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quankiquanki
Community Member

Name on a received invoice?

I have a quick question on the invoices you receive from Upwork. As a client, when receiving an invoice from Upwork whose name and address is shown on that invoice? Is it Upwork itself or is it the name and address of the freelancer that was hired by you? So who are you paying according to the invoice, Upwork or the freelancer?

237 REPLIES 237
600b15db
Community Member


@Garnor M wrote:

Hi Pawel and others,

We hear your concerns and requests to add freelancer's addresses to the invoice and we've raised this to our team so they can evaluate the best way to include this information.

 

Please note we have not previously had freelancer addresses included in these invoices so while the invoice has changed, this was not something we removed. 


 Hi Garnor,

 

due to full time load in my business, I did not downloaded my invoices of the 2nd quarter till yesterday and noticed all info is gone. Almost a white document with only my information. Helpdesk told the changes took place in June2015.
But why retrospective to all invoices before that date? I have now thousands of dollars paid to Odesk with no invoice.
“Please note we have not previously had freelancer addresses included in these invoices so while the invoice has changed, this was not something we removed. “
Correct, but Upwork took all other information of the invoice. If Upwork takes away valid invoices for their clients, they should give an alternative. Just taking away with retrospective without giving an alternative is not a correct way of doing business. Especially if the money is already collected, an invoice should be given.

 

UPWORK NEW STRATEGY:

I understand the whole strategy behind this: Elance-oDesk Becomes 'Upwork' In Push To Build $10B In Freelancer Revenues from $1B now. forbes.com/
Pushing us as business clients in the direction of the high paid official freelancers. This can be seen also with the new freelancer search.
The new “user agreement” of Upwork, different as that of Odesk, already explaines the new idea: “When a Client pays a Freelancer… EEC will credit the Freelancer Escrow Account and then deduct and disburse to Upwork a 10% service fee that Upwork earns” 
 
To make this all work, there are now 4 parties.

  1. Clients has a contract with freelancer. (fixed price or hourly rate + bonuses)
  2. Clients transfers 100% to EEC (Elance Escrow Corporation) for previous work of freelancer.
  3. EEC transfers 90% to the freelancer.
  4. EEC transfers 10% to Upwork as their service fee

RESPONSIBILITY PROBLEM UPWORK RESOLVED: So Upwork is covered here to take no responsibility at all for the work delivered or for any local tax laws.

The change of the name from Odesk to Upwork and new company solves all responsability of Odesk of the old invoices.


PROBLEMS:

  1. Still the client needs to get an invoice for the 100% he paid. What he needs to ask to the freelancer to provide that valid invoice with all details of both parties.
  2. But the freelancer doesn’t get a valid invoice of Upwork for the 10% service fee. So the freelancer can NOT make an invoice for the 100% the client paid as he cannot deduct the 10% Upwork fee as a cost as that invoice has no value at all.
  3. Client cannot use the Upwork invoice as that has also no value at all as all details required for a valid invoice are missing now on top it is clearly stated that the invoice is by the freelancer with their name on top of the new invoice. But all the rest of the freelancer information is missing.
  4. For an invoice to be valid and pass tax inspections, a proof of payment is also necessary.
  • But the client has only proof of payment to Upwork and not to the freelancer
  • The client has only proof of payment of 100%, but never the 90% that the freelancer received to square the invoice received of the freelancer with a payment.

SOLLUTION:

Upwork could add address and tax nr or any other local required nr of the freelancer to the invoice that Upwork provide to the client.

And with a small text and link to the disclaimer explaining that the invoice comes from the freelancer and payments of the invoice are done to the EEC that distributes 90% to the freelancer and 10% to Upwork for the service fee.

 

For sure for a studied reason by the whole Upwork lawyers team, to avoid any other responsibility, Upwork is also not allowing the freelancers details on the invoice the clients receives.
This new invoice covers Upwork all responsibility but leaves 2 parties in the dark; the client and the freelancer.


