a client how it is. After all, we are hired for our expertise and when a client proceeds to tell us how to do our job, it poisons the freelancing community. edit: spelling errors.
- alinoudev 10y agoYou are exactly right. Same exact thing is happen to me too.
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoYou summed this up with far more articulation than I could muster, please may you lend me your words for the article as an edit?
- desaiguddu 10y agoBrave of you to put a write-up ! Fuck you Upwork !! When I started my consulting company, I decided I will not rely on this Upwork - Freelancer.com shit! I use various aggregator services - 1.) StackOverFlow Jobs 2.) No Mad Jobs 3.) PDX Startups 4.) Slack Groups 5.) Domino Slack 6.) Meet, demonstrate your services Everyone can teach WipeRecord service a lesson - I will be giving them 1 Rating on Facebook, Yelp and all other places with a write-up.
- dba7dba 10y agoAnother avenue for picking up some work and potentially new client or even full time {remote} jobs is signing up for email list at place like http://nextspace.us/ http://nextspace.us/ and other coworking shops. I don't know about others but nextspace.us has (or used to have) a members-only internal email group where people (founders and such) ask for some one off help with scripts and such for a fee. It seemed like a good way to get some small work, but most importantly, business contacts. Because it's not a totally anonymous place, the groups seemed to have much less douchebags.
- dkns 10y agoActions of one (presumably) manager guy doesn't reflect company as a whole. Yelp/facebook/etc. isn't for rating how company deals with freelancers. Don't be childish.
- Gigablah 10y agoUnfortunately it looks like this Kevin guy is the company director, if you look up his full name.
- ftrflyr 10y agoHow is this falling off the front page?
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoFROM THE AUTHOR, PLEASE READ: Apologies for the capitals, ladies and gentlemen. Please can I remind all of you to be Civil. I've just received an email from the man himself, suggesting that I'm getting people to give his FB page 1* reviews and to spam his email. He's threatened (implied) legal action directly against me. Publicly let me say, for the record (Hopefully it doesn't get wiped), that I do not encourage any of the aforementioned behavior, nor do I condone it. He's currently posting on reddit and generally acting like a massive douche over email to me, still. After all of this. So the above was quite hard for me to write, but remember there may well be a lot of people working at said company, that have families and lives beyond this. So please refrain yourselves. Appreciate all of the support and input, from everyone.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dba7dba 10y agoI don't facebook so don't worry about me. But looks like the douchebag still hasn't learned his lesson.
- pg_is_a_butt 10y agowell, of course i was spamming his email... you implied i should by posting his info with a big "FUCK YOU"... but, thanks for also suggesting i use the 1* reviews... i forgot about that... good idea!
- dba7dba 10y agoEven before the threats made to Upwork, I feel the 'client' was trying to trick the freelancer. - Snag a freelancer without providing spec up front. - Once some desperate freelancer signs on, flood the freelancer with tons of work. - If the freelancer tries to back out, threaten that you will file complaint with Upwork. Since freelancer was desperate enough to sign on, the client probably assumes the freelancer will be desperate enough to suck it and finish the work. - Repeat. Hence 40 previous jobs. I think some call this 'client' a shrewd businessman.
- webtechgal 10y agoAs another freelancer who has been there, done that (not quite at Upwork, but at three other platforms namely Freelancer.com, PeoplePerHour and Fiverr [yes, Fiverr - and unlikely as it may sound, I found individual clients who placed thousands of dollars worth of work with me there,]) I can only and totally identify + sympathize with the OP here. Of the three platforms above, I've found PPH to be the best in terms of overall mix/quality of clients as well as the platform's fairness (such as it may be) towards me (the freelancer). After over two years of doing this almost full time, here is my takeaway: The platforms have no love lost for the freelancers. Their first and foremost loyalty is (almost exclusively) reserved for the buyers, even to the point of being downright unreasonable in terms of favoring the buyers. While I've been fortunate enough not to end up with the terminal outcome (yet), I have come close a few times and every time that happens, it is such an emotionally upsetting and disappointing experience that I feel I could write a whole book about it, but then lose the inclination after a while. Such then, is the state of affairs and I guess there's little anyone (well at least I, at any rate) can do about it.
