Ripped Off, I paid for A website Redesign They deleted the job and took the money.

[b022b774]

HI there, i just want to know what can i do in the case of these freelancer from agency that i hired for a job, the worst thing that i made is paying a web redesign based in hourly rate.

anyways the case is that they were making a poor job, slowly process, they told me that it will took 40-45 hours trusting on these guys believing they were about to do an incredible job, WRONG.
They took 12 hours for 8usd rate, they were doing just copy paste for the original page that i have, images they already had from the examples that they gave me to see how could be the page, when i requested something original based on these examples obviously, ripped off, i asked a refund , they say no , ok i opened a dispute, the dispute team gave them the case, 
Conclusion after all that they deleted the work, they dont even let the backup of images themes, just nothing and they took all my money.

The dispute team just took in case that Per Upwork's user agreement the client, not Upwork, is responsible for managing and maintaining the quality of work. oh yeah what about that they deleted the work.

I felt scammed in every way because at the first that i was negotiating about the redesign they insisted in the hourly rate just when i was saying that is better in fixed price, but i trusted on them, they know how the system works, BEWARE of this, anybody can do a scam with these because in fact they will win the case using the norms in their favor.

Now i have another week billed that i have to dispute with this poor team from upwork too, ridiculous.
I mean i like upwork, but they dont care, they dont see the facts.

Any help to what to do in the next week bill that i have to pay to these scammers will be helpful.

[prestonhunter]

The following is my opinion, as a long time freelancer, web developer, and client on Upwork:

Using hourly contracts for web developers is a good decision.

Continuing to pay an underperforming freelancer (or agency) is a bad decision.

Your main problem is not the contract model.

You main problem is not even with the agency or freelancer you hired.

Your main problem is your project manager.

A proper project manager would have stopped working with this freelancer/agency and assigned the work to other team members.

You did not hire an independent project manager, and you did not act as project manager yourself. So, by default, the role of project manager feel to the lead developer. But only about 20% of lead developers are able to act as project manager. The one you hired is NOT able to do so. Therefore, your project was doomed to failure.

What do YOU need to do?

You need to hire an independent project manager.

And you need to make sure that your project manager understands the importance of hiring multiple freelancers and continuing to work only with the best of them, while ending contracts with underperforming freelancers.

And no more agencies. For now on, you need to hire only individual freelancers.

[prestonhunter]

re: "i asked a refund , they say no , ok i opened a dispute, the dispute team gave them the case"

You made a mistake by asking for a refund.

You made a mistake by thinking about refunds at all as part of a web development or web design process.

Refund thinking hurts clients.

You yourself were hurt by refund thinking.

Your attempt at refund actions failed.

What should you have done differently?

You should decide that you will never ask for a refund. Instead, you will proactively monitor and evaluate the work that freelancers submit. You will compare the work done by all of the freelancers on your team. When you find a freelancer whose work does not provide great value to your project, you will quickly end the contract. That way you will no longer waste money on that freelancer.

It is far safer to STOP paying money to a freelancer rather than pay money to him and later try to ask for money back.

re: "Now i have another week billed that i have to dispute with this poor team from upwork too, ridiculous... Any help to what to do in the next week bill that i have to pay to these scammers will be helpful."

Rather than continuing to pay this particular freelancer/agency each week, and then trying (and failing) to dispute or ask for a refund... you should STOP paying them money.

Refund thinking hurts clients. You are thinking that you can pay money to this freelancer/agency and then get a refund if things don't work out perfectly. But that is not happening. And that approach will not help you achieve your project goals.