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datdeejay
Community Member

Now that Connects cost hard-earned money, why don't job postings expire?

It's going on August and I still have open proposals from jobs I applied to back in April! Clearly the client isn't looking to hire anyone anymore. These clients have either gone ghost or for whatever reason just leaves the listing open indefinitely. 

 

Now that Connects are costing us money, there should be some sort of policy in place that automatically cancels a job listing is no one is hired after a certain amount of time.

 

I've always purchased more Connects and have been a Plus subscriber for years. I counted 98 Connects still up in the air from job listings 30+ days old. 

 

It's bad enough we're being nickled and dimed every step of the way, but freelancers also assume all of the crap around here.

- 20% taken out of our earnings.

- Up to $1 to apply for a position.

- Constantly having to re-verify identity, complete reCaptchas every other hour, or otherwise have your account frozen until you do. 

Meanwhile, clients aren't regulated or checked in any way except to have a lower hire rate % when they waste our time.... which doesn't do much on their end but literally costs us money on ours. 

30 REPLIES 30
williambernal
Community Member

DL,

 

All of your points are absolutely valid and this is an ongoing problem for all freelancers. If it's any consolation I can tell you that, even for the most experienced FLs, things are currently tough all over.

 

In regards to obviously abandoned job posts however, 

I would call to your ATTENTION, the professional pledge of Upwork Moderator Joanne Marie P.-

"We regularly reach out to clients who have open job posts to encourage them to close them if they don’t intend to hire. Because we know the move to paid Connects has made this issue more important, we have already ramped up our outreach to clients who post jobs and don’t hire, and are looking into other ways to BETTER ENSURE THESE JOBS GET CLOSED SO YOUR  CONNECTS ARE RETURNED IN THESE CASES."

 

I personally track all of my proposals carefully and at the 30 day mark I begin to flag these posts. At the 33 day mark I report these posts to the Upwork "Help" Center, reminding them of the above pledge, and then request-

1. Please contact client regarding their professional intentions

2. Remove post without further delay

3. Return my Connects immediately

 

There is responsible action taken occasionally, but just as often there is no responsible action taken, and absolutely no "Help & Support" given. You should know, however, that either way it's a time-consuming process. 

If more freelancers made this request, however, I would hope that UW might make some reasonable changes.

 

Work smart, work safe!

 

Hi! William.

If client proactively closes job more than 30 days after original posting, you don't get back your connects.

This is how it was even in the era of free connects.

If they proactively close it less than 30 days after posting, you get it back.

 

Please confirm if you've experienced anything on the contrary.


Abinadab wrote:

 

If client proactively closes job more than 30 days after original posting, you don't get back your connects.

This is how it was even in the era of free connects.

If they proactively close it less than 30 days after posting, you get it back.


 

If the client closes the job post without having hired anyone you get your connects back. It makes no difference whether it was over 30 days or not.

If the job post expires for being over 30 days inactive, you don't.

 


William wrote:

personally track all of my proposals carefully and at the 30 day mark I begin to flag these posts. At the 33 day mark I report these posts to the Upwork "Help" Center, reminding them of the above pledge, and then request-

1. Please contact client regarding their professional intentions

2. Remove post without further delay

3. Return my Connects immediately

 

If more freelancers made this request, however, I would hope that UW might make some reasonable changes.


If more freelancers willfully waste Support time (which we all pay for with our fees) I would hope that Upwork might make the reasonable change to charge for support. Considering the blatant abuse which clogs up the system and means that people who REALLY need support have to wait, I'd be all in favor of that.

Say 20 connects for live chat, 10 for a ticket?

 

William, did you really misinterpret that canned response so completely that you thought it was "a pledge" and meant an actual human would contact clients to beg them to close contracts? 

Did you really think a vague promise to look into other ways constituted some promise to return connects (rather than the auto-generated emails that are sent?) 

 

Or do you just have too much time on your hands to track every proposal and then keep running to support to remind them of some pledge you know perfectly well does not mean what you are trying to pretend that it means?

Petra,

 

Please feel free to share what your definition of professional Help & Support entails, anytime. All I know from this forum is it appears clear that many feelancers do, in fact, require actual help and support from the Upwork Help Center.

If the suggestion is that the Upwork Help Center reps might find themselves somehow overburdened by their professional repsonsibilities, perhaps they should seek less stressful employment elsewhere, and give the next in line an opportunity to shine!

 

As for the words of Upwork Moderator Joanne Marie P; that is a direct quote, without edit or alteration. If you have some issue with that pledge or are unclear as to her meaning, perhaps you should take it up directly with JMP. 

 

Thanks.