If the client has no way to deduct his costs paid to the freelancer via Upwork ECC, for tax purposes. Then there is no reason at all for the business client to outsource work over the Upwork platform.

 

The whole strategy to push business clients to spent more via Upwork to reach that $10B goal in 6 years is lost.
If this new invoice system doesn’t get solved:

  • The idea behind fast hiring on Upwork is lost as business clients will now loose a lot of time by studying the invoices and details of each freelancer. It will get to complicated that many business clients just will let it go.

What clients will stick with the new Upwork:

  1. Retail clients that do not need an invoice at all. But they will not be the big spenders.
  2. US business clients that use the Upwork payroll system.

Some months ago, as I liked so much Odesk and had big plans outsourcing all work via odesk, I was looking to invest in the stock of Odesk.

But found out it is privately listed Smiley Sad

Maybe good, as if it was a public listed company, many would be shorting the stock now.

As I foresee many business clients leaving to look elsewhere, to platforms that have solved the invoice client-platform-freelancer problem.

I heard others speaking here about Envato have solved that issue.

 

 

 

 

Correction on the above:

I found out of a freelancer there side, so this is how it works now:
there are now 4 parties.


When you open an account or hold an account at Upwork, you agree to the new terms:
“You hereby authorize and instruct EEC to act as escrow agent in connection with the Escrow Accounts and the payment”

 
1. Clients has a contract with freelancer. (fixed price or hourly rate + bonuses)
2. Clients transfers 100% to EEC (Elance Escrow Corporation) for previous work of freelancer.
   a) Client can download an invoice via Upwork with only the name of the freelancer on top and an invoice nr Txxxxxxx1
   b) This invoice is clearly from: the freelancer
  c) Created via Uwork so forget to say the invoice is of Upwork.


3. EEC transfers 100% of funds to the “freelancer escrow account”
   a) Freelancer can see that the invoice nr is Txxxxxxx4 (the same nr as the client but 2 till 4 higher.) why not one   higher?
   b) But cannot download this invoice as a pdf, only see the nr in there transaction history.


4. EEC transfers 10% to Upwork as their service fee and TAKES THAT AUTOMATIC OF THE FREELANCER ACCOUNT.
   a) Freelancer can download an invoice for the 10% service fee of Upwork
   b) This service fee invoice has more details as for the client and is usable in many places for the freelancer to use as a cost for the 10% service fee to Upwork.
   c) It would be better if Upwork Global Inc also mentions there Company No as in the EU that can then be uses as there VAT nr. There is no reason at all for Upwork to leave that nr out of it.
   d) The invoice nr of this one is Txxxxxxx6 (2 nrs higher as the invoice nr the freelancer cannot open and where they see the amounts 100% coming in to there escrow account. ) why 2nr higher?
   e) The invoice for the freelancer of Upwork explains very well the Contract ID nr and Contract title and Client.
   f) The invoice of the freelancer from Upwork for the service free, mentiones also the invoice nr Txxxxxxx4 of the money coming in to their account.
  g) I can say this invoice is very minimalistic and Upwork can do better with more details on it but it is usable for the freelancer.


GOOD INVOICES FOR THE CLIENTS WITH THIS ESCROW SYSTEM:

  • On contrarian, the invoice for the client, should have all the same details as the freelancer has, and all the details of the freelancer as address and VAT nr or other nr as PAN for India, etc. Ofcourse the freelancer should provide that infor to Upwork.
  • Upwork should make all this process for the clients more easier and faster and ask all that info upfront of the freelancer. Eventually it are the clients that let this business run.
  • It should also have the information how a client has paid for the invoice. Paypal account or credit card nr. As this invoice can only be downloaded after a client has paid, I do not see any problem by adding that info.
  • All contract details should be on there and explaining why the client is paying to Upwork Global Inc and not direct to the freelancer.   (tax inspectors do not understand this 3 way payment system well)

An invoice is valid if the details of how to pay and to who are the same as the payment receipt.

