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salman_siraji
Community Member

I worked 85 hours for a unresponsive client and now he is demanding the full refund.

I have placed a proposal for the job "INSTAGRAM AD FOR NATURAL ORGANIC SKINCARE" on January 10, 2019. He had sent an hourly contract on January 15, 2019, after the discussion. I accepted the offer and started working on the job. Then he disappeared the whole season. All of a sudden he came back, ended the contract and left feedback with a full of lies. From then he had been continuously lying and blaming me. He is demanding the total money back. Now I want to consult with the community about what should I do?

ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Melanie is quite right:

A freelancer can't simply start logging time and billing hours to a client's account on his own.

 

The client must set up a contract and allow the freelancer to log time.

 

I agree with Petra: 85 hours for this project seems like a LOT.

 

I think there are two sides to this story.

 

It would be good if the client himself would join us in this Forum discussion. We are not going to fully understand his perspective if he does not do so.

 

But let's point out some obvious things:

The freelancer has ALREADY been paid.

The client is apparently REQUESTING a full refund.

But the client has LOST A LOT OF LEVERAGE by closing the contract and leaving a 1-star review with accusations of fraudulent behavior.

 

If it was ME PERSONALLY who was the client, I probably would have messaged the freelancer and said something like this:

"Hello, Salman. Thank you for all the work you did on this project. I'm sorry I was so difficult to reach for a while, but I am here now. I think there may have been some misunderstanding about my expectations regarding this project. $300 is a lot of money for me right now. But I know you did a lot of work on this. Can we discuss a compromise that might be acceptable to both of us?"

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29 REPLIES 29
melaniekhenson
Community Member

It doesn't seem like this client has a bad history overall. He tends to give good reviews. It sounds to me like either a) there's more to this situation or b) he completely misunderstood that he had started the contract and now thinks he is somehow being scammed. 

 

I don't know of ANY way for a freelancer to log hours if a contract isn't started so any client reading that review will likely realize it is the client who misunderstood the situation. A freelancer can't just decide to log hours on a random contract without the contract being awarded to the freelancer and started. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, it's a situation I've never encountered personally.

petra_r
Community Member


Salman S wrote:

He is demanding the total money back. Now I want to consult with the community about what should I do?


Were your hours tracked using the Upwork tracker and with meaningful memos and adequate activity etc?

 

85 hours for an Instagram advert sounds a bit excessive....

The manual hours was not permitted. The total hours was logged by the tracker. And the complete work has been delivered!


Salman S wrote:
The manual hours was not permitted. The total hours was logged by the tracker. And the complete work has been delivered!

meaningful memos? Activity? 85 hours spent on one advert?

 

I have created almost 170 contents.


Salman S wrote:
The manual hours was not permitted. The total hours was logged by the tracker. And the complete work has been delivered!

If you respond to the negative feedback you should indicate that the hours were logged using the time tracker and billed weekly. Thus, someone representing the client and using the client's Upwork account did authorize the contract. 

But did the client communicate to you that he wanted you to make 170 ads? The original post seemed to not be pural but rather looking for 1. Did they communicate that they needed more and if they did, with something like 170 ads I'd be checking with them to see if 2-3 are good first before continuing.

 

That's what would be important here because if they didn't communicate and it was me I'd wait until they get back to continue work. I'd send a message every so often to check in and see if there is any work they need or just leave a message kindly wondering about the contract. 

 

At the same time, the client had the chance to review the hours so did he just keep approving and releasing payments? If so, it is their fault for not expressing to you that they disliked the work. 


Amanda F wrote:

But did the client communicate to you that he wanted you to make 170 ads? That's what would be important here because if they didn't communicate and it was me I'd wait until they get back to continue work. I'd send a message every so often to check in and see if there is any work they need or just leave a message kindly wondering about the contract. 


Personally, so would I...but it was on the client to make sure he didn't hit a button to get work started without realizing what he was doing (I guess...?), then forget all about it, then not dispute hours which he was surely advised were done for a given week. I agree that it's a bad idea to move forward when there are crickets from the client if there was no CLEAR outline of exactly what to do, at X hours per week (and it sounds like there wasn't), but that's not the feedback Salman wants changed. What he wants changed is the weird feedback indicating that the project was somehow never assigned and the hint that Salman somehow has cracked the system and managed to illegally log hours or something. 

Yeah it does definitely seem weird the way the client left that message. But something has to be going on there. It almost seems like they liked the work up until a certain point and then got mad and regreted getting it all. They did have to approve the hours afterall. I personally still would want to check with the client and make sure they approve so many before continuing to do 170 if it was the case that this didn't happen. If the client kept approving though and suddently got angry and made up this whole story about not hiring in the first place, well that is different. 

prestonhunter
Community Member

re: "Now I want to consult with the community about what should I do?"