 

William, there are two million registered freelancers on Upwork and tens of thousands of clients. How many customer service reps would you have Upwork hire to hand-hold each of tens of thousands of freelancers through the exact same process, answering the exact same questions one-on-one. Upwork is already losing money each month, so how much extra would you be willing to pay to hire hundreds of additional customer service reps? Personally, I'm not so into the idea of paying 40-50% fees so that freelancers don't have to be bothered to read the TOS.

If I convert the hourly rate into connect, a minute at $45/h is worth 5 connects. I rather spent the time working and earning money for new connects that wasting my presious time on contacting CS for something that is clearly defind.

Who's hourly rate? As a web developer, I can honestly say I spend about $75-100 per month on Connects. Because of the high budgets for these projects, almost every job I apply for is 6 Connects. My hire rate is pretty high but the fact is I'm paying this ON TOP of being charged 20% for the contract anyway. 

 

In response to whoever said Upwork is losing money, that's what companies do! Spotify hasn't made a profit since they started. That's what investors and stocks are for. That doesn't mean continue to tack on fees to the people that generate your revenue. I was just saying how about spread things a little more evenly. Charge these ghosting clients, or the ones who post 10 duplicate jobs posts every 10 minutes, wasting all of our time and money only to never hire anyone!?


Deja L wrote:

Who's hourly rate?

William's

As a web developer, I can honestly say I spend about $75-100 per month on Connects. Because of the high budgets for these projects, almost every job I apply for is 6 Connects. My hire rate is pretty high but the fact is I'm paying this ON TOP of being charged 20% for the contract anyway. 

Are you aware that your profile is set to private? Clients cannot find you, but if they could you might save some money.

In response to whoever said Upwork is losing money, that's what companies do! Spotify hasn't made a profit since they started. That's what investors and stocks are for. That doesn't mean continue to tack on fees to the people that generate your revenue. I was just saying how about spread things a little more evenly. Charge these ghosting clients, or the ones who post 10 duplicate jobs posts every 10 minutes, wasting all of our time and money only to never hire anyone!?

And how do shareholders behave when a business keeps losing money? I also have at least three realy good clients that never replied to my proposal and then hired me months later. Do you think they would have hired someone if they had to pay before they were ready to decide on a freelancer?

And just out of curiosity: How much money do you lose with your business?


 

1) My profile isn't set to private. It's set to Upwork users only. I receive 1-2 invitations a day so clients can find me just fine. 

 

2) You'll never win defending Upwork's right to keep taxing freelancers at every corner when freelancers are the only reason Upwork exists. I'm not saying make everything free like it used to be. I'm just saying maybe put some of these costs on inactive clients. I've officially started accounts at Guru and Freelancer and even with zero feedback I've gotten some pretty decent web dev contracts....for free...with "connects" refreshing on their own.

 

3) Most clients that leave jobs open for 3+ months aren't looking to hire. And logically, who's to say freelancer proposals submitted 3+ months ago even apply anymore. If a client has a job that's been open for that long without hire, that job should expire, connects should be refunded, and the client can REPOST the job when he's actually ready to hire someone. Don't waste our time, and now money, on ideas you plan on hiring for someday.


Deja wrote:

 I receive 1-2 invitations a day so clients can find me just fine. 


LOL, maybe tell Upwork that their metrics are wrong in that case... On your profile it says that you were invited 14 times in the last 90 days.

 


I can honestly say I spend about $75-100 per month on Connects.

 

Your claim that you spend $ 75 to $ 100 a month on connects doesn't make much more sense either, because if you really blow through several hundreds of connects a month you would be BETTER off with the system as it is now, because extra connects, in excess of the 70 you got with the plus plan, cost $ 1 each before the change...

 

So let's work this out: You have the Plus plan, so you have 70 included in that which costs you $ 15 (previously $ 10)

 

So you have to buy an extra 60 to 85 Dollars worth - that is 400 to 560 extra connects to get to a total cost of $ 75 to $ 100 a month. This is enough to apply for 78 to 105 jobs per month at 6 each.

 

Under the old system that would have cost you $ 86 to $ 140. (1 connect used to cost $ 1.00 and ever proposal was 2 connects)

 

So if your "honest" numbers are correct, you are saving between $ 11 and $ 40 a month under the new system as compared to before. That is assuming that *all* your proposals are at 6 connects per proposal (unlikely) or your savings would be even more.

 

If you had a high hire rate and burned through 470-630 connects a month you would have more than those 27 jobs overall over the lifetime of your profile.


Deja L wrote:

Who's hourly rate? As a web developer, I can honestly say I spend about $75-100 per month on Connects. Because of the high budgets for these projects, almost every job I apply for is 6 Connects. My hire rate is pretty high but the fact is I'm paying this ON TOP of being charged 20% for the contract anyway. 

