Clients not closing jobs leading to loss of connects

[kaustubhags]

Clients are unresponsive and have not responded to proposals submitted. In that why should I withdraw proposals and loose connects and thereby waste money? It has been more than a month that my proposals are pending with 6 connects each and clients have not responded at all to my proposals. If the hiring has ended why dont clients close the jobs so that I can get my connects back to apply to other jobs. Moreover why are clients allowed to keep jobs open for more than a week which causes a loss of contractor connects? Is Upwork trying to make money using unethical ways under the pretext of connects ?

Please cancel/close the jobs if the clients don't want to hire us and refund the connects so that I can apply for other work.

Regards
Kaustubha Gudi

[feed_my_eyes]

Upwork recently did a test in which they returned connects if the client didn't hire anyone. They decided to end this practice, so I would assume it's because this led to clients being flooded with proposals and therefore, they were less likely to hire anyone. Upwork isn't trying to scam you out of connects - they make a lot more money when a freelancer is actually hired - but clients are under no obligation to hurry up and make a decision, or to hire anyone at all if they don't find what they're looking for. I, for one, would hate to see job posts closed after only one week, since I have frequently been hired even after several week or months have gone by.

You should just treat connects as a business expense and buy more if you need them. 

[kaustubhags]

If clients can't decide for sure whether they must hire a freelancer even after a month has passed by then the number of connects must be reduced for the job or they should make the jobs mainstream ones rather than using freelancing platforms. Sleeping with plenty of proposals for a month and not hiring candidates and not even turning up politely or deciding not to use freelancers service must not cost freelancers money when freelancers have other clients to apply jobs for as well. Upwork must be a level playing field  and play fair with both freelancers and clients and must not be greedy or partial towards clients alone and use money making tactics to extract money from freelancers.

I know lot of clients have the habit of just sleeping with freelancer proposals forever and never reply back or connect with the freelancer's at all and rather play cheap exploitation tactics to extract money from freelancers without paying them at all. This further allows them to tell other freelancers that they have multiple proposals and so they can't decide who is less expensive, who is more laborious and can work for less pay, who is better of all the freelancers etc. just to name a few.

Upwork is a freelancers market and not mainstream job market and it was never one. I have seen Upwork quietly looking it's charm due to several reasons and unfair competition among freelancers as well. 

This needs to be worked out.

[martina_plaschka]

Use the hiring rate as your guidance, and only apply to jobs where the client has a hiring rate above 80%, or 90%, or whatever is the number you find useful for your decision. 

[wlyonsatl]

When a client hires a freelancer on a project and doesn't need to hire another freelancer on the same project, the job posting should be taken down so freelancers won't waste time and money sending a proposal the client won't even read.