Problem with fixed priced bid contract work.

[blakemitchell55]

To whom it may concern,

Back in July, I worked on and completed, in my  opinion a fixed price contract for **Edited for Community Guidelines**. I followed his precise instructions to the letter. Unfortunately, after I got signed up, on his website, and received a user id and password, I then logged in to his website. The login was successful and I got a signon greeting. Then, a few seconds later, I got an error message saying I did not have permission to use the website or maybe, the app, or something. I tried everything I could think of, but could get no further. So, since there were no instructions about what to do when this happened, I went ahead and wrote a review of my findings and sent them to Mr. **Edited for Community Guidelines** . He sent me back a terrible reply including a frowny face emoji, which I did NOT appreciate and told me that was not what they wanted. THEN, he went on to say he would now require me to do a bunch MORE work for him, presumably for free, also. I was to go through the entire process again, take screen shots and then send those to him. I have already filled out a request for payment as I see no point in spending GOD only knows how much more time and effort doing more and more work for him for free!! If I had to make a guess, at this point, this is another one of the crooks I have encountered that seem to be not uncommon on Upwork teases you with promise of payment if you will only do one simple thing, while they actually have NO intention of paying you anything! **Edited for Community Guidelines**. If he wants me to trouble shoot his website login issues, I think he should pay me for what I have done first, and then we might talk about a new contract. This is my posiiton. I have attached the review I sent to him about my experiences with his website.

[prestonhunter]

Blake:
It is not Upwork's intention that freelancers work for free.

This is SPECIFICALLY ADDRESSED in Upwork's ToS.

The client was asking you to work for free, by asking you to do ANYTHING outside of the original agreement.

It is indeed possible to report clients for asking to work for free.

Personally, I may or may not report clients for doing that sort of thing, but here is my main suggestion (for myself and others):
Do not accept LARGE fixed-price contracts with clients that you haven't worked with before. Instead, for the initial fixed-price contract/milestone, agree to a task which is only an hour or two of work. So there is not such a large investment in time. That way, if the client turns out to be dishonest (such as the client you encountered) or if the client is simply a person incapable of understanding the fixed-price contract model... Then I can just walk away from it. If I can see that this is going to be a waste of my time, then I can just walk away. I can close the contract myself and then there is no way for the client to ask for free work or dispute anything.

In such a situation, the client has lost the most valuable resource in the whole equation: my good will and my willingness to work on their behalf.

And I can focus my efforts on the honest, professional Upwork clients, who make up the overwhelming majority of clients in my niche.

[blakemitchell55]

There was no name included with this E-mail so I will simply Thank You to
whoever replied. How do I go about closing the contract myself. I no longer
care about the money as I am sure I will NEVER get it. But I most certainly
do not want to have to take $50.00 out of my pocket to refund to him when
he never paid me in the first place!

[feed_my_eyes]

Click the three dots on the contract page and select "end contract". The money in the escrow account will go back to the client (I don't know where you got the idea that you had to pay the client out of your own pocket). But you should be aware that a contract with no money paid will count negatively towards your job success score.

[LuiggiR]

Hi Blake,

I'm very sorry to hear about your experience with his client. Since you've submitted the work completed for payment already, you can wait for the client to release the payment or dispute it. If it does go through a dispute, you will both be assisted further by the team to resolve the issue.

Thank you.