Client giving me threat.

[b09ad86b]

Client is giving me threat for not refund his money.

i will add whatsapp chat i know upwork don't believe outside chat but i just want to send you and give you alert that this client may want to harm my profile please check that cleint his name is **Edited for Community Guidelines**   you can check in myprofle...

**Edited for Community Guidelines** 

[prestonhunter]

The screenshot shows that the client is asking you for a $840 refund.

That makes no sense.

When clients hire freelancers to work for them, the clients are supposed to pay the freelancer.

Freelancers are not supposed to pay clients.

Why is this client making such a silly request?

[b09ad86b]

i want to report this to upwork he is also threatning me in whatsapp to banned my account please do something

[prestonhunter]

That is a silly, empty threat.

He can not "ban" your Upwork account.

It sounds like he is simply a bully and a thief.

You need to BLOCK him on WhatsApp so that it is impossible for him to send you messages using that app. If he wants to communicate with you, he must do it on the Upwork Messages tool.

And of course you should not give him money.

Is this an hourly contract?
Is the contract open or closed?

[b09ad86b]

hourly contract and upwork close that contract ...i just don't want any risk in upwork i just want to make sure that....

[prestonhunter]

The contract is hourly.

The time you logged was automatically billed and you were automatically paid.

The contract is now CLOSED.

That means that this contract is over. It is in the past.

Maybe the client can ASK Upwork to help, but about all that Upwork would do would be to ask you to consider the client's request.

It sound like there is nothing at all that the client can do.

He is just being a crybaby and a bully.

Do NOT argue with him. Do not defend yourself. Ignoring him completely may be the best thing to do.

How long ago was the contract closed?

[feed_my_eyes]

That's pretty strong language after hearing only one side of the story and not getting a clear answer as to why the OP charged 15 times his profile rate. The OP has started a new thread in which he says that Upwork did refund the client, so it looks like the client COULD do something about this, contrary to your opinion.

[martina_plaschka]

Refund him. Why should he pay 15 times your hourly rate? That makes no sense. 

[the-right-writer]

Relax, the client can't get you banned unless you violated the Terms of Service for Whatsapp or Upwork.

Also, Upwork has no control over a messaging platform. They would have to take that up with Facebook, ahem, Meta. Upwork can ban you for violation of the rules but not because a client wants a refund.

It apears the contract is still open. You said Upwork ended the contract. How did Upwork end the contract? 

[penngrp]

Job is showing as being in progress. It is also 15 x's your normally hourly rate of $6. The actual job posting has an hourly rate of $3 to $4. It sounds like you were inadvertantly paid $90/h instead of $6/h.

[yofazza]

That client will get his money back one way or another 😁

You should just refund to save time and to prevent possible "financial account suspension".

[martina_plaschka]

The client probably made a mistake paying you 90/hour when your hourly rate is 6. Refund the client. You didn't legitimately earn this money. 

[bobafett999]

Don't want to argue if buyer made a mistake or not.  Just curious, the buyer did agree to pay the high rate. I wonder who will upwork side with.

[martina_plaschka]

Well it goes without saying that this is not a good look. Even if he used the time tracker correctly, upwork will pay his profile rate, not the fantasy rate. 

[prestonhunter]

re: "Even if he used the time tracker correctly, upwork will pay his profile rate, not the fantasy rate."

If thr matter came down to Upwork Payment Protection, Upwork covers the freelancer's regular hourly rate OR the going rate within the market niche. So I agree with what Martina is saying about what Upwork will cover,

But Upwork Payment Protection is not necessarily going to be invoked in this situation.

Hasanur: If there was a misunderstanding about the hourly rate, then go ahead and issue a refund to the client calculated to cover the difference that arose from the misunderstanding.

I think that the original poster will do the right thing.

Having said that, an interesting question arises:

What if the freelancer decides to not refund anything?

Would the client have any recourse whatsoever? Or would the client be unable to get Upwork to do anything?

If the client issued a chargeback on their credit card, then Upwork would NOT cover the full amount of payment. In face, Upwork might claw back all of this client's payment. But that would mean that Upwork would terminate the client's account, because issueing a chargeback is a violation of TOS with clearly defined consequences.