- marcell 10y agoShameless plug: I run a new company, CodeGophers, that competes with Upwork. We get a lot of unhappy Upwork customers. Unlike Upwork our service has a quality guarantee, so clients aren't forced to manage freelancers, and deal with low quality work. It's kind of like a product manager and freelancer combo, and overall it's much easier for the client. If you're unhappy with Upwork, please give us a shot. You can see our site at https://codegophers.com https://codegophers.com, or start a task by writing in at: start@codegophers.com We're able to handle most small tasks in a matter of a few days.
- orthoganol 10y agoI took a look. Main feedback is it's just an info page with email addresses... You need a webapp, a platform, signups, etc., if you want people to consider participating. Something that can be put up in a couple hours does not instill confidence that it's a serious thing. Just my opinion.
- marcell 10y agoThanks for the feedback! We're actually working on a lot of improvements to the site, and we'll be pushing them out within a week or two. Please check back soon :)
- rakic 10y agoHey Marcell, I really like the idea. Do you code simple iOS apps in Swift?
- marcell 10y agoYep! Please write in to start@codegophers.com and we can figure out a more detailed spec. Looking forward to helping you. You can also contact me directly at marcell@codegophers.com (I'm a founder)
- ivm 10y agoFrom your landing page: > Anything from $100 to $1000 is fair game. If the project is too big, we won't accept it. I know many people who use Upwork for long-term hourly billed projects that last months if not years.
- DominikR 10y ago> I’m not going to talk about the impossibility of competition they offer due to being seriously undercut by those that live in countries with lower costs of living. As a freelancer/contractor working exclusively for customers that have large budgets and pay a lot I'd advise against ever using such platforms. You are going to compete with very cheap labour (and often low quality services) and businesses will expect that and pay accordingly. Even if you have no projects lined up it's better to create your own small service or product which you can use later to advertise effectively what kind of value you could create for prospective customers. (go to local events and get into contact with future customers this way) It's also interesting to note that Globalisation is so heavily pushed on all levels of our society although we can clearly see that it sucks for the majority living in rich countries. Most people here probably do recognise (at least subconsciously) that it's impossible for them to compete with persons doing the same job in a third world country, no matter if they do a worse job. They make up for it by offering their services at such a low rate that they offset this easily. (some of them live in countries where you can easily feed, clothe and house a family with $200 a month - it's impossible to compete with that) You could argue of course that it's great for third world countries (it was) lifting many people out of poverty, but would you want to get poor in the process? (take a look at Detroit, this could be our future) Google, Apple and other large IT corporations (or really any large corp that needs IT services) of course are interested in lowering the cost of labour for them (which is a legitimate interest for them), so make no mistake, what they try to push politically in this case is certainly not in your interest.
- phantom_oracle 10y agoNobody else has said it, but I guess I should then... Does anybody else find it odd that this mans real name is: Shadi Al'lababidi However, his UpWork profile is: Shadi Paterson I've seen this done quite a bit when companies (especially the American kind) ship their support overseas, but are either too embarrassed to let their workers use their real names OR justify such actions by saying: "Some Americans will find it difficult to say your name" (or in other implicit scenarios, because your name is Muslim-sounding - or X-sounding - will associate you with terrorism/other-ism). Imagine the world we live in, where in order to do a job (or get work), you have to literally change your REAL name to appease to the demographic. Whether Shadi did this of his own accord or was instructed to by UpWork to 'passively appeal' to the hiring-clients, it is quite a shocker to see it YET AGAIN.
- pronik 10y agoDo you have a problem with Chinese adopting a "western name" (https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Chinese_name#/Western_name https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Chinese_name#/Western_name)? This has been going on for a long time, the basic idea is neither new nor has anything to do with Muslims. It should still happen voluntarily, but I consider it OK to actually help people pronounce your name correctly.
- shadlovesgrowth 10y agoHey man, I'm actually English born n' bred. I have Arab roots on my fathers side. My Full name is Shadi Al'lababidi Paterson I act on my own terms. I just found that when interacting with certain clients (Basically, Americans), my Muslim sounding name definitely reduced my opportunities. Like, it was truly noticeable. To be fair, this is the same for East Asians as they seem to value 'White names' more. I'd like to see Upwork do pornhub like stats on all demographics. Including skin colour and gender. I think as a global society we'd be very surprised to see what a 'True free market' produces.