 

First of all... This IS THE RIGHT thing to do.

 

Talk to us. There is a lot of experience here.

Don't do or say anything rash.

 

And I'm sorry about your situation. But let's talk this through so we can come up with a solution that works well for you, and the client as well.

 

Let's get something out of the way, and be transparent about what is happening here.

 

The original poster has a closed contract with 85 hours logged, at a rate of $3.99/hour. The total is almost exactly $300.

 

So, yes, that is a chunk of change. But we need to be clear that this is 85 hours billed at under four dollars an hour, not 85 hours billed at $100/hour or something. Need to keep this in perspective.

Yes, he disputed the last weeks 5:30 hours. I accepted that.
mystudiomke
Community Member

Salman - so this client send you a contract, you accept it and then he ghosted?

How can you have worked for 85 hours without any direction, confirmation, clarifying and approval of the work if your client ghosted?  What type of work did you provide for him and did he get that final work?

 

I guess I am stuck on how you can put that many hours on a project without communicating with him at all. Did you assume to continue working even though he was no longer replying? Also, did you have a weekly limit or unlimited hours? Did you use the tracker or submitted manual hours?  Please give us more info so we can advise. From what you have said and the client feedback it just doesn't add up. 

 

 

 

 

 

Lila

Melanie is quite right:

A freelancer can't simply start logging time and billing hours to a client's account on his own.

 

The client must set up a contract and allow the freelancer to log time.

 

I agree with Petra: 85 hours for this project seems like a LOT.

 

I think there are two sides to this story.

 

It would be good if the client himself would join us in this Forum discussion. We are not going to fully understand his perspective if he does not do so.

 

But let's point out some obvious things:

The freelancer has ALREADY been paid.

The client is apparently REQUESTING a full refund.

But the client has LOST A LOT OF LEVERAGE by closing the contract and leaving a 1-star review with accusations of fraudulent behavior.

 

If it was ME PERSONALLY who was the client, I probably would have messaged the freelancer and said something like this:

"Hello, Salman. Thank you for all the work you did on this project. I'm sorry I was so difficult to reach for a while, but I am here now. I think there may have been some misunderstanding about my expectations regarding this project. $300 is a lot of money for me right now. But I know you did a lot of work on this. Can we discuss a compromise that might be acceptable to both of us?"

Can I upload my conversations screenshots?

re: "Can I upload my conversations screenshots?"

 

How about you summarize what we would learn if we read those screenshots.

If you upload the actual screenshots, they are just going to be removed by Forum Moderators as a violation of community guidelines.

 

The time to discuss refunds is BEFORE closing a contract. And BEFORE giving a freelancer a one-star review.

 

IT IS POSSIBLE that the client may simply be done with all this and walk away angry.

 

But it is also possible that the client could still cause problems for the freelancer by going to Upwork Customer Support directly and trying to get a refund.

 

The client is not here, so I will focus my advice on the freelancer.


Salman: That's a lot of hours for a project for which there was no communication. If you can think of ANY WAY in which your work on this project may have been... questionable. If you can put yourself into the client's mindset and think of things from his perspective and come up with some rational for compromise here... Maybe the right thing to do is to offer a refund. If you think that the client has a point, and if maybe you didn't work as hard on this project as would justify that number of hours... then you should keep in mind that a complete refund would completely remove that job listing and feedback from your public work history. (Private feedback would remain in the background.)

 

Or if a complete refund is unjustified, but if a partial refund would be the honorable thing to do based on the work that was actually done, that is something you could do without needing to ask anybody's permission.

 

But if the billing is genuinely justified, then I'm not suggesting you refund anything. If the client is acting dishonorably here, then that should not be accepted. And could even be reported.

Yes I have got the idea about what should I do!I have got my solution here!
I am feeling lucky for having the kind community like you, Sir
Thanks to you, for your valuable time here.
Wish your well fortune.
God bless you!

There might be more than meets the eye here. I reviewed the client's reviews, and the client was addressed by various freelancers as Kyle, Monica, and Jorge. So perhaps one of these personas hired Salman without notifying the others. In fact, one freelancer received 5 star reviews from both Monica and Jorge, but then on the last job she did for the client, she received a 4 star review with a comment about a language barrier, which somehow wasn't a problem during the previous 12 jobs.

__________________________________________________
"No good deed goes unpunished." -- Clare Boothe Luce

Yes, his behaviour was like I stole his money. Or some kind of cheating I have done with him. That is not acceptable.
Of course if he asks me politely or in a kind way that he does not need the work he needs a refund. In a way like that everyone can do a negotiation!
We are working here, not cheating with anyone!
Those aggressive words with full of lies!
Is should not be the behavior of human beings!

