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a1bb41b9
Community Member

Upwork has paid the freelancer without my consent

I hired a freelancer to do a job. Upwork paid two milestones to the freelancer without asking me, or consulting me, two weeks after the freelancer submitted her work. The third milestone was also the last. I am not happy with the completed work by the freelancer, but since upwork paid the freelancer, she doesn't care.

 

When she submitted her work, I told her I was going away for three weeks on holiday and wouldn't be able to check the work and pay her. She was ok with it. But when I returned from my holiday the milestone had already been paid.

 

What can I do? How can I get back the money from upwork? It should be put back into the milestone, until I am happy with the result.

 

I can't claim credit card fraud, because it has been almost two months since I financed the milestone. So, what can I do?

I feel I have been defrauded by upwork. I opened a ticket, but of course no reply. 😞

25 REPLIES 25
petra_r
Community Member

It wasn't without your consent at all, you consented to the way the Escrow System works when you set up the contract and received several emails alerting you to the fact that the freelancer submitted work and later that Escrow funds will be released if you don't take any action.

 

You will have to work it out with the freelancer.

a1bb41b9
Community Member

No. I never received "several emails alerting you to the fact that the freelancer submitted work and later that Escrow funds will be released if you don't take any action". In fact, I didn't receive a single E-mail. They just transferred the funds, without any communication at all.

I second that ... had the same thing happen to me. Not happy about it.

re: "I second that ... had the same thing happen to me. Not happy about it."

 

I am sorry that you had a disappointing experience while using Upwork.

 

Upwork intends for users to receive email notifications, but it can't always guarantee such.

 

There is nothing you can do about that.

 

If it is important to you to know what is going on with the Upwork contracts you hire freelancers for, you will need to log into the Upwork website and check the status of contract. Don't rely on email notifications.


Nada Q wrote:

I second that ... had the same thing happen to me. Not happy about it.


So you didn't read how the fixed price contract works and do your due diligence either? The only person to not be happy with in this instance is the person in the mirror. 

AveryO
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Nada, 


I checked your account and can confirm that emails were sent to you when a freelancer submitted work for a milestone on 9-, 16- and 22-August. If you are not receiving emails, please check your spam/junk folder as they may have been sent there. 

When a freelancer submits work for a fixed-price contract, you have 14-days to review the work. If the freelancer doesn't hear from you, the system will process the payment to the freelancer after the 14-day review period. You may read more about it here.

Let us know if you have other questions about fixed-price contracts and we'll be happy to assist you further.



~ Avery
Upwork
melaniemaghanoy
Community Member

Hi Mark,

 

For Fixed price contracts you have 14 days from the most recent submission on a milestone to review and approve, or request changes. Approval releases the payment from escrow to your freelancer. You will be notified when your freelancer submits work. If you fail to respond to a submission within 14 days, the escrowed funds are automatically released to your freelancer. Therefore, it is important to use the Request for Changes flow on the platform if you would like your freelancer to edit their submitted work. Requesting changes will remove the review period until the freelancer submits their work on the milestone again. I know that this is important to you, a member of our team will reach out to you directly to further assist you with the issue you have.

I did respond to the submission within 14 days. I wrote to her within a day of her submission that I was going on holiday and will review her work and let her know if I was happy with it within 3 weeks. She was ok with it.

petra_r
Community Member


@Mark L wrote:

I did respond to the submission within 14 days. I wrote to her within a day of her submission that I was going on holiday and will review her work and let her know if I was happy with it within 3 weeks. She was ok with it.


 That does not stop the countdown. What stops the countdown is clicking on "Request changes"

 

It is also entirely unreasonable to make a freelancer wait 3 weeks for the client to even look at their work.

a1bb41b9
Community Member

Upwork should still ask the employers if they are ok with the work, or inform them that the payment will be made. As you wrongly wrote, Upwork should have sent "several emails alerting you .... that Escrow funds will be released". Well, Upwork doesn't send such E-mails!!

 

Also, the problem is that she completed her work over one months late. If she had completed her work as agreed before she started the contract, I wouldn't have left on holiday. Furthermore, she said she is fine with waiting for three weeks.

 

Hi Mark,

 

I'm sorry about the outcome of your contract. Please refer to the explanation our agent posted on your tickets last Tuesday and earlier today, and the process Lanie and other users described on this thread. From your earlier comment is sounds like you received the notification and the freelancer's release request, which I can see in Messages, but failed to respond to it and only messaged the freelancer.


@Mark L wrote:

I did respond to the submission within 14 days. I wrote to her within a day of her submission that I was going on holiday and will review her work and let her know if I was happy with it within 3 weeks. She was ok with it.


Please review this Help article and note that you can communicate directly with your freelancer regarding the released payment.

~ Vladimir
Upwork

Where does it say that my funds I put in milestone will be automatically wired to the freelancer after two weeks?

iamchunchunchun
Community Member

I suggest you to contact the freelancer politely, and ask if she would agree to make amendments. If I were this freelancer, I would agree to make reasonable changes, as it was agreed to. Of course, there is no guarantee about this. On the other hand, I think you should not have asked your freelancer to wait for three weeks. When my clients have no time to check my completed work, they always let the payment go through first. In other words, I sincerely believe that your vacation should not have kept her from getting money for her completed work.

The problem is that she completed her work over one months late. If she had completed her work as agreed before she started the contract, I wouldn't have left on holiday. Furthermore, she said she is fine with waiting for three weeks.

reinierb
Community Member


@Mark L wrote:

I hired a freelancer to do a job. Upwork paid two milestones to the freelancer without asking me, or consulting me, two weeks after the freelancer submitted her work. The third milestone was also the last. I am not happy with the completed work by the freelancer, but since upwork paid the freelancer, she doesn't care.

