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db8aa16c
Community Member

Client made the offer to someone else but sent work file to me first

A client sent me a file to work on and later told me that the offer was given to someone else. Is this against the rules or am I protected?

10 REPLIES 10
colettelewis
Community Member


Worawan S wrote:

A client sent me a file to work on and later told me that the offer was given to someone else. Is this against the rules or am I protected?


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I hope you did not deliver the work. Don't ever do any work for a client before you have an official Upwork contract (that you have agreed to) in place.

 

You are protectedf if you have an official contract and if your client funded the agreed amount  in escrow for a fixed-price job. Or if your contract is hourly  but officially tracked. 

 

 

Luckily, I hadn't begun working for them. They said the other freelancer responded sooner (I replied within 4 hours given the 7-8 hour difference in time zones.) The thing is I wasn't even made aware someone else was given the same file. It never happened to me since I started using this website years ago when it was still oDesk!

prestonhunter
Community Member

No, you are not protected.

 

If you worked without a contract, you have no protection from Upwork.

 

You will not be penalized by Upwork. But you won't get paid anything, either.

 

If you didn't do any work, then you have nothing to worry about.

 

Clients are indeed allowed to send files to freelancers. Clients may discuss projects with freelancers and send them files to review and then hire somebody else. That is not against the rules.

 

What clients are not allowed to do is to ask freelancers to work for free.

It would be even more unfair to be penalised by Upwork on top of this when 20% of what I earn go to them. Luckily, I hadn't begun working for the said client, knowing I wasn't given a contract yet. But surely, clients shouldn't go around sending the file to more than one freelancer and saying you get the job (yet hasn't offered a contract) then taking it back and saying well, you didn't respond quickly enough. I did my best to reply given the time zone difference. It feels extremely unfair to receive little support from Upwork when they take so much service fee.

I am sorry if you think this is unfair. But it violates no rules.

 

I have often interviewed for jobs, and been given files to review and then not been hired because the client hired somebody else. Conversely, I have often been hired by clients who were interviewing and providing files to other freelancers.

 

I regard this as normal.

 

If this has never happened to you before as far as you know, then maybe you have been lucky. Or maybe you have consistently been the top pick from among a field of multiple freelancers.

They explained the file over to me. All the message clearly state I got the job, not just one of their shortlisters. I feel freelancers have the right to know they're being put against other candidates. 

tlbp
Community Member

Oops. Zombie thread.


The situation is same with me, im a newbie in upwork and my client gave me the job. But i wasn't aware that i wasn't the only who was given the task, my question is how will i know i get the contract, i thought we had agreement because he gave me access to the file. Please answer. thankyou


Joevelyn D wrote:
The situation is same with me, im a newbie in upwork and my client gave me the job. But i wasn't aware that i wasn't the only who was given the task, my question is how will i know i get the contract, i thought we had agreement because he gave me access to the file. Please answer. thankyou

If you were sent an email from Upwork (!) with an offer and you accepted that official offer and there is a contract on your My Jobs page, you are hired.

 

Otherwise you are not. If you are not hired you should do no work because you actually CAN'T get paid.

Joevelyn, it doesn't matter if another freelancer was given the same job.

 

All that matters is if YOU were actually hired officially on Upwork.

 

Lots of clients hire multiple freelancers to do the same job. That is fine and has nothing to do with you.

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