Refund request

muachristinagade · ‎03-11-2020

Hello. I have one client and we completely disagree on a work I did for him, a transcription job who took me 17 hours, (it was 3 hours approx audio) he made the contract to max 10 so I didnt reply for more cause of my own mistake..
Now he says he dont want to pay the 10 hours I put in the time log because "it dosent take more than 1,5 pr 1 hour audio maximum" well because its logged in timelog, it's now already in review, but he paused the contract and requested a refund, which I'm not interested in giving him.
So! Should or can I reject the refund somewhere or should I ignore it? I cant seems to find a reject button only cancel and give refund.
Just for information my work was bulletproof and flawless.. but how does this effect my payment?

AveryO · ‎03-11-2020

Hi Christina,

I'm sorry to learn about your experience on this contract. You may read this help article for more information about the next steps you can take when a client disputes your hours/requests for a refund.

~ Avery

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

Hello. Thanks for replying, it just days raised bit in dispute, and I cant seem to find any cancel of request button ??

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

Hello thanks for replying, he only paused the contract, he didnt dispute anything. And I cant press or review this?
What do I do?

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

jr-translation · ‎03-12-2020

Christina G wrote:
Hello thanks for replying, he only paused the contract, he didnt dispute anything. And I cant press or review this?
What do I do?
**Edited for Community Guidelines**

Pausing a contract means you cannot work and track time for this contract. It is quite commen e.g. for jobs that are done but the client wants to wait with the final feedback until he had time to check everything.

In the meantime you could read the ToS and correct your profile accordingly.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

No i think he paused it cause he thinks it will solve that he gets his money back.
He is not very well behaved

jr-translation · ‎03-12-2020

Christina G wrote:
No i think he paused it cause he thinks it will solve that he gets his money back.
He is not very well behaved

So what did he do? You wrote:

"He only paused the contract, he didnt dispute anything."

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

He paused the contract and filed for a request.
He did not dispute anything at least it's not written like that..
My solution was to change the refund to 0.01 USD and I closed the contract. Cause with no respond he will get it automatically, and I was not able to recline the request any places

jr-translation · ‎03-12-2020

Christina G wrote:
No i think he paused it cause he thinks it will solve that he gets his money back.
He is not very well behaved

You accepted a refund though he could have refused to pay for the manual time. Next time do not offer to transcribe a language other then Danish.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

There was nothing wrong with my work!

jr-translation · ‎03-12-2020

Christina G wrote:
There was nothing wrong with my work!

Transcribing a non-native language takes longer than your native language. If you do that on an

hourly contract, you are asking for trouble. Next time offer a fixed-rate based on the length of the recording, this way the client does not care if you need 10 or 17 hours as long as you meet the deadline.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

I will ofcourse takes this into consideration but my German is AS good cause of family connection, this also shows up in my work..
The client had a dialect caused by he coming from Dresden and spoke VERY fast.

prestonhunter · ‎03-12-2020

Christina:

Nobody is claiming that there was anything incorrect about your transcription.

But there ARE more things that a client considers when hiring a freelancer. And if a client uses an hourly contract, then speed is one of those things. This client may have been able to hire a freelancer whose native language is German with the same Dresden accent, and that freelancer may have been able to do the work faster, incurring lest expense.

I'm not saying the client was correct in how he acted. But there is more to this situation than simply a "client acting badly."

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

Ofcourse, as i wrote in previous comment, I had my part of th le blame therefore I didn't charge ekstra, but NO HUMAN can transcribe 1 hour audio I 1.5 hour like he claims

prestonhunter · ‎03-12-2020

re: "but NO HUMAN can transcribe 1 hour audio I 1.5 hour like he claims"

I agree.

There was an unfortunate confluence of a client with unreasonable expectations, a client who doesn't fully understand Upwork, and a freelancer trying out transcription in a new way... without completely thinking things through or knowing how this would work out.

Now that you have gone through this, you can make a more informed decision about whether or no to take on such work, based on the level of difficulty, how long it would take, etc.

Of course I advise ALL transcriptionists to listen to the audio files before they accept jobs, and be realistic in their quotes or estimates. Because clearly a fast-speaking unfamiliar dialect takes longer to transcribe than speech by someone speaking without an accent at a normal tempo.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

Thank you so much for the advise, I sure got smarter from the experience

tta192 · ‎03-12-2020

Both you and the client left feedback on the contract. However, someone looking at your profile will only see the feedback you received, not the one you left (profile visitors have to click on the job details to see what you said which they probably won't).

But you have the option to also reply to the client's feedback. Your response will be clearly visible on your profile, so you should add your comments there too. You want future clients to know the bad feedback was due to price not low quality.