As Upwork is global, they should help protect the client against tax inspectors that do not like invoices to people paid from other countries as the tax inspector does not speak that language and do not understand the system of that other country.  (logical)


Now as client, you need to ask the freelancer to make an invoice for every transaction. And ask to write all that info of payment system down on it. Check the freelancers details, check there country law of what details should be on a valid invoice and so on...


A tax inspector will always first reject invoices they do not understand and ask the client to proof they are correct. Expect yourself in a situation after paying $20k dollars a year for 5 years and having to proof 52 weeks x 5 years x amount of freelancers you work with to the tax man.  (On top the tax man has the right to ask you to translate the invoices in the languange of the country you delcare your taxes.)  (this happend to me 2 years ago with invoices of other EU members)  Maybe by then Upwork has changed again there name etc. so no proof of the past can be found again as now with Odesk.

 

Question to Upwork:

  • why are the invoice nrs that the clients can download Txxxxxxx1 not the same as the one that the freelancer can see in their account coming in the 100% funds as Txxxxxxx4 and is mentioned on the Upwork invoice to the freelancer?
  • And why are there numbers between the transactions?

I think there are movements between each invoice internal in Upwork and that is the reason that Upwork will not write the details of the contract and the freelancer address, on the invoice the client can download.


I understand that Upwork wants to protect them self but they are placing all the responsibility and work on the client. It became overnight so difficult for a client and risky to get a correct invoice where the client can feel safe with that one day, the tax inspector won’t reject all the money spent on Upwork.


Clients come to Upwork to buy time, but loose it now with investigation to be sure of having received good invoices of their freelancer from another place in the world.
The risk is that clients will go back to what they know, their own country to be sure that invoices will not be rejected by the tax man.

 

For the freelancer all is perfect, any tax inspector in the world will never reject income you declare from clients living on the other side.

 

But a tax man wants to reject invoices, so you pay more. And the easiest are invoices he doesn't understand, or can not verify.

 

The whole idea of hiring fast as Upwork new strategy has lost.  Or for clients that do not spent a lot on Upwork as retail clients.


You can put apples for sale, but if you have no buyers, they will just dryout in your storage room.

600b15db
Community Member

the whole terms and conditions with the new company Upwork and new website has been changed and very clear that ECC proived escrow services to the 3 other parties: the client, the freelancer and Upwork for the service fee.

 

But it is not correct to change all the invoices with retrospective matter before the change to Upwork. without notification that the invoices will be changed, and a time is given to collect/download the old invoices.

 

I have now for the full month of April 2015 payments made to Odesk and payment receipts of Paypal and credit card with the name of Odeks mentioned on, but the invoices (documents ) I can download are from Upwork, the new company.

 

You probably will tell me: if the new invoices are not usefull, why even complain about it.

The reason is that I now can not even ask the freelancers to make an invoice for April 2015 with the terms & conditions of the new Upwork and ECC as the escrow service. Because the payments where made to Odesk and not to Upwork.

 

soniademurcia
Community Member

I am  one more user who is going to leave Upwork.

 

EU USERS NEED LEGAL INVOICES.

Hi Lena or anyone else from Upwork. The invoices that I am downloading from Upwork still do not have the address of the freelancer on it (I know they are created dynamically). It still only has the full name of the freelancer, when can we expect the new update to be live?

Quang,

 

I apologize for the lack of communication. I know this is a change that was planned to be released, i thought it was made live last week. I will check with the team to get and update for you all.

 

-Lena

Untitled
kochubei_valeria
Community Member

Hi All,

 

We have gotten a confirmation from the team that Upwork name and address will soon be added back to the invoices both current and past.

 

Sorry about the inconvenience.

~ Valeria
Upwork

But Upwork is not the seller of the service - the freelancer is.