- erklik 10y agoIt can be difficult for people to pronounce and after them asking the third time as to if they are pronouncing it right. I decided it was just better to Anglicise it and make it easier for me and them. :)
- matsatler 10y agoUpwork seems to always take sides with the company/client. It is terrible practice and very scary for freelancers that use upwork as primary income generator. I had few challenges with upwork and it took weeks to resolve. Seems as freelancers have to walk on eggshells around upwork support or clients when issues arise. I guess there is a huge opportunity for the next upwork.
- 35bge57dtjku 10y agoDidn't everyone know Upwork was a total POS a decade ago?
- throwaway7312 10y agoFrom the employer side. We're a platinum employer on UpWork with probably close to $100,000 spent on the platform and maybe 70 completed jobs. Tons of reviews calling us one of the best employers on UpWork. Right after oDesk merged with eLance to form UpWork, the platform rolled out its new "job success" score and sidelined star ratings (which was how it'd previously determined employer and contractor quality). We typically hire multiple contractors to small test jobs, and let them know these are test jobs. We then keep the best one or two on, and the rest we thank for their work, give them a good review (assuming they at least tried), and end the project. In this case, right after UpWork rolled out its "job success rate" score, we had a few trial freelancers we brought on who simply did not even start their projects or respond to communications. So we ended those jobs and marked them "unsuccessful." Within maybe a week, I received a "letter from the principal"-type email from UpWork letting me know that we had too many unsuccessful jobs and UpWork would be monitoring our account to make sure we were following sound hiring principles. I assumed this was probably a situation where we had 3 job success ratings and 2 of them were unsuccessful, or something like this, since they'd just rolled this out. Whereas we had something like 70 five star ratings (and a couple of four star ratings) built up over the years. I wrote to UpWork asking what this was about, pointing out that we have tons of five star reviews and this job success thing was brand new, and we just got a form letter back saying, in effect, "just be more careful." So, now, we make every job "successful" when it ends, regardless how it ended, and are very careful to end jobs in a cheerful way with freelancers and tell them, "Okay! Job 5-starred and marked 'successful'!" in hopes they'll be inclined to do the same. It's not about accurate information. It's about not losing access to the platform. We do hiring on other platforms as well. Guru, Freelancer, PeoplePerHour. Freelancer and PPH are comparable to UpWork in terms of fees (UpWork's a little bit higher). The PPH interface is pretty good; Freelancer's is not as good, and the quality of contractors on Freelancer leaves something to be desired compared to UpWork (though PPH is pretty good here too). Guru has great contractors and its rates are almost half of UpWork's (12.5% instead of 22.5%), but its interface is something out of 2009 and employers aren't even able to end their contracts with freelancers. It's just a downright byzantine system to use. So, like it or not, we seem stuck with UpWork for now, and UpWork can run a crummier service than it used to in the oDesk days and charge twice as much for it because, well, they're the only game in town, and that's the market economy. We've moved what work we can off it (e.g., we use 99designs for design stuff now, and have found some terrific contractors we've gone back to repeatedly from them), but UpWork's still the best general place. Maybe someone else will come along with a better service, cheaper. I kind of hoped PPH would be that, but they charge comparable rates, so maybe that's just what the market rate is for the middle man service between employers and freelancers. Wish they'd plow some of the new capital into better tech though. The new site design is worse than what it was before the upgrade, and often gets stuck loading in the browser. Still better than Guru though.