As an experienced client, I may not be able to completely relate to the client in this situation, because I don't hire freelancers without noticing what the freelancer is charging for their hourly rate.

And I don't let freelancers spend time working on my behalf without monitoring their work diaries. And I don't let freelancers spend a bunch of time working and then ask them to pay me the money that they earned.

I understand the discomfort some posters in this thread are expressing about the freelancer. But also: This client really messed up, and if he is threatening the freelancer due to his own mistakes, he is not innocent at all.

[bobafett999]

I have never understood why people from Bangladesh work for such a cheap rate.  BTW the freelancer does have an ongoing job at $43/hr.  I don't understand.  May be they were fixed price jobs converted in to hourly rate for whatever reason.  

I was in similar situation.  We agreed on a fixed price, but they made a mistake and made it hourly.  I don't know now, but at that time once a job order is issued the payment mechanism can't be changed.  I had charged few hours.  The way it got settled was me issuing them a refund and they creating a new contract.  

[martina_plaschka]

The client does not look like the typical scammer, otherwise I would have suspected some kind of collusion to game the system as we so often see here. 

Still there is the fundamental problem of accepting 90/hour with a profile rate of 6/hour. Maybe the freelancer believes that is a good look. It isn't. It looks like the freelancer taking advantage of a client and overcharging him. Many people fail to understand that showing that kind of inconsistency is a red flag. What do you tell a client that insists on paying, for whatever unknowable reason, 15 times your hourly rate? You politely decline, and ask to be hired at your profile rate. You think you can charge more than 6? Increase your profile rate. This is what professionals do. 

[roberty1y]

Having said that, an interesting question arises:

What if the freelancer decides to not refund anything?

Would the client have any recourse whatsoever? Or would the client be unable to get Upwork to do anything?

The freelancer would probably be within his rights not to refund anything. But the client could give him a rotten one-star review, claiming he stole $800 from him by not returning money that was mistakenly paid out. The longer the dispute goes on, the less chance there is of avoiding a bad review from this client.

[pgiambalvo]

Client. And if they don't, client will get a chargeback and not pay anything.

[yofazza]

Upwork use ambiguous articles in the terms to not pay the freelancer where I think they should. It'll be weird if they side with the freelancer now.

[feed_my_eyes]

They absolutely do not use ambiguous terms. It states very clearly that hourly payment protection covers your usual rate or the going market rate, whichever is lower. This is to prevent dishonest freelancers from trying to game the system. This freelancer's usual rate is $6/hour, and he tried to charge $90/hour in this case. What part is "ambiguous" here?

[yofazza]

"Adequate and fair" activity level, "inadequately described memos", by whose definition?

"Usual rate", "going market rate", how can this be clear? Is it usual in Upwork? In the world? In the freelancer's country? What about experience level?

"Complicit in another user's violation".  When the other party violates terms, you are not (or you still are) eligible for protection, decided by Upwork, and goodwill (don't know the correct English term) doesn't count. Rubber term.

The above ambiguous terms has example cases. Different outcomes for the same terms. One interesting case is when a freelancer who initially not eligible for protection, becomes eligible (and paid) after weeks of support chat and forum post. Then the thread is gone. It was (IIRC) about rates. The freelancer initially not eligible because of the "unusual" rate, where it was explained that it's normal to have different hourly rates.

That being said, I wrote "ambiguous articles" above to respond to comment about who's Upwork will side with? I basically said that Upwork don't protect on some cases where I think they should  (freelancer conned by chargeback on non-scamjob case although all the "terms" are met), so it's impossible that they'll apply the protection on the thread starter's case (even if all the "terms" are met by him), because I don't think they should.

[roberty1y]

You should give him back the money. I don't know what went wrong, but he paid you $90 an hour for a job advertised at $3-$4 an hour. He's owed just over $800. Judging by his work history, he's a reasonable client. He must have mistakenly set the hourly rate at $90.

[ahmadsameerch99]

I believe it is always better to talk over the zoom meeting with the client and be honest with the commitments and terms you have decided while starting the project. You should always look into resolving the issue rather than taking to the Upwork community.