Protect yourself with direct contract for hours worked

[32aafab3]

Learning after a major ripoff from a dishonest client.  Upwork has direct contracts for hours worked jobs.  After doing over  $2000 work for a client, he blocked me when I requested payment.  At the beginning of project, I informed him he could not solve a financial metric with the information provided.  I withdrew from the project.  He later requested to continue.  When I delivered the work, he again demanded that I solve the problem I had earlier pointed out that had insufficient data:  only one  equation  but two unknowns. There are some bad people out there on this site.  But I see how a direct contract for hours projects protects us.  And asking up front for a deposit would shake out scammers like this at the beginning.  Guy presents himself as a trader with  a platform and big spender.  But is financially illiterate. No finance education, no math or coding skills. My intuition about him, things not adding up, proved to be correct. Also a google search prior to contracting would have revealed other people with negative experiences with him and his alleged trading platform.  I had taken on this project to both help a friend and make a  mortage payment.  No Thanksgiving for me.

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

[f1785f8c]

Yeah, you have to protect yourself Nancy. Upwork has a large selection of freelance scammers. Use it as a learning lesson, so next time you know what to look for. Best of luck.

[32aafab3]

Thank you, Malcolm.  I just received notification that client blocked me.  Recentering.  Prior conversation with a friend about this learning experience: Protect yourself, go from being a victim to empowered

[tgcodes]

I can relate. the last project I did was meant to be 4 tasks, I eventually saw myself working on 25 tasks, and when I saw that this was becoming  a wild goose chase I decided to end the contract he paid part and left a bad review. 

[32aafab3]

So sorry we both got hit. Thank you for your response 

[sajal36]

I think you had the indication but you still proceeded with the contract. I will suggest to do due diligence before accepting the contract, this might have mix and match of all scenrio but it will keep more on right side by minimizing the wrong selects.

[32aafab3]

Thank you. Yes I had a sense of warnings. Plus I didn't write a contract
for hours. My guess, is this client would not have made a required down
payment. It's helpful to learn that there are weird clients out there. And
to learn about contracts. Trust but verify! An expensive lesson. This
Wednesday I have research interview with a real quant in a big city
trading firm.