Upwork is forcing projects to be finished in 75 days for "fixed-price contract"

[600b15db]

I have been here since Odesk as client. And have spend for multiples of 10.000 USD on Odesk/Upwork.

But never have had so much interfering in a contract by Upwork up till now.

When a client and a freelancer agree to a fix price contract, the time to finish that project should be solo at the decision between client and freelancer.   Upwork should not interfere with this at all.

NOW:
after 75 days Upwork sends the client an email:

"Your contract, ........ with ........, has been idle on Upwork for more than 75 days after the last milestone deadline.
Per the escrow instructions for fixed-price contracts and for your security, this contract will be closed on Upwork in 14 days.
When the contract is closed, a refund request for ....... (the funds still in escrow) will be sent to the freelancer. They will have 7 days to dispute this request.
If you prefer this contract remain open, take action to keep DATABASE manager active for another 90 days.

button to Keep Job Open

I have tried anything. copy the link in the email on the button to "keep the Job Open" and pasting in the browser with the last updated Firefox, Chrome and Explorer with Upwork.
Nothing worked.

I wrote support on February 19, 2020 and they would fix the buy.
No support came.

No 6 months later, again I have the same problem and again i can not use the button to extend.

It looks like Upwork has on purpose deactivated the contract "extending" option, and the bug is not a bug because otherwise it would have been fixed after 6 months.

Hereby Upwork forces client and freelancer to finish a project in 75 days and that is unacceptable. Many things can happen that an extension needs to be given. Especially now with COVID-19, it can happen that some freelancers can not work all the time. Even family matters etc.

This is to much interfering of Upwork forcing client and freelancer in a 75 day period.

[600b15db]

seems this is already from 2018 like that: https://community.upwork.com/t5/Clients/Need-to-Extend-the-contract/m-p/514036 

Support seems to be aware of this and for that they have lots of tricks around it to be able to extend a contract.

- give a bonus (sometimes it is not possible if the freelancer has not done work because of personal issues they could not work, etc.

- create a new milestone (project) for the same reason as above, this is also not always possible.

In short, anything can happen in a life of a freelancer and it should be totally up to the client to give the freelancer an extencion of time to finish the project without Upwork forcing the 75 days on them by blocking the "extencion button" .

Upwork will only get more frustrated clients because they loose a lot of time chatting with Support to find a solution around something that should take no longer then 1 min to click on the button " Keep Job Open" and confirm it in the client account.

After all, clients come to Upwork to gain time by outsourcing tasks to Freelancers. But not to lose hours with chat to solve a problem that after 6 months still is the same.

To much competition online to let clients pass all this. Especially when the costs have gone vertical up compare to years ago when it was stil Odesk and all much simpler.

[g_vasilevski]

Hi Wim,

I`m sorry about the inconvenience this had caused you and I understand your frustration with this. I checked your account and I can see that you`ve already managed to extend your contract and you`re communicating with our team directly on your tickets. 
Our team will update your ticket with additional information as soon as possible and will assist you further. Also, thank you for your feedback I will share it with our product managers. 

[600b15db]

Hi Goran,

thanks for the reply.

Pleae note that the " already managed to extend your contract " was done via the tricks of the support to give a bonus or create a new milestone. I still could not use the "Keep Job Open" button in the email at it is intended to work.  Same as 6 months ago I had to use those tricks also to extend the contract. = also long time loss .

= nothing has been solved by Upwork for this problem.

the explanation stays the same as what I wrote from start.  Upwork should enable again the "Keep Job Open" botton in the email to work so that a client and freelancer can choose what time frame they want to work on a project without Upwork forcing it in the 75 days.

without needed to contact support, spent lots of time and use tricks that legally interfere with a contract.

legally a bonus or a new milestone are given with the first project is finished and not when the first still needs to be done.

so these tricks to extend the contract should not always be used.

[917ff35e]

I have the same issue I need to resolve who can help me ? 

[PradeepH]

Hi Vartan,

Thank you for reaching out to us. I shared your report with our team and one of our agents will reach out to you using a support ticket to assist you further. You can access your support tickets here.

- Pradeep 

[tlsanders]

You can take as long as you like to finish a project. Upwork simply doesn't hold funds in escrow for more than 90 days without activity on the contract. Upwork is not a bank and can't have money sitting around in its care indefinitely with no sign as to whether you're still working on the job or not. The client can easily release a partial payment to cover work completed to date and your 90 days will start over. 

[prestonhunter]

Then don't use fixed-price contracts.

Use hourly contracts.

Problem solved.