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07d84256
Community Member

Freelancer acting toxic and threatening to leak content from a project after being fired

I hired a freelancer who completed 2 milestones of a project, then demanded I double the budget or walk away. Since the amount he requested was more that double actually (requesting $500 on a $200 milestone, not exact numbers but I rounded to the nearest hundred for you guys), and since I was having problems with the freelancer's attitude (he became defensive when I asked him to correct a small mistake), I fired him. I figured there was no chance of us working together because of these conflicts. 

After firing him, he stated I could not use any of the submitted work as he planned to use it. When I reminded him it was the other way around - I paid for the work and owned the rights, and thus he was the one who was not entitled to do so - he became quite hostile, lying in his review (which doesn't matter to me too much), and angrily berating me to the point I had to block him. 

I am concerned that the freelancer will continue his aggressive behavior by leaking content, stealing the project, and potentially harassing me outside of the site. 

What should I do?

ACCEPTED SOLUTION

re: "Where do I send reports?"

 

Basically, there are 3 ways:

- Click on the "Flag as inappropriate" link in the top-right-hand corner of the freelancer's profile page

 

- Create a customer support ticket

 

- Report the incident here in the Forum. (Forum moderators, who are Upwork employees, will often intervene and work with you to get your incident report to the correct people.)

 

Also, a variation on the final method is that you can click on the name of a Forum Moderator in a thread (the Upwork logo appears by their photo), and send a Direct Message to a moderator.

View solution in original post

11 REPLIES 11
prestonhunter
Community Member

re: "What should I do?"

 

This freelancer's behavior is unacceptable.

 

You did the right thing by blocking him in Upwork.

 

If he has your email address, Skype handle, phone number, etc., then go ahead and block him in those communication channels as well.

 

I strongly recommend that you NOT hire him again.

 

Change any psswords/usernames to your systems that he had or had access to.

petra_r
Community Member


Dillon H wrote:


What should I do?


Report him to Upwork with proof.

07d84256
Community Member


Petra R wrote:

Dillon H wrote:


What should I do?


Report him to Upwork with proof.


Where do I send reports, I never saw the option to do so. I've never had any negativity with people on this community so I don't know the systems in place for such things haha.

re: "Where do I send reports?"

 

Basically, there are 3 ways:

- Click on the "Flag as inappropriate" link in the top-right-hand corner of the freelancer's profile page

 

- Create a customer support ticket

 

- Report the incident here in the Forum. (Forum moderators, who are Upwork employees, will often intervene and work with you to get your incident report to the correct people.)

 

Also, a variation on the final method is that you can click on the name of a Forum Moderator in a thread (the Upwork logo appears by their photo), and send a Direct Message to a moderator.


Preston H wrote:

re: "Where do I send reports?"

 

Basically, there are 3 ways:

- Click on the "Flag as inappropriate" link in the top-right-hand corner of the freelancer's profile page

 

- Create a customer support ticket

 

- Report the incident here in the Forum. (Forum moderators, who are Upwork employees, will often intervene and work with you to get your incident report to the correct people.)

 

Also, a variation on the final method is that you can click on the name of a Forum Moderator in a thread (the Upwork logo appears by their photo), and send a Direct Message to a moderator.


Thank you so much, I really appreciate it. This is my only bad experience on this site really (I used to work on the freelancer side too so I've been underpaid here and there but nothing like this), so hopefully it's just a one off situation. Every other person I've worked with here has been a wonderful human being. 

BojanS
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Dillon,

 

I'm sorry about your experience with this freelancer. I was able to locate the Contract and the Freelancer you're referring to. I'll go ahead and share this with our team and one of our agents will reach out to you directly and further assist you!

 

Thank you for reaching out to us!

~ Bojan
Upwork
07d84256
Community Member

I actually managed to connect with a Mr. Chen from the support team and he helped me out a lot, but thank you so much, I appreciate it. 

 


Bojan S wrote:

Hi Dillon,

 

I'm sorry about your experience with this freelancer. I was able to locate the Contract and the Freelancer you're referring to. I'll go ahead and share this with our team and one of our agents will reach out to you directly and further assist you!

 

Thank you for reaching out to us!


 

Hi Dillon I am also having a problem with a freelancer I recently hired. I have flagged their profile but also wanted to private message you. I keep getting an error when I try to private message me. Can you please get in touch so I can get some support with an unfortunate situation.

 

Thank you!

Hi Robert,

 

I checked but couldn't find the issue with a freelancer that you are referring to. Could you please send me a PM with more information so that I can check and assist you further?

Thank you.

~ Aleksandar
Upwork

I noticed you said that the freelancer lied in his review about you. If there is a clear misrepresentation of facts, you can ask Upwork to remove the review (they rarely do this, but they might in your case, from the looks of it).

07d84256
Community Member

They handled it in a way that was satisfactory. I was really appreciative. 

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