I (European resident) need an invoice in my name with my address (and my VAT ID when working for EU clients).

 

Upwork invoices clients on behalf of the freelancer - and I get paid by the client, not Upwork. 

alexandrefoisy
Community Member

Seriously, 

 

  even if you have made some change and put your logo and address at the end of the invoice, in your actual system my provider still be the freelancer instead of you. 

 

That may work if you provide is address and a way to see the amount charged one time affected to it.

 

But you don't do it !!!!

 

 

I am very angry because we have not been notified for this and it a major modification in your billing policy.

Also you won't agree to send us the old invoice on the odesk time

 

I am taking my 25 000 per years away !

I also noticed that as a client I can fill in my VAT-ID under "Settings > Company Contact" and it will be shown on the invoices which is great. However, there is no option for the freelancer to fill in their VAT-ID. Right now, I found out that the freelancer can force it into their address, you just make VAT-ID part of your address. You can then check if it works by downloading one of your service fee invoices. Note that all invoices on Upwork are dynamically created.

Then, when Upwork pushes the update which will show the freelancers address in the invoice you will "hopefully" also see their VAT-ID.

 

After that is done, I think the best temporarily solution is to give the freelancer access to the invoice that the client is getting from Upwork. That way, the freelancer will have their clients Name, Address and VAT-ID and the freelancer can then create their own invoice that satisfies their EU tax laws. The freelancer can then directly send the invoice to their client and tell the client that Upworks invoice is invalid. Even though Upwork creates the invoices, it falls down to the freelancer to make sure that the invoices with their names on them are compliant to their tax laws.

 

Right now as a client, you can contact your freelancer/contractor and send them Upworks invoices that have their name on it. The freelancer can use the information on those invoices to create tax compliant ones and will then send those back to you. If the EU freelancer does not know how to make a valid invoice, then they probably do not have a VAT-ID either. You can then just ask for their address and you can make one yourself.

 


@Quang N wrote:

 

 

After that is done, I think the best temporarily solution is to give the freelancer access to the invoice that the client is getting from Upwork. That way, the freelancer will have their clients Name, Address and VAT-ID and the freelancer can then create their own invoice that satisfies their EU tax laws. The freelancer can then directly send the invoice to their client and tell the client that Upworks invoice is invalid. Even though Upwork creates the invoices, it falls down to the freelancer to make sure that the invoices with their names on them are compliant to their tax laws.

 

 


That's the way it is done on Elance. Both parties can enter the VAT ID into their profile which is then displayed with both addresses on the invoice. And, both parties have access to the invoice. One of the reasons I always try to move jobs on Upwork to Elance.

pkrakowiak
Community Member

Not all freelancers on Upwork are a business. Consider that you hire a freelancer who is not a business and additionally lives outside of the European Union. What kind of implications does it bear for EU clients? This is a serious question, frankly I don't know. I often work with Ukrainian or Russian freelancers who don't have a firm, before I was able just to book the invoice as if oDesk / Upwork was the seller (they get their cut).

jmeyn
Community Member


@Pawel K wrote:

Not all freelancers on Upwork are a business. Consider that you hire a freelancer who is not a business and additionally lives outside of the European Union. What kind of implications does it bear for EU clients? This is a serious question, frankly I don't know. I often work with Ukrainian or Russian freelancers who don't have a firm, before I was able just to book the invoice as if oDesk / Upwork was the seller (they get their cut).


Pawel, this is a common misunderstanding. From the EU's point of view everybody selling a service for money and issuing an invoice for this is considered a business. Provided the invoice has the name and address of the seller from outside the EU on it (e.g. Russia) there is no problem. The EU client just has to pay importation VAT in his country of residence, that's it. 