 

When she submitted her work, I told her I was going away for three weeks on holiday and wouldn't be able to check the work and pay her. She was ok with it. But when I returned from my holiday the milestone had already been paid.

 

What can I do? How can I get back the money from upwork? It should be put back into the milestone, until I am happy with the result.

 

I can't claim credit card fraud, because it has been almost two months since I financed the milestone. So, what can I do?

I feel I have been defrauded by upwork. I opened a ticket, but of course no reply. 😞


 This bothers me.

 

Would you have considered "credit card fraud" to get your money back if less than two months had passed, or would you still consider it if you don't get your money back in any other way? To me it looks that you will simply (falsely) claim fraud if you don't get your way, so please tell me I'm wrong about this. 

Upwork paid someone without my consent. If I put the money in a milestone it doesn't mean it should directly be wired to the freelancer, without my consent. That's why it's called "milestone" and not "pay". I consider this credit card fraud.


@Mark L wrote:

Upwork paid someone without my consent. If I put the money in a milestone it doesn't mean it should directly be wired to the freelancer, without my consent. That's why it's called "milestone" and not "pay". I consider this credit card fraud.


Maybe you should start reading up on what will actually happen when you are entering your credit card information on some website. If you had done that before funding a milestone here, you would know that the funds would be released to the freelancer 2 weeks after they requsted it, unless you ask for revisions.

 

Even if you could still request a chargeback (don't know what the timelimit is for that where you are from), no way you would win on this one. Sorry, but this is not credit card fraud. I would rather say that you would be the one attempting fraud by filing a chargeback request.

________________________
Freelancing is a gamble - To win you need skill, luck and a strategy

I am still curious as to where it says that the freelancer will be paid 2 weeks after they requsted it. I haven't seen it on the page where I pay the milestone. Where is it?

You can see it in Fixed-Price Escrow instructions. 

 

3.4

"If Freelancer submits a Release request and client does not take any action for 14 days from the date of the Release request, Freelancer and Client agree that Upwork Escrow is authorized and irrevocably instructed to immediately release to Freelancer the amount related to the milestone with Release request."

 

________________________
Freelancing is a gamble - To win you need skill, luck and a strategy

1. It doesn't say what action the client has to take. I did take an action. I told the freelancer she would have to wait for 3 weeks.

 

2. How would I know that the freelancer submitted a "Release request", since I was not informed of this? All I received was a message stating "

Milestone 3: "3rd"
 
Amount in escrow: $200.00

"

 

It doesn't say anywhere that this is a "Release request"

AveryO
Community Manager
Community Manager

Mark, 

You may check out about the details of paying for fixed-price contracts hereWhen your freelancer submits work, you may approve and release escrow funds for that milestone OR you may request changes. If you are not satisfied with the work your freelancer submitted, you may click on "Request changes" and add details of the changes you want made on the Message Window. 

Please take note that it is also noted on this page that you have 14-days to request for changes. 

You may want to check out the client section of the resources we compiled here to help you understand how the platform works.

 

3 Request for changes.png


~ Avery
Upwork


@Mark L wrote:

Upwork paid someone without my consent. If I put the money in a milestone it doesn't mean it should directly be wired to the freelancer, without my consent. That's why it's called "milestone" and not "pay". I consider this credit card fraud.


 Credit card fraud would be if UW were to charge money without your knowledge or previously expressed consent.  That is not the case here.  You knowingly deposited the amount into escrow.  At that point, your credit card no longer has anything to do with the transaction in any way, shape, or form and to claim fraud would actually be you defrauding the CC company with a false claim.

 

You stated that the freelancer completed the work (albeit late).  Also, that they apparently submitted said work and received the milestone amount for their work after the 14-day window for review had passed.   All of this progresses precisely the way the system is intended to work.  I'm honestly not sure how your freelancer, or UpWork, are in the wrong here.

~I am only here when I can tolerate having my eyes blasted, my privacy treated like a joke, and my temper pushed to it's limit. For all other times, please request alternate contact methods~

It continues to amaze me regarding the # of people (Freelancers AND Clients) that don't review enough or in some cases any content within "Help and Support" and this Community prior to utilizing Upwork and then become challenged when things go wrong or don't go their way.  Really!!!???  Well...DUH!  That's not professional for me to state, but in not operating intelligently they're not being professional either.  I just couldn't help myself---me bad.  

colettelewis
Community Member

Upwork has a default payment in place for fixed-price jobs. Once a freelancer submits the work, and asks for funds to be released, the client has two weeks in which to review the work, if there is no response from or payment by the client in that time, then the funds are automatically released to the freelancer. Since you knew you were going away, you should have asked the freelancer not to submit the work before you returned. 

 

You haven't been defrauded or scammed, you just hadn't read enough about how fixed-rate gigs work on Upwork. 

Even if I don't read the instructions at all... As a client, I can think about this on a very basic level:

 

1) I hired a freelancer to do some work for me.

2) My credit card was charged immediately to pay for that work.

3) I have asked the freelancer to do the work.

4) Now I go on vacation and don't pay any attention to any of that.

 

Exactly what do I expect will happen with that money?

What do I think is the fair thing that SHOULD happen if I hire a freelancer to work for me, and then he does the work?

After the freelancer has finished the work, there is a period of two weeks during which he waits to get paid for his work. Should that period of time be longer? 2 months? A year? What is reasonable?

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