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tomzilla1
Community Member

Account flagged for sharing email for platform invite.

So I just got an email from Upwork that my account was flagged for sharing my email for invite to Google Analytics so I can scope out the work on a potential client. Wasn't this a settled matter that it's not a violation under the new rules? I'm so confused. All the chat and calls have gone through Upwork's new call feature, and I signed the new client on Upwork, the reason for asking for invite is only so I can scope and provide the potential client a quote.


**Edited for Community Guidelines**

11 REPLIES 11
wescowley
Community Member

According to the bold text in the first post in this announcement thread, that situation is explicitly allowed:

https://community.upwork.com/t5/Announcements/Frequently-Asked-Questions-on-TOS-changes-regarding-in...
pandoraharper
Community Member


Tom Z wrote:

So I just got an email from Upwork that my account was flagged for sharing my email for invite to Google Analytics so I can scope out the work on a potential client. Wasn't this a settled matter that it's not a violation under the new rules? I'm so confused. All the chat and calls have gone through Upwork's new call feature, and I signed the new client on Upwork, the reason for asking for invite is only so I can scope and provide the potential client a quote.


**Edited for Community Guidelines**


Finally, we have a real live example of:

 

1 team believing one version of the TOS, and another team believing another version.

 

Totally expected, stupid, and furthermore unsafe for all of us faithfull freelancer who are just trying to obey the stupid rules.

This is not okay.

 

Nobody is perfect. Upwork's programmers are not perfect. Upwork's team members are not perfect. Upwork's policy makers are not perfect.

 

But I believe they are all people with good intentions who want to do the right thing.

 

I'm not perfect. Had I been involved in any of this, as a programmer, support person, or policy maker, I could have made mistakes as well.

 

The thing to do now is to take whatever back-end steps are necessary to remove the flagging of this freelancer's account... remove any kind of sanctions, and send the freelancer a short note to apologize for the inconvenience.


Then a short, simple note explaining what happened and why it was a mistake should be sent to the Upwork team members who made the mistake. This is a VERY NEW policy, and there is some complexity to it that not everybody has completely learned yet.

 

No reason to get mad at anybody. Just need to fix this.


Pandora H wrote:

Tom Z wrote:

So I just got an email from Upwork that my account was flagged for sharing my email for invite to Google Analytics so I can scope out the work on a potential client. Wasn't this a settled matter that it's not a violation under the new rules? I'm so confused. All the chat and calls have gone through Upwork's new call feature, and I signed the new client on Upwork, the reason for asking for invite is only so I can scope and provide the potential client a quote.


**Edited for Community Guidelines**


Finally, we have a real live example of:

 

1 team believing one version of the TOS, and another team believing another version.

 

Totally expected, stupid, and furthermore unsafe for all of us faithfull freelancer who are just trying to obey the stupid rules.


 

 

Yea I'm so confused... And at the same time wondering if one day my account will be disabled because of one team member saying one thing and another saying something else... The email is only for sharing access, no communication outside of Upwork. I've been even explicitly telling new potential clients that the new Upwork policy is we have to have the call inside Upwork, no cell phones, no zooms until contract is in place.

You are not confused.

You understand the policy correctly.

 

You are disappointed that somebody made a mistake and you are concerned about how that will impact you.

I never crtiticise the platform I'm a part of, but this is stoopid with a double 'oo'. We all know that we could cold email anytime we want. All of us.

The reason we stick to Upwork AND pay 20% service charges is for payment protection. At least I do!

This is EXACTLY what we've been trying to get Upwork to understand, to no avail...

 

I've been having conversations like this

 

email.png

 

I can promise you that should I get flagged, the Internet will blow up....

lenaellis
Community Member

Hi Tom and all, 

 

Thank you for sharing your experience. I understand there is a degree of confusion and anxiety with the TOS changes. We are not out to action and remove people from the platform because something was misinterpreted. If you receive a message from us regarding these changes it is for us to further understand why the contact info was shared and to educate customers on these new changes.

 

You are allowed to share your email for scoping purposes. Please be clear when communicating with clients that you are sharing your email for that purpose. Don't just volunteer your email address and then assume that we know it is for project scoping purposes. Tom, in your case you were very clear from the conversation that it was for project scoping and it was specifically related to the job post. The agent involved will be coached as this was a clear mistake.

Untitled


Lena E wrote:

We are not out to action and remove people from the platform because something was misinterpreted. If you receive a message from us regarding these changes it is for us to further understand why the contact info was shared and to educate customers on these new changes.


The point is that if the exceptions are official and deemed acceptable in the workflow (even though I still maintain - feeling like a parrot at the n-th repetition of this - they should've been included in the actual ToS for aboslute certainty), we should not be getting flagged for them, and we should not have to do additional work to explain to a support rep why the info was shared. 

 

On top of the unnecessary explanations, every *you've been flagged* email causes some anxiety - even when you're certain you haven't done anything wrong - because your platform rules are getting messier and you never know if a bad client match hasn't started a money-motivated crusade just to try their luck. 

 

If the goal here was to create an atmosphere of constant uncertainty, congrats, it's working. 

tlsanders
Community Member

I'm sure thousands of freelancers will have the same experience, since Upwork created a bizarre and complex decision tree as to when this is and isn't allowed and then did not make it an official part of the rule.

tlbp
Community Member

This policy may be the one to convince me that I am better off sourcing my own clients. It is sooooo embarrassing to tell prospects that Upwork doesn't trust either one of us enough to let us use the communication channels of our choice.

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