88cc0fc9
Community Member

you dont consider this:

 

in italy, if I pay $ 1.000 to a subject, my country want to know exactyl who is the subject that has taken $ 1.000, and why

 

so, also if that subject take $ 50 and forward the remaining $ 950, i need to justify exactly WHO is taking the inital $ 1.000 - we dont care about the rest, about where there goes part of total of that money

 

thats why ENVATO, from an initial moment where billed correctly only their part (the $ 50 ) has switched to a new legally valid whay where they again provide and invoice of $ 1.000 , detailing in it that $ 950 will go to someone else.

 

but the point is that they emit a valid invoice for $ 1,000. and thats all.

jmeyn
Community Member


@Gabriele D wrote:

you dont consider this:

 

in italy, if I pay $ 1.000 to a subject, my country want to know exactyl who is the subject that has taken $ 1.000, and why

 

so, also if that subject take $ 50 and forward the remaining $ 950, i need to justify exactly WHO is taking the inital $ 1.000 - we dont care about the rest, about where there goes part of total of that money

 

thats why ENVATO, from an initial moment where billed correctly only their part (the $ 50 ) has switched to a new legally valid whay where they again provide and invoice of $ 1.000 , detailing in it that $ 950 will go to someone else.

 

but the point is that they emit a valid invoice for $ 1,000. and thats all.


Dear Gabiele,

 

Please don't forget that with the invoices the way they are today you will also have to pay Italian VAT to your tax office for every single Dollar revenue here on Upwork. As you can't prove that your client is outside the EU or in a different member state your VAT is due. What's the VAT percentage in Italy? 

88cc0fc9
Community Member

i'm not the seller, i'm the BUYER

 

your case doesnt apply. and still for the fact i'm the buyer, if my company do a payment of $ 1,000, italian fiscality want to know exactly WHO is getting that money (and that "who" has to be a recognizable - name, address, vat id - company)

pkrakowiak
Community Member

I just read an article about hiring foreign freelancers and it confirmed how I view this setup. Because Upwork gets a commission for all the work performed by freelancers and additionally serves as a payment gateway (we are charged by Upwork, not the freelancer), technically Upwork is the seller for us:

 

Client/Upwork = buyer/seller

Freelancer/Upwork = seller/buyer

Client/Freelancer = no relationship for the purposes of payments & taxation

 

It would be different if Upwork simply connected a client with a freelancer, took a one time commission and then stepped aside. Then, of course, client would be paying the freelancer directly and they'd have their own agreement and would be responsible for invoicing and taxation. But that is not the case. Upwork takes an active part in this and gets paid for every single hour the freelancer has worked. It also charges clients' credit cards (Upwork is on the bank statements) and sends money to freelancers (again, Upwork is denoted as the sender on bank statements). Essentially it is viewed as an agency and freelancers are its subcontractors.

 

By the way, if I hire a software developer from Ukraine, apart from their full name and address I'd need their certificate of residency, otherwise I'm obliged to take 20% of their earnings (on top of what Upwork already takes) for tax. I bet they'd be happy about that. 🙂

Pawel, you're probably from Poland?

 

I'm based in Poland and my accountant also notified me that I was required to obtain the certificate of fiscal residency of Upwork Inc otherwise I'd have to pay an additional 20% tax. Upwork refuses to help me obtain it, after doing my own research it seems such certificate has to be requested at the IRS for  USD 85... every year!

 

I hope Upwork will at least put their company data back on the invoice, because if they will be issuing the invoices on behalf of the freelancers only.. I can't imagine chasing all of them to send me their certificate of residency.. Headache!

jmeyn
Community Member


@Pawel K wrote:

I just read an article about hiring foreign freelancers and it confirmed how I view this setup. Because Upwork gets a commission for all the work performed by freelancers and additionally serves as a payment gateway (we are charged by Upwork, not the freelancer), technically Upwork is the seller for us:

 

Client/Upwork = buyer/seller

Freelancer/Upwork = seller/buyer

Client/Freelancer = no relationship for the purposes of payments & taxation

 

It would be different if Upwork simply connected a client with a freelancer, took a one time commission and then stepped aside. Then, of course, client would be paying the freelancer directly and they'd have their own agreement and would be responsible for invoicing and taxation. But that is not the case. Upwork takes an active part in this and gets paid for every single hour the freelancer has worked. It also charges clients' credit cards (Upwork is on the bank statements) and sends money to freelancers (again, Upwork is denoted as the sender on bank statements). Essentially it is viewed as an agency and freelancers are its subcontractors.