If the future: try and keep your client informed on how long the job will take. Give them an initial estimate when bidding and a refined one at the start of the contract: e.g., tell them you normally log x hours for one hour of recording, but the actual charge may depend on various factors.

At the start of the contract you first listen to the entire audio and say 'this will take longer than expected because a, b, c, etc...'. IF the client refuses the new estimate you charge only for the time spent re-estimating (15 - 30min ?) and they close the contract.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

Thank you very much

jr-translation · ‎03-12-2020

Andrei T wrote:
Both you and the client left feedback on the contract. However, someone looking at your profile will only see the feedback you received, not the one you left (profile visitors have to click on the job details to see what you said which they probably won't).
But you have the option to also reply to the client's feedback. Your response will be clearly visible on your profile, so you should add your comments there too.

If the future: try and keep your client informed on how long the job will take. Give them an initial estimate when bidding and a refined one at the start of the contract: e.g., tell them you normally log x hours for one hour of recording, but the actual charge may depend on various factors.
At the start of the contract you first listen to the entire audio and say 'this will take longer than expected because a, b, c, etc...'. IF the client refuses the new estimate you charge only for the time spent re-estimating (15 - 30min ?) and they close the contract.

Bad advise, never accept a contract until you had the chance to check the file and can confirm that you are able to do the job in question for the rate you and the client can agree on.

tta192 · ‎03-12-2020

Jennifer R wrote:
Andrei T wrote:
[...]
At the start of the contract you first listen to the entire audio and say 'this will take longer than expected because a, b, c, etc...'. IF the client refuses the new estimate you charge only for the time spent re-estimating (15 - 30min ?) and they close the contract.
Bad advise, never accept a contract until you had the chance to check the file and can confirm that you are able to do the job in question for the rate you and the client can agree on.

I'm not suggesting to adjust the rate, just the estimate of how long it will take (remember, it's an hourly contract). What if it's a large file and you need 4 hours to 'check' it? would you do it for free? that's an important part of the project for both freelancer and client. I'd even say it's more important for the client as now they're correctly informed about the difficulty of the work - so why not charge for it?

jr-translation · ‎03-13-2020

Andrei T wrote:
Jennifer R wrote:
Andrei T wrote:
[...]
At the start of the contract you first listen to the entire audio and say 'this will take longer than expected because a, b, c, etc...'. IF the client refuses the new estimate you charge only for the time spent re-estimating (15 - 30min ?) and they close the contract.
Bad advise, never accept a contract until you had the chance to check the file and can confirm that you are able to do the job in question for the rate you and the client can agree on.
I'm not suggesting to adjust the rate, just the estimate of how long it will take (remember, it's an hourly contract). What if it's a large file and you need 4 hours to 'check' it? would you do it for free? that's an important part of the project for both freelancer and client. I'd even say it's more important for the client as now they're correctly informed about the difficulty of the work - so why not charge for it?

That is something you ~~can~~ should discuss before being hired. I always make sure I have checked the work that needs to be done before accepting a job. It would have been easy to give the client a rough estimate about the duration since she new it was a ~3h recording. Did she tell the client that it takes 5-6h to transcribe 1h of recording? Why should I charge the client for that? But there is no need to listen to the entire audio just to realise the speaker has a strong dialect. Most Germans have problems understanding that dialect. Speaking German on a B-level might not be enough.

As a freelancer you also have to keep in mind that most clients (as are more freelancer than care to admit) are ESL and that most clients know what they want but not what it takes to get it. It is part of our job to consult the clients in a way that they trust us enough to hire us for the work they need to have done.

tta192 · ‎03-13-2020

Jennifer R wrote:
[...]
As a freelancer you also have to keep in mind that most clients (as are more freelancer than care to admit) are ESL and that most clients know what they want but not what it takes to get it. It is part of our job to consult the clients in a way that they trust us enough to hire us for the work they need to have done.

should the consulting part be free of charge? it depends...

For fixed price of course you have to analyze the material beforehand, since you're bearing 100% of the risk. You build the cost into the price and don't communicate any conclusions to the client other than your quote. The analysis is entirely for your own use. The client is not able to use your conclusions to adjust their negotiations with other freelancers, for example.

In the case of an hourly contract you don't really care about the risk, it becomes the client's responsibility to have (and pay for) an estimate on the costs/duration/etc. All you have to do is be honest about your skills / experience / qualifications and let the client decide whether to use your services or not.

muachristinagade · ‎03-12-2020

How do i add a comment to my clients feedback

AveryO · ‎03-12-2020

Hi Christina,

You may read this help article for more information on how to respond to a client's feedback.

~ Avery

kochubei_valeria · ‎03-13-2020

All,

A few posts have been removed from this thread as they were against the Community Guidelines.

Please, note that personal attacks based on a user's English, lack of knowledge, experience of Upwork platform or any