- tabbott 10y agoUgh, what a terrible, terrible client. But I think the title draws the wrong conclusion. I've personally been a client on Upwork over the last year, paying several developers to work on open source software, and all parties have been very happy with the experience. I think one should think about this incident in the broader context: * It's clear Upwork support screwed this case up. But one should keep in mind that resolving disputes between two people who both complain the other is a criminal (as in this case) is a really hard problem. The US justice system often gets it wrong (something egregiously). While it sucks when it happens, I think one should expect platforms like Upwork to screw up sometimes too. * Dealing with people trying to cheat is a fact of life in any business. I've heard horror stories in the freelancing world of clients deciding not to pay a freelancer for months or work, freelancers pretending to do work, etc. Often, the wronged party is unable to get the dispute resolved satisfactorily, especially if the two parties are in different countries. Any marketplace the size of Upwork (https://www.upwork.com/about/ https://www.upwork.com/about/ says $1B in jobs annually) will have a large absolute number of both bad clients and bad freelancers (there are certainly tons of bad bosses and bad employees in America, lots of bad taxi drivers, etc.). At least with a platform like Upwork or Uber, there's a reputation system where bad actors get bad reviews and eventually stop getting matched with other people. I'm willing to bet that this employer is a jerk to the people he hires not on Upwork, too. * This particular client's behavior is extremely bad in several ways. But at least the client had bad reviews on the platform. Do business with bad people at your peril! They will figure out how to screw you. * I had thought the "screenshots every 10 minutes" feature of Upwork was just an annoying invasion of privacy, until I had a freelancer report 50 hours of work fraudulently (i.e. he didn't post any work starting ~50 hours before I stopped paying him), make a bunch of increasingly unrealistic excuses that he would post his work soon once he got back from a vacation or whatever, and eventually disappear. After investigating, Upwork banned the freelancer, but their terms of service don't allow them to recover money already paid since we weren't using the screenshots feature. While I was upset and frustrated by it, I've also seen employees in the US stop working and hope to get a month or two of free pay before they get fired, and it's basically the exact same thing. Given the larger picture of Upwork having 3M jobs/year, mostly for relatively small amounts of money, there are probably a lot of disputes, and I think you should expect to have a significant fraction of disputes decided in a way where at least one of the parties leaves the dispute upset because the decision was wrong (the US civil justice system certainly has that property!). And keep in mind: a 5-20% fee on projects with a <$1000 average size doesn't pay for a lot of manual dispute resolution. Things like screenshots of emails can be forged; who knows what other fabricated evidence the client gave to Upwork support to help their side of the case. The screenshot mechanism is Upwork's current best solution for making dispute resolution efficient, and I think it does help: I haven't had fraud issues with those freelancers who are using it (and Upwork's ToS do allow recovering money from people whose screenshots show they weren't working). They address the privacy issues somewhat in that the freelancer can delete any screenshots they like before sharing with the client. They just don't get paid for those 10 minute windows. OK, that's my little essay on the Upwork experience. Upwork isn't perfect, but no large marketplace is. Keeping bad actors out of a marketplace is a really really hard problem, and I don't think it's possible for them to eliminate bad behavior. Still, I hope they kick that client off the platform and take this incident as a wake up call to invest more in improving their dispute resolution processes.
- nfriedly 10y agoBack when Elance was a separate site, I created a script to automatically withdraw funds from my Elance account to my bank account. I posted it to their forums and promptly had my account locked "after a routine review". They unlocked it after I jumped through some hoops, but I think the same shoot-first attitude clearly survived the merger with upwork.
- mamon 10y agoAnyone has a similar experiences with Crossover company?
- kinkdr 10y agoUnfortunately corporate bullying is a new trend seen more and more frequently. We should be very careful in our choice of companies we choose to interact with.
- prmph 10y agoUpWork is simply a joke now. They were a bit better when they were oDesk, but now the sheer incompetence is hard to understand. They keep inviting me to jobs that have no relationship to my declared skill-set. They keep inviting me to apply to jobs for clients who have no intention of actually hiring. They invite me to apply to work for them, and then fail to show up at the agreed upon interview time, several times Whenever I reach out to support about an issue, they invariably, without fail, make the issue worse. I'm seriously thinking of just deleting my account so I can focus my efforts on local freelancing
- mderazon 10y agoSounds like he stumbled upon a subclinical psychopath.