 

dannnnng $75-$100/month on connects? Doesn't it cost $12 for 80 of them? So you blow through 500-600ish connects a month? holy crap lol  How many jobs you get with that kinda churn?

florydev
Community Member


Jennifer M wrote:

Deja L wrote:

Who's hourly rate? As a web developer, I can honestly say I spend about $75-100 per month on Connects. Because of the high budgets for these projects, almost every job I apply for is 6 Connects. My hire rate is pretty high but the fact is I'm paying this ON TOP of being charged 20% for the contract anyway. 

 

dannnnng $75-$100/month on connects? Doesn't it cost $12 for 80 of them? So you blow through 500-600ish connects a month? holy crap lol  How many jobs you get with that kinda churn?


No joke!  High budget and high hire rate too.  If I could FIND 100 jobs worth proposing to in a month I would be more than happy to spent $100.00 to propose on them.  

lysis10
Community Member


Mark F wrote:


No joke!  High budget and high hire rate too.  If I could FIND 100 jobs worth proposing to in a month I would be more than happy to spent $100.00 to propose on them.  


Funny thing in my section -- if there is a high budget posted, I avoid bidding.  lol Sometimes the budget is so obviously a scam too but **Edited for Community Guidelines** keep bidding. There was one not too long ago with a $100,000 budget and **Edited for Community Guidelines** people bid on it. lol

Deja, are you farming out the projects you win, or are you exclusively bidding on projects so small that you can finish them in a few hours?

Tiffany,

 

Please reread JMP's words.

But since you asked, I personally would strongly suggest (and have done so on many, many occasions) that UW shut down the entire Upwork "Help" Center, and would strongly suggest that all UW freelancers request the same, then replace it with an auto-email reply system which would be far more cost effective and undoubtedly-

1. Provide more timely responses

2. Provide at least the same level of service.

 

It would also save all the brave Help Center reps from the terrible burden of their professional responsibilities.

 

But it's very good to hear that so many Community Gurus are so concerned about the harsh, stressful work conditions our UW Help Center reps have to suffer.

 

Thanks for asking!

 


william b wrote:

Tiffany,

 

It would also save all the brave Help Center reps from the terrible burden of their professional responsibilities.

I can't tell whether you've somehow managed to sincerely misunderstand what is a super, super clear and repeated statement from various people here or are just being an **bleep**, but just in case it was an honest mistake, the issue isn't the "burden" on an individual customer service rep, but on the SYSTEM. A customer service rep with nerves of steel can nonetheless only respond to so many whiny freelancers demanding that their JSS be recalculated and asking questions that have been answered 5,000 times in the forums and are easily located in the help materials. To increase their work load would require increasing the number of customer service reps dramatically, which would increase costs, to accomplish nothing other than to have those new reps available to read something out loud to the freelancer that is posted in 17 different places on the site.

Tiffany,

 

Please reread what you are replying to because it appears you did not understand it.

I have, would and will always encourage UW to close the entire "Help" Center and save whatever payroll is currently being wasted there.

Where I'm from there is a high level of expectation from all professional (that means you get paid to do the job) "Help & Support" reps. If those reps are uncomfortable, unable or unwilling to at least meet that high level, they are immediately encouraged to seek employment opportunities elsewhere. It may be difficult for you to comprehend, but this system works remarkably well. 

Evidently, where you're from professional expectations are much, much lower. 

As a Community Guru please refrain, however, from referring to your fellow community member's legitimate requests for support as "whiny", or from using demeaning language in your replies. 

Demonstrate respect, and you will be respected.

 

Thank you.

lysis10
Community Member

Now that Connects are costing us money

Now that Connects are costing us money

Now that Connects are costing us money

Now that Connects are costing us money

Now that Connects are costing us money

 

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lori_murray
Community Member

I have to agree this is frustrating and a waste of time and money (connects) for Freelancers if the clients are coming in and posting jobs with no intent on hiring!


Lori M wrote:

I have to agree this is frustrating and a waste of time and money (connects) for Freelancers if the clients are coming in and posting jobs with no intent on hiring!


But why assume that clients are posting with no "intent on hiring"? Wouldn't that be a weird waste of their time? Isn't it more likely that they posted in multiple places and hired somewhere else, or didn't find a freelancer that suited them in their proposals, or were overwhelmed by junk cut and paste proposals and bailed, or had the project put on hold from above (or any of dozens of other things that can lead to someone not hiring a freelancer from a specific platform during a specific time period)?

joeywashburn
Community Member

Or at least give us connects back when we withdraw proposals.  I recently went back and withdrew (withdrawed)  Smiley Happy proposals because they had been sitting for 60 days.  I didn't realize that you don't get your connects back when you withdraw.  I am more than happy to withdraw after 60 days to that support does not have to get involved, but I want my connects back

Because people getting them back would be counter to making them pay for them in the first place.  If there is no loss then there is no risk, therefore they can still blanket send proposals for which they are not qualified.