 

By the way, if I hire a software developer from Ukraine, apart from their full name and address I'd need their certificate of residency, otherwise I'm obliged to take 20% of their earnings (on top of what Upwork already takes) for tax. I bet they'd be happy about that


 Pawel,

 

I don't agree. Upwork is a service provider (intermediate) between the client and the contractor. The services provided cover:

 

- A platform to post jobs and make bids

- Escrow for fixed price jobs

- Handling the payment services

- Issuing the invoices on behalf of the contractor and in the name of the contractor

- A messaging platform for the communication between client and contractor

- and more

 

For these services they charge a fee of 10%. The contractor is free to state his own price, delivery time etc. The client decides which contractor he will use if any. If Upwork were the buyer Upwork would make these decisions. Receiving an ongoing commission for all business for a limited period of time is nothing unusual in sales.

 

For now it's the buyer's responsibility to pay importation VAT. This will change as of January 1st, 2016. Then the seller will be responsible for paying the VAT in the buyer's country. This can be avoided if both parties have a VAT ID. I've dealt with all these VAT problems on Elance for more than 1 1/2 years with my tax office. Nearly everything with regards to VAT is solved on Elance but not on Upwork. Upwork is focused entirely on the US, far from being an international company. The current situation for EU clients and contractors with Upwork forces the contractor to add his local VAT to the price offered as he has to pay VAT in his country. At the same time the buyer has to pay importation VAT on his purchase. So just because Upwork is incapable of providing an invoice compliant to EU regulations VAT has to be paid twice. The legal situation will be worse in 2016.

I agree with Joachim, currently Upwork is the one that connects the contractor with the client. For that, Upwork charges the contractor a 10% fee.

 

If either or both the contractor or client is from EU, you will need to ignore the invoices that Upwork sends to the client in name of the contractor. The contractor will need to manually create their own invoices that is compliant to EU and send those to you. You can then use that invoice in your administration. It is a hassle but until Upwork creates EU compliant invoices this should be the way to go.


@Quang N wrote:

I agree with Joachim, currently Upwork is the one that connects the contractor with the client. For that, Upwork charges the contractor a 10% fee.

 

If either or both the contractor or client is from EU, you will need to ignore the invoices that Upwork sends to the client in name of the contractor. The contractor will need to manually create their own invoices that is compliant to EU and send those to you. You can then use that invoice in your administration. It is a hassle but until Upwork creates EU compliant invoices this should be the way to go.


I agree that is a workaround, although the tax office in Germany will not be happy with two documents for the same job. Another question that then comes to mind, what exactly is left of the services we pay Upwork for? In other words, if I have to do all the small paperwork myself anyway, why use Upwork? 

db1d7ef0
Community Member

Yes, that is exactly my Problem. i am in Germany and my freelancer ist in north africa. He ist ready to rwite an EU-Conform-Invoice but it doesnt realy solve the problem.

 

So i realy dont know what to do.

jmeyn
Community Member


@louqmane G wrote:

Yes, that is exactly my Problem. i am in Germany and my freelancer ist in north africa. He ist ready to rwite an EU-Conform-Invoice but it doesnt realy solve the problem.

 

So i realy dont know what to do.