If you correctly understood the work you agreed to, completed it and logged your hours properly using the Time Tracker app, it is the client's fault for not checking with you and not paying attention to the hours you were booking in real time via the easy access (s)he had to Upwork's ongong recording of your activity.

 

(S)he could have called halt at any time to keep you from billing hours; (s)he didn't, and you continued on. There is no apparent reason for you to even consider refunding any money.

 

Good luck.

 

 


Will L wrote:

If you correctly understood the work you agreed to, completed it and logged your hours properly using the Time Tracker app, it is the client's fault for not checking with you and not paying attention to the hours you were booking in real time via the easy access (s)he had to Upwork's ongong recording of your activity.

 

(S)he could have called halt at any time to keep you from billing hours; (s)he didn't, and you continued on. There is no apparent reason for you to even consider refunding any money.

 

Good luck.

 

 


I'm wondering about ^ this ^ part of it too. Mistakes can happen but how could the client legitimately think that, for one thing, the freelancer started working without there being a contract (???), and for another, somehow secretly kept working without her noticing the hours logging on and on?

 

Granted if it had been me...I wouldn't have continued to work that many hours if I had heard literally not a peep from the client, unless I had been given clear directions on the project that would justify that many hours. I mean...you really never know. I've worked a few hourly contracts and each time I haven't felt comfortable adding more hours, even if they were alotted, if I hadn't heard anything from the client and wasn't 100% certain on how to move forward. But that's at least somewhat beside the point...whether or not Salman was pushing ahead with (designated) hours perhaps a bit foolhardedly, the client client(s) clearly didn't oversee this work at all, and clearly did award the contract...or else no work could have been done.

 

The thing is, if a mistake did happen and one member of the client's team, for example, didn't know the other member had awarded the contract, that's fine. Mistakes DO happen, everyone makes one every once in a while. But this angry response on the part of the client, and his/her insistence that work started with no contract (???), is so out of left field.

 

Clearly whatever the problem is or was, it comes down to communication. Salman...I would not in the future just push forward with quite a few hours of work if I had heard absolutely nothing and had even the slightest doubt about the project. JMO.

Oh, sorry. So here's what I would do, personally. I'd write a quick note to the client:

 

"(Client), I wish this project could have worked out to your and my satisfaction. As your records will show, you awarded me this project on (date whatever) with a maximum  of (however many hours per week). On Upwork, a freelancer is not able to log hours or even begin work if there is no contract. It seems as though there was a misunderstanding somewhere. Can you check your records to try to find out where you believe the miscommunication occured? From my end, it seemed as though this were a standard contract and that it was proceeding as hourly contracts generally do and per  the instructions that you gave me on (date x). Thanks so very much."

 

Or something like that.

 

I wouldn't respond yet to the client's feedback on your profile. The rest of your profile has very positive reviews, and as I mentioned, any client should know that you actually couldn't have logged hours without a contract. BUT if you do decide to respond to the feedback (I rarely recommend this...actually, this may be the first time I've ever wondered whether a response to feedback should be left), I might say something very simple, professional and to the point, like: "Unfortunately there was a misunderstanding on the client's part about how hourly projects are started and billed. I worked per the parameters given to me by Upwork and per the client's exact instructions. Hope to have a better experience in the future."

 

You don't, of course (hope to have a better experience in the future - with this dude, anyway), but it leaves things on a positive and polished note, v. the client's rantings about how you somhow magically worked a project that was never awarded to you.

 

And as I said...in the future, don't log so many hours (two full standard work weeks, at least per U.S. standards, and probably in other countries as well) with no communication from the client and if you have ANY (I mean that...ANY) doubt that you client would be THRILLED with the amount of hours you're working and that the project absolutely warrants that much work.

 

 

If you correctly understood the work you agreed to, completed it and logged your hours properly using the Time Tracker app, it is the client's fault for not checking 
Everything is checked!
But I don't want such comment on my profile. I will request him to remove his aggressive words.

 

re: "But I don't want such comment on my profile. I will request him to remove his aggressive words."

 

What are you offering him in return?

 

How would he benefit from removing or changing that feedback?


Preston H wrote:

re: "But I don't want such comment on my profile. I will request him to remove his aggressive words."

 

What are you offering him in return?

 

How would he benefit from removing or changing that feedback?