- urza 10y agoSo who is going to do a decentralized alternative to Upwork in the spirit of OpenBazaar, ArcadeBNB and ArcadeCity? :}
- phonon 10y agoSome new developments (in comments of the original post) Rich Pearson 1 hr ago Shadi, I work at Upwork and your post about your experience makes us feel terrible. We’ve reopened your case and are investigating it much more thoroughly. We hope to have a response to you quickly — if you have any questions or want to provide more details, please email me at rpearson(at)upwork.com. We care very much about our freelancer community and want to make this right. Rich 1 response Shadi Al'lababidi 16 mins ago Rich, it shouldn’t take a post like this for you (Upwork) to give someone special treatment. I know there are thousands of others like me that rely on your platform (most, far more than myself, for much larger %’s of their income). In some cases this can very literally mean the difference between putting food on the table and not. They may not be able to spread the message like I, or speak English in such a manner. They may not be able to drum up enough attention, so they go unnoticed. It’s no skin of Upwork’s back, until it turns into a PR mess. Hence why you’re commenting. Let’s cut the shit, Rich. I’ve got 2 tickets open and have been messaging everyday for the last 11 days. Nothing, nada. Just, ‘We’ve banned you and you can’t know why’. (For those reading this, yes, they do say you cannot know why.So as to not to let on to why they ban you). I’ve tweeted at you, nothing. Now, I have roughly 75% of a months worth of Upwork money stuck on there. If I were someone else, or someone without other income streams, what would I do? What could I possibly tell my incumbent clients? Shit, what am I even going to tell my incumbent clients? you’ve just left me without a months worth of wages and a big ‘fuck you, there’s nothing you can do.’ So, I do not want any special treatment. I will not contact you via email. This is an integral problem with Upwork itself and I will highlight it as much as I possibly can, even if that means losing the money and my reputation on there that I’ve been building up over the last year. And please Rich, I’m a bloody marketer for Christ’s sake. Don’t come at me with that standard company mumbo jumbo ‘it makes us feel terrible’. You’re just being patronising.
- akashaggarwal7 10y agoThanks, I was hoping to get work at Upwork before, now I'm considering not to. I hope things turn out in favorable for you.
- erikb 10y agoThe goal here should be to sue, not just making things public. Why don't you get a lawyer the moment your account won't be reopened? Upwork owes you over $1000. A client is seriously trying to harm your public image, which may result in losing customers/business. Both points themselves would be enough to talk to a lawyer. Together they are clear suing material. If you go public you actually open yourself up to get sued. Also cheaters and bullies will see that you didn't sue and therefore see you as an easy mark. Normal schoolyard logics apply, just that as a grownup you don't hit them in the face but sue. (I'm not a lawyer)
- marcamillion 10y agoWhat's interesting about the timing of this story is that I have recently been playing around with Upwork for some freelance work and the issue I am having is actually a different one. I have come to realize that there is a fundamental problem with the marketplace itself. I don't think it matches clients to freelancers properly. I did two exercises. I posted a few positions as a 'buyer', and I got a lot of spam (i.e. non-personalized, crap postings to my position/gig/job that was obvious they never read it). I got more than I expected, which makes it difficult to weed through and find a freelancer I want to work with. Granted, I didn't want the typical "low-ball" freelancer. I was looking for a freelancer that knew what they were doing. Alas, I was unsatisfied with the results and ended up not finding what I was looking for. I also responded to gigs as a Ruby developer. What's remarkable is that it is literally very, very difficult to get any work, much less the type of work I would like (high-value work with a handful of clients, potentially doing on-going work). I first started off with a relatively high-ish hourly rate for UpWork ($80/hr for someone with 8 years of Ruby & Rails experience and 15+ years of web development experience overall). Because I had no 'history' with the platform, that didn't work. I filled out my portfolio, and responded to each job in a very custom way detailing the specifics of how I would tackle each job I was submitting a proposal to. This took much longer than just spamming, and was more mentally taxing, but I figured I could make up for my non-Upwork-track history by putting more into my proposal. No dice. I then dropped my rates (down to as low as $40/hr) just to test, still no dice. I didn't even get responses. Then, I assumed that maybe my proposals weren't robust enough or maybe I wasn't communicating my capabilities in my portfolio properly enough, aka I was being hit with a 'portfolio tax'. So to get over this, I decided to actually bid on fixed budget tasks that were very specific in what they want and overlapped with specific stuff I have done in the past -- specifically "B2B