My checking account got stolen

deanna-mccoy · ‎02-13-2021

everyone

Please be careful someone from upwork tricked me a Bonus check and for laptop and stole all of my money from my checking account

I am trying to heal that now I have zero money

Take care To all Freelancers

petra_r · ‎02-13-2021

Deanna M wrote:
Please be careful someone from upwork tricked me a Bonus check and for laptop and stole all of my money from my checking account

This is why it is strictly forbidden to communicate with a client outside of the platform before a contract is in place and why it is equally strictly forbidden to accept any payment (real or fake) from any client for whatever reason at any time outside of the platform.

That scam is one of the oldest on the Internet.

I am really, really sorry that this has happened to you, may you make better decisions going forwards.

colettelewis · ‎02-13-2021

Deanna M wrote:
everyone

Please be careful someone from upwork tricked me a Bonus check and for laptop and stole all of my money from my checking account

I am trying to heal that now I have zero money

Take care To all Freelancers

______________________________

It was not "someone from Upwork", it was a scammer pretending to be a client on Upwork. This is one of the oldest scams going (since the Internet came into existence). If you had only read Upwork's Terms of Service - which prohibits any exchange of private contact information before a formal contract is in place and also prohibits financial transcactions taking place offsite - before agreeing to a dodgy transaction with a complete stranger, you might still have money in your account.

If Upwork allows you to keep your account, this is a useful place to start:

https://community.upwork.com/t5/New-to-Upwork/Getting-Started-on-Upwork/m-p/264214#M2460

colettelewis · ‎02-13-2021

So sorry Petra, I didn't see your post until after I sent mine. (Something odd going on at the moment, as this keeps happening - as well as my not being able to see public profiles.)

petra_r · ‎02-13-2021

Nichola L wrote:
- as well as my not being able to see public profiles.)

You can see public profiles by removing the extra weird character at the very beginning of the profile url. There is a bug that inserts an extra underscore for reasons best known to itself. If you delete it, you get to the profile. It's the underscore between com/ and the start of the freelancer identifier part of the url - So basically the bug turns https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/~xxxxxxx into https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/_~xxxxxxx

All you have to do is delete the _

NikolaS · ‎02-13-2021

Hi Deanna,

I am sorry to hear about his. Could you please click on my name and send me a PM with more information about the user you are referring to? I will be sure to look into your report and escalate it accordingly.

~ Nikola