That's presuming we really think that the reason they are charging for connects is to prevent unqualified people from putting in too many proposals.

 

I am sure better solutions for that problem exist.  As much as I don't like automated resume screening, it would work in this situation.

My use case may be unique.  I have a higher rate than many, AND the category of work I apply for is pretty limited in the number of jobs that are posted the combination of not getting connects back and them expiring makes it a tough pill to swallow.  Combine that with high commission rates and its all a little frustrating.


@joeywashburn wrote:

Or at least give us connects back when we withdraw proposals.  I recently went back and withdrew (withdrawed)  Smiley Happy proposals because they had been sitting for 60 days.  I didn't realize that you don't get your connects back when you withdraw.  I am more than happy to withdraw after 60 days to that support does not have to get involved, but I want my connects back

 

But giving them back to you to use again defeats the whole purpose of charging for them, which is to encourage freelancers to bid on far fewer jobs and be far more selective about the jobs they do bid on.


Mark F wrote:

No joke!  High budget and high hire rate too.  If I could FIND 100 jobs worth proposing to in a month I would be more than happy to spent $100.00 to propose on them.  

Funny thing in my section -- if there is a high budget posted, I avoid bidding.  lol Sometimes the budget is so obviously a scam too but dummies keep bidding. There was one not too long ago with a $100,000 budget and stupid people bid on it. lol

 

**bleep** it, I really, really wanted that job.

I am not saying we should get everything back, but when we apply for a job and after 30 days and there is zero movement from the client we should be eligible for something.  I have posted a screenshot as an example.

I feel very much like all the weight of the worker/upwork/client relationship is on the back of us the freelancers.  I understand that the hiring people are busy, but 16 days with not a single interview.  If this was to go to 30 days without any movement, I would think that it would be acceptable to make them close the proposal, give back at least some of the connects.  Or maybe it should kick off a workflow so that someone from Upwork gets involved and sends out invitations to qualified candidates.

Screen Shot 2019-07-26 at 1.57.14 PM.png

Joey, no one likes having to pay for anything, we all like everything to be free.

 

I see it like this, if you (or I) were to go and pitch for a job out in the 'real world', it would cost us money. Money to get to the potential client's offices, money (in time) to produce a presentation, money in transport costs, money to get some lunch. Would I expect the people or company I am pitching to, to reimburse me for that? Of course I wouldn't, so why on earth would I expect the same on here, either from the poster or the site? 

 

I don't pay for any of those costs on Upwork. Absolutely zilch. All I pay is a tiny, tiny amount to potentially get a job which will pay me far, far more than it cost to apply for it.

This analogy kind of doesn't apply because it's a totally different market. Upwork's business model isn't par for the course with any other freelancer site. We're talking Guru, Freelancer, Fiverr... even Indeed and Flexjobs if you want to include those. We're applying for remote jobs without the expectation of ever having to incur those costs in the first place. So to compare it doesn't make sense. I've applied to and have been hired for remote jobs on Indeed without having to pay for an application, have 20% of my income docked before taxes, or ever having to leave my home office.

 

There are so many options now, I just haven't really put as much effort into them because I've been with Upwork for so many years. But having been forced to test the waters, it's really not all that bad. 

This analogy kind of doesn't apply because it's a totally different market. Upwork's business model isn't par for the course with any other freelancer site. We're talking Guru, Freelancer, Fiverr... even Indeed and Flexjobs if you want to include those. We're applying for remote jobs without the expectation of ever having to incur those costs in the first place. So to compare it doesn't make sense. I've applied to and have been hired for remote jobs on Indeed without having to pay for an application, have 20% of my income docked before taxes, or ever having to leave my home office.

 

There are so many options now, I just haven't really put as much effort into them because I've been with Upwork for so many years. But having been forced to test the waters, it's really not all that bad. 

 

Well, we'll agree to disagree. If people make the decision to only do work remotely, then they don't incur costs that they otherwise would pitching for work 'in the real world' - being two different markets with different costs was exactly my point.

 

 

I doubt the client knows to cancel his job posting if he decides not to hire -- and what the ramifications are for not cancelling for those freelancer who bid. He may just let the posting expired instead; it is certainly less work for the client to simply let it expire. Also, the client may have posted a job to get bids to compare build vs. buy or posted the job to multiple job boards.

 

Why not treat an expired job post as cancelled? Our bids were submitted in good faith. Refund the connects and let us post for a different job. If Upwork needs to recoup expired job costs then charge the client that keeps posting jobs and never hires instead of charging the freelancers who have no control over what a client posts.

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