🐈
» Forums » Clients » Re: Contractor runs off
Page options
bertpoels
Community Member

Contractor runs off

My contractor cancels a job because he gets busy with other projects. I want this to show on his review to save others from this disappointment. How to handle?

12 REPLIES 12
tlsanders
Community Member

You can't. If the job is canceled without money changing hands, you can leave private feedback for Upwork's use, but you cannot leave a public rating or comment.

prestonhunter
Community Member

Hubert, if you are able to pay the freelancer, you may leave public feedback. If he closed the account, you can  obtain the ability to leave public feedback by paying the freelancer using the Pay Bonus tool.

 

But keep in mind, he may be able to refund anything you pay him, so I can't guarantee that this will work permanently.

 

If you have paid the freelancer zero dollars, then there is no way for you to leave public feedback. But rest assured that your private feedback does have an impact on his job success score.

As an experienced client, I inderstand that there is a statistically predictable failure rate for every job niche.

 

If I need four people to help me on a moving job, I hire 7 people on Craigslist. That means I will end up only needing to pay four people, because only four will show up.

 

If I need four different writers to write articles by an important deadline, then I will hire six writers on Upwork. That way I will obtain four articles, as two of the writers can be predicted to not turn in the work by the deadline, or at all.

 

These are simply numbers. It is nothing I take personally or expend emotional investment on. I don't owe anything to the freelancers who commit to do work but don't do it. Not money. Not time. Not even a second thought.

"If I need four people to help me on a moving job, I hire 7 people on Craigslist. That means I will end up only needing to pay four people, because only four will show up."

 

Out of the other three people, one will start squatting in the empty house when they know you've left, one will kill you an eat you, and the other one will hijack your moving van and steal all your stuff.

 

That's an extreme, but more than four people turning up and having to pay more than four people... or less than four people turning up, are all considerably more likely scenarios. Add that to the possibility that the people who do turn up might not be very good, might damage your stuff, accidently break your stuff etc etc... I'd rather hire a professional moving company. Probably wouldn't be much more than if the seven people end up arriving. 

"Welcome, humans. I'm ready for you!"
- Box, Logan's Run (1976)

Scott, this is based on my own real-life experiences. I didn't say what kind of moving jobs these were.

 

Sometimes one needs to move things that belong to other people.

 

But because you asked, I have been very pleased with the work done be laborers hired from Craigslist to move my own things as well as things belonging to other people who have asked for my assistance.

 

The quality of the work has been excellent, but there are certain percentages of people who don't show up, whether one hires on Upwork, Craigslist or elsewhere.

Paying all who are hired is always a statistically possible outcome, and should always be considered as a possibility when one considers deadlines, budgets, etc.

 

Whenever I hire more people than are necessary, I'm always ready to pay all of them. The cost of their labor is outweighed by the importance of the deadline and the possible problems that would arise from not having enough people.

Not to mention all the time you have wasted screening the three people who say they were going to show up and didn't or in the case of upwork, say they showed up and did the job and dispute it when you cancel the contract. The point is there is little accountability for the freelancer if they do a terrible job or don't show up, unless you PAY THEM? How stupid is that?

 

The end result is that we cannot have confidence in the reviews.

re: "Not to mention all the time you have wasted screening the three people who say they were going to show up and didn't"

 

I agree.

 

Screening freelancers is mostly a waste of time.

If you have an important, pressing deadline, then it is better to spend little or no time on "screening."

If you are going to hire multiple freelancers that you have not worked with before, then ust hire freelancers and give them the assignment.

 

If you use hourly contracts and make this a team project, there will be no disputes. You simply hire multiple people and once you get the work done that you need, you end all the contracts.

 

re: "The end result is that we cannot have confidence in the reviews."

 

Agreed.

When you have an important deadline and plan to hire multiple freelancers to work on the project, we should not count on reviews. A freelancer may have received great reviews for prior work. But that is no guarantee that she will deliver the work on time. So we hire multiple freelancers to "hedge our bets" rather than gamble that a freelancer with good reviews from past projects will deliver a task on time.

VladimirG
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Hubert,

 

I can confirm public feedback can't be left on jobs if no payment was released, but you will have the opportunity to leave an honest and accurate private feedback.

~ Vladimir
Upwork

But what they dont say is that a freelancer with good ranking can REMOVE a feedbck and make them look good again. The fact that you get perks to remove bad feedback is Upwork somewhat supporting scamming freelancers.

lysis10
Community Member


@kevin c wrote:

But what they dont say is that a freelancer with good ranking can REMOVE a feedbck and make them look good again. The fact that you get perks to remove bad feedback is Upwork somewhat supporting scamming freelancers.


 For top rated contractors, yes. It is glorrrrrious. This is me when I do it.

 

Image result for do you like that jim carrey

sam-sly
Community Member


@kevin c wrote:

But what they dont say is that a freelancer with good ranking can REMOVE a feedbck and make them look good again. The fact that you get perks to remove bad feedback is Upwork somewhat supporting scamming freelancers.


This would be true if the "scamming freelancer" only scams one client every three months and completes 10 projects successfully within the next three months before scamming another client. And if the freelancer is fortunate and none of these clients open a dispute. 

 

Really, the top-rated feedback removal perk doesn't support scammers. It does support freelancers who consistently satisfy clients and every once in a while have one bad contract.

 

I would be surprised if there were many freelancers who time their scams to meet the 3 month/10 jobs criteria AND who choose clients who would not complain or open a dispute. My guess is they might get away with this once. I realize that is small comfort to a client if it happens to them.

 

Also, when a top-rated freelancer removes feedback from the profile, Upwork labels that job "feedback removed." So prospective clients would probably guess there was negative feedback for that job.

 

I am just pointing this out because sometimes people don't realize there are limitations on the feedback-removal perk and they imagine that top-rated freelancers are able to remove every instance of negative feedback. 

Latest Articles
Learning Paths