I'd say problem solved. What are you still missing? 

pkrakowiak
Community Member


@Joachim M wrote:

 

For now it's the buyer's responsibility to pay importation VAT. This will change as of January 1st, 2016. Then the seller will be responsible for paying the VAT in the buyer's country. This can be avoided if both parties have a VAT ID. I've dealt with all these VAT problems on Elance for more than 1 1/2 years with my tax office. Nearly everything with regards to VAT is solved on Elance but not on Upwork. Upwork is focused entirely on the US, far from being an international company. The current situation for EU clients and contractors with Upwork forces the contractor to add his local VAT to the price offered as he has to pay VAT in his country. At the same time the buyer has to pay importation VAT on his purchase. So just because Upwork is incapable of providing an invoice compliant to EU regulations VAT has to be paid twice. The legal situation will be worse in 2016.


 Thank you for the insightful posts. You seem to be focusing on EU entities here. What if the client is from the US? What if freelancers are from non-EU countries, like Russia? I wish somebody wrote an article about this.

jmeyn
Community Member


@Pawel K wrote:

@Joachim M wrote:

 

For now it's the buyer's responsibility to pay importation VAT. This will change as of January 1st, 2016. Then the seller will be responsible for paying the VAT in the buyer's country. This can be avoided if both parties have a VAT ID. I've dealt with all these VAT problems on Elance for more than 1 1/2 years with my tax office. Nearly everything with regards to VAT is solved on Elance but not on Upwork. Upwork is focused entirely on the US, far from being an international company. The current situation for EU clients and contractors with Upwork forces the contractor to add his local VAT to the price offered as he has to pay VAT in his country. At the same time the buyer has to pay importation VAT on his purchase. So just because Upwork is incapable of providing an invoice compliant to EU regulations VAT has to be paid twice. The legal situation will be worse in 2016.


 Thank you for the insightful posts. You seem to be focusing on EU entities here. What if the client is from the US? What if freelancers are from non-EU countries, like Russia? I wish somebody wrote an article about this.


 Pawel, the situation with clients from outside the EU is a tad easier. All you need is an invoice with your and the clients full address on it. This is sufficient proof for the tax office in Germany (other EU member states should not be different) that the client is outside the EU and no VAT is to be charged or due. If the client is in the EU and the contractor outside the EU you need exactly the same type of invoice, you merely have to pay importation VAT on it. I use a small, cheap (29 Euro) tax software and just book accordingly and once a month I file electronically with the tax office. BTW the importation VAT for "imports" into the EU is due even if you have an exemption from charging VAT. This exemption is quite common for small businesses (in Germany less than 17,500 Euro annual revenue). Working on a site like Upwork or Elance they should still apply for a VAT ID.

 

It gets complicated only if both parties are located in the EU and the client doesn't have a VAT ID, e.g. private enduser. In this case I'm oblidged to charge my local VAT (not his, mine). Procedure is then as if the client were in the same country as I am. Amazon abused this loophole by invoicing books to German customers from Luxembourg. VAT on books there was only 4% hence they could undercut any bookshop in Germany just due to a lower VAT.

 

The charm with a VAT ID if both parties are resident in EU member states is that the seller reports the sale together with VAT of his client to his tax office. The tax office reports to the tax office of the buyers country. The buyer reports the import to his tax office using the sellers VAT ID. Everything else is then handled automatically.

88cc0fc9
Community Member

Guys, you should simply take example (if you really want to make UE compliants invoices) from the solution adopted by the other big players of the freelancing industry, like ENVATO

 

this is an example of a perfect invoice, that tutelate their fiscal needings and ours

Screenshot 2015-07-08 19.12.50.png

 

so, as you can see, companies that "really" want to solve the issue, have found a way to.

 

 

pkrakowiak
Community Member

Another week passed, still nothing? @Upwork: couldn't you just revert to the old invoice format while you keep working on it? If it was good before, it could last a bit longer.

html5maker
Community Member

Are there any other freelance websites that can generate invoices like the "old" Odesk had done it in the past?

jmeyn
Community Member

Try their parent company but it will close soon, being merged with Upwork. 

e11cd111
Community Member

When do you plan to

- include address on invoice, and state that upwork is the selelr here (as we pay your company, not freelancers)?