Preston, normally I would agree with this ^ but in this case, the client IS clearly wrong. I still don't know whether I would ask a client to revise feedback, personally, but the feedback is incorrect no matter how you slice it. That's not a matter of opinion or expectations, it's a matter of how Upwork works and how hourly contracts work. There's just no debating that happy or unhappy, the points the client makes in the feedback are really off. There's nothing a freelancer should owe a client for the client simply not writing something that is nonsense regarding how Upwork operates, IMO. 

 

The only way a client would benefit, as far as I can see, is to not look like someone who assigns projects, forgets about that, insists it never happened, attacks freelancers, and who has no clue how projects work and may fly off the handle after having paid for work. Not all freelancers look at clients' feedback to others but many do. That's really the only "benefit," if you will, besides the fact that presumably, he did get 85 hours of work done...I can't see any additional benefits the client would require or deserves.

 

(That said, I doubt he'd change the feedback anyway...again, I personally would leave it...the client made himself look like a loon, no need to eliminate that warning to other freelancers, IMO. That team, if it's a team, needs to get its ish together.)

 

By the way, Salman, if the client changes his written feedback (the comments), the actual numerical feedback he originally gave will still remain. That can't be changed. Just something to keep in mind. 

I think what I am just wondering with this one is if the client ghosted you like you said, how were you both communicating about all those 170 ads? Like I said I wouldn't do that much unless asked to do so and with approval ongoingly from the client. Did the client actually say "give me 170 ads" and if so, were any shown to the client during the process or did he just not come back and you kept doing them? 

 

If there was communication and they just kept approving, who was the person you were dealing with at that time? Was it that person who left the feedback or someone else? 

 

I can definitely see a client leaving fake feedback to get out of it too though. In asking this I am not saying you did anything wrong, just wondering if you kept up with the client as you did so many. 

 

Either way, the approval of all the work and not realizing the person is hired sounds very silly indeed. That would certainly be mismanagement of the client/project manager or a largely fabricated story if they wanted you to do all the work. 

If the client is actually running a business, then the client needs to manage the freelancer he hires. If the client is sharing an Upwork account with other people, then he needs to do so responsibly.

 

If my office has a petty cash account for paying for incidentals and accessed by 15 people, I'm not going to chew out the pizza delivery guy when 10 pizzas show up that I didn't order.

 

Anyway... it's three hundred dollars. That's a rounding error for most businesses.


Melanie H wrote:

By the way, Salman, if the client changes his written feedback (the comments), the actual numerical feedback he originally gave will still remain. That can't be changed. Just something to keep in mind. 


This is actually not true. Of course the number of stars can be changed, along with the text.

The *private* feedback can't be changed.

kat303
Community Member

IMO I think that this job was for only 1 completed add to be placed on facebook and instagram. I can see the OP sending off some drafts of which the client will pick from and the OP would then complete the job, BUT... 170??? Was the client going to put 170 adds on just 2 sites. 

 

I may be wrong but I see it this way. - The clients account was a shared account. The client who wrote that feedback was probably the head or the one in charge of this project. One of his associates probably put the job up, and hired the OP without getting the ok from the main client. Then either forgot about it, or got busy doing something else, or didn't want to let the main client know what they did. The OP didn't hear anything back, so he just kept working producing ad after ad for 2 weeks and would probably have continued way past 170 ads if the main client didn't see on some report that this was going on. The client may be 100% right that he didn't hire the OP. (one of his associates did) And since the main client didn't know about what was happening, he had no reason to check anything,....until he saw a bill.

 

I hope that the main client can get to the bottom of this,to find out exactly who initiated this, because someone hired the OP. He can not hire himself and set up a contract for himself and accept his own contract. 

 

But also the OP should not have continued to work, producing ALL those ads. (and who knows how many more if he wasn't stopped.)  There definitely should be some sort of compromise between both the client and the op. 

petra_r
Community Member


Kathy T wrote:

IMO I think that this job was for only 1 completed add to be placed on facebook and instagram. I can see the OP sending off some drafts of which the client will pick from and the OP would then complete the job, BUT... 170??? Was the client going to put 170 adds on just 2 sites. 


I see it exactly the same as Kathy.....

 


Kathy T wrote:The OP didn't hear anything back, so he just kept working producing ad after ad for 2 weeks and would probably have continued way past 170 ads if the main client didn't see on some report that this was going on.

over 2 months... contract started in January...

Who takes a contract for one advert and then just keeps going for months without ever hearing from them again...

 

Preston H wrote:

re: "But I don't want such comment on my profile. I will request him to remove his aggressive words."

 

What are you offering him in return?


Wonderful,  what you are (subtly as a brick) suggesting is called feedback manipulation (it is a terms of service violation to barter for change of feedback in exchange for anything.)

 

Are you trying to get the OP suspended?

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