Terms of Service Update 2018

[Douglas Michael M]

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@Wendy C wrote:

Taylor, the contract I use does have the clause "this contract overrides and supersedes Upwork's generic contract" in it - and both the client and I sign it before work begins.  It resides in the workroom ... and therein lies the concern.

IF Upwork does not actually review and honor items in the workroom ... is it all for naught?

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 Wendy,

Supersession clauses are pretty standard. For all I know, Upwork has one in its "optional" (read: default) contract. It's at a minimum a declaration of the intent of the contracting parties. And as I understand Upwork's peculiar implementation of optionality, the very existence of your own contract with your client means theirs does not apply. How or where it's recorded does not affect its enforceability (or practical lack thereof). Documenting it in the workroom is facial evidence of supersession, with or without Upwork's say-so.

Remember that Upwork as escrow agent is debarred from rendering judgments on any disputes between the contracting parties: they ignore, as they must, the substance of any dispute, and can only suggest that the parties come to an agreement on their own or go to arbitration. To my mind, this is a good thing.

The only thing Upwork can enforce is its own terms of service. That is the rubric under which they can release escrow funds to one party when the other party fails to respond.

Best,

Michael

[Wendy C]

Thank you, Michael.  Confirmed once again, you are the most logical and analytical person I know.  

[Muhammad Awais R]

do you have some provision for legal actions against freelancers for misuse/ theft of data from the originator?

[Amanda F]

Wow is U. serious about not allowing communications through other means like skype in the interview process? About 90% of my work is gotten by first talking to the client over skype, gotomeetings, etc. Clients want to hear you and learn more about you before working together, at least the good clients do this. Stop trying to fix stuff that are not issues please! Instead can you focus on stopping the aweful US only stuff so I can finally start getting more jobs to apply to? My feed is seriously lacking lately. Luckily I recently won a decent ongoing contract but I haven't seen much of anything else and noticed there are far less jobs than before and the rates just seem to be going down because of the lack of quality jobs out there. 

[Valeria K]

Hi Amanda,

There hasn't been a change regarding communication methods between the freelancer and clients. While we recommend that the communication is kept on Upwork or at least important terms, updates and agreements are recorded in Messages, it's not against the ToS for freelancers and clients to user other methods of communication.

[Valeria K]

Hi Muhammad Awais,

You may check section 6. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS of the Optional Service Contract here.

[Ewald B]

Thank you my profile has not been approved but I have out all the right and necessary information to get approved. Please is this the reason my profile has not  been approved?

[Bojan S]

Hi Ewald,

I checked this for you and our team has reached out to you just recently. Please check this link for the ticket related with your concern, or check the last email sent to you by our team which details what steps you should take to lift the hold on your account.

Thank you.