- provide certicate of residency?

 

BTW: is therer a way to download all invoices at once?

prrole
Community Member

I was shocked to receive the updates invoices, it really causes a headache.  My bank statement says that upwork has charged our company, and I need an invoice for that - simple as that.

 

That the change has been made without notifications, for whatever reason, makes it worse - as accounting has no way to do the books with the current invoice format.

 

I called upwork, got a ticket # and was promised a call-back.  I suggest you all do the same.  I am also forced to pause all my current contracts until this issue is resloved - which means no revenue for upwork.  

 

Are there any competing sites or companies that offer similar services to odesk/upwork?

 

 

 

 

jmeyn
Community Member


@Per Ole K wrote:

I was shocked to receive the updates invoices, it really causes a headache.  My bank statement says that upwork has charged our company, and I need an invoice for that - simple as that.

 

That the change has been made without notifications, for whatever reason, makes it worse - as accounting has no way to do the books with the current invoice format.

 

I called upwork, got a ticket # and was promised a call-back.  I suggest you all do the same.  I am also forced to pause all my current contracts until this issue is resloved - which means no revenue for upwork.  

 

Are there any competing sites or companies that offer similar services to odesk/upwork?

 

 

 

 


 Per, forget it. I've had hot discussions with CS regarding EU compliant invoicing for freelancers and clients. They won't do it, period. What they have seems to be good enough for the US and that's all they are looking at.


@Lech B wrote:

When do you plan to

- include address on invoice, and state that upwork is the selelr here (as we pay your company, not freelancers)?

- provide certicate of residency?

 

BTW: is therer a way to download all invoices at once?


 

Upwork is not the seller of the service: the freelancer sets up a contract with a client and gets paid by said client, not Upwork.

 

Have you ever looked at the user agreement you signed (and which was changed when they rebranded)?

 

"When a Client pays a Freelancer… EEC will credit the Freelancer Escrow Account and then deduct and disburse to Upwork a 10% service fee that Upwork earns” 

 

yes, it all has changed to an escrow service with 4 paties. Today I wrote here about it.

 

https://www.upwork.com/info/terms/

 

8.7 Worker Classification

Client assumes all liability for determining whether Freelancers are independent contractors or employees and engaging them accordingly; Upwork disclaims any liability for such determination or the related Engagement.

 

And how do we as clients supose to do that? ask all the job post candidates there personal details? That they sent before contracting, sent all there work related documents. Where for each country the law is difference.   This will push businesses to hire of there own country, again the push to hire freelancers from the US from US based businesses.

 

typo:  with 4 parties

jmeyn
Community Member


@Lech B wrote:

When do you plan to

- include address on invoice, and state that upwork is the selelr here (as we pay your company, not freelancers)?

- provide certicate of residency?

 

BTW: is therer a way to download all invoices at once?


Lech, Upwork is not the seller. Upwork is an intermediate providing certain services. The work contract is between you and your - unknown/not identifiable - client. 

prrole
Community Member

Regardless if they are seller, intermediate, facilitator or these days probably more appropriately PayPal competitor by the looks of it - they should be able to provide a specified invoice/receipt for the amount they charge our credit cards.

 

 

 

jmeyn
Community Member


@Per Ole K wrote:

Regardless if they are seller, intermediate, facilitator or these days probably more appropriately PayPal competitor by the looks of it - they should be able to provide a specified invoice/receipt for the amount they charge our credit cards.

 

 

 


Absolutely true and a legal requirement in the European Union. 

88cc0fc9
Community Member

no further info from the STAFF, on this topic?

garnorm
Community Member

Hi Gabriele and others,

We are revisiting this and plan to make updates to the invoices in the coming months. As part of this, we're continuing to share your feedback to the product team so they're aware of your needs. To be clear however, we are not making any changes to this right away.

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