Lead Discovery" or "Website Scraping" for something. I recently have been playing around with scraping websites for different types of leads, particularly B2B, and so this suited me perfectly. I then started applying to some of these with not just the specifics of what I have done, how I would tackle their specific task, but I would even send them sample results for similar leads to what they were asking for. So say someone was looking for wedding planners from each state (an actual job posting) where they would need the $CompanyName, $Website, $Email, $PhoneNumber, $Address. I replied telling them I have experience doing exactly this....in fact, I recently did this exact thing for accountants, so I replied explaining what I have done and how I can help them and I sent them a CSV file with a list of sample accountants, along with a picture of my script producing those results. In one case, I crawled the specific website they wanted crawled and showed them pictures of the script doing that and then I gave them a suggestion based on what they were looking for and what I found. There was a disconnect between what they wanted, and what could be technically scraped from the website (they wanted email addresses for all users on MySpace to be exact). So I informed them that unless MySpace has an API that gives out this information, and unless you are looking for email addresses that people post within comments on the music throughout the site, this is a waste of time and I provided proof from my script. Suffice-it-to-say, I did a lot of work on each proposal. I did about 7 - 10 of these specific proposals for scrapers, and about 15 - 20 other specific but not as specific proposals. I also didn't change the price they asked. So if they said their budget was $10, I replied with all of the above with a $10 budget. This is crazy, I know...but I did it just to experiment. The results? Not even 1 reply. Not even 1. You can see screenshots here [1]. Yes, my portfolio on Upwork could be weak (although I doubt it because I think it looks pretty robust), and my profile could be a deterrent (because the language I use is a mismatch to what these clients are looking for) and my rates could be high relative to the rest of the marketplace, but the real issue is just an overall non-response from ANY of the 20+ proposals I submitted over the period of a week. Something feels fundamentally broken with that, especially when considering my experience with the other-side of this experience. I believe that there is some middle ground between the "elitist" Toptal and "broken" UpWork. So, I would like to try an experiment. Do you have any high value ($30K+ -- note this is a floor, just to weed out inappropriate clients) development projects that you would like done? Either generic projects where no tech stack is specified or Ruby and Rails jobs for starters. I won't specify the types of projects, but something where you would prefer a "high-quality" developer help you see it to fruition rather than the cheapest developer you can find. Perhaps you have tried other developer services/gig boards and are unhappy with the process. Do you want a product manager to help drive the entire process for you, from beginning to end? If this sounds interesting to you, please send me an email to: marc+hnexperiment@mymvpblueprint.com. If I can find a pattern for how to find these types of projects consistently, I would love to work with other developers to fill these needs. Until then though, let the experimentation begin! [1] - http://imgur.com/a/MjHYk http://imgur.com/a/MjHYk
- graeme 10y agoIt's a real shame. I used Elance for around four years (as a client, not a freelancer). This was before Elance merged with Odesk and became upwork. I'm sure elance had issues. But I noticed a marked uptick in problems when the upwork migration became. The Elance interface was old school, but very functional. Upwork was confusing. The migration was a mess and made me a freelancer by default, as I had also had a minor freelance profile on elance that I had never used. Took weeks to resolve. The desktop app....actually, I don't remember the issue, but it led to me leaving the platform entirely. I think messages took ages to load. I will eventually look for new freelancers, and I'll need to figure out a replacement when I do. It sounds like Upwork is not a great place to be for a freelancer now – and that means the quality ones will be elsewhere. As a client, I want freelancers to be able to make money, and to denounce bad clients. By catering excessively to clients, Upwork is going to select for toxic clients.
- esalman 10y agoI had a similar experience; used to have 4.8+ rating on Upwork, then accepted a job which went bad largely due to poor and inaccurate spec provided by the client. He actually went to my company website, found out the team members' emails and sent a message to everybody castigating me. I basically begged to him to stop doing any further damage. Upwork always give their clients the benefit of doubt because they know they'll always have a cheap source of freelancers from countries where living cost is low.
- aagha 10y agoAll these posts make me think there an amazing opportunity to create a new platform with a big focus on revenue sharing and amazing customer experience.