I have both, a freelancer as well as a client account on Upwork and they are linked. As a freelancer, I've made a significant amount of which Upwork has rather happily taken its share of 10%. And they recently treated me like a thief. I am posting this to vent out and try to find the reason behind their actions.
One of the cards I had on Upwork since the last year was maxed out due to some purchases I made earlier. And on Monday (17th July), a $44 transaction that I owed to one of my freelancers (I was the client) was declined. I received the email that said that I have until 21st July to pay up or my account will be restricted. It was expected workflow. I paid the amount from another payment method I had on my profile. I noticed that my accound had been suspended.
The deviation from this was pretty nightmarish. My client and freelancer accounts were blocked simultaneously on July 17th itself, despite the email saying any action would only be taken on 21st. All my freelancer proposals were marked as withdrawn, and my profile went from being Top Rated to 100% JSS.
I reached out to the reps and asked why they took action if I had until July 21st. No direct response except that I had to "remove" the erring card. Only once I removed the erring card were my client contracts unpaused, and the notice to contact support was removed on Wednesday. My proposals continue to be marked as withdrawn by Upwork and my Top Rated badge is still nowhere to be found.
Now, I pay my 5% cut to Upwork in exchange of it acting as my collection agent and providing me the platform. While I am fortunate enough to be confident about replacing the platform part of it, I was happy to pay its cut in exchange for collecting on my behalf. I was hugely disappointed when my collection agent turned against me for $44 after taking over $20,000 in fees from me. Now that Upwork has proven itself to have questionable decision making, I am highly motivated to switch to other methods for growing my work.
Did anyone else have similar experience? What did you do? And what was the final verdict.
If anyone representing Upwork is reading this, have you already implemented AI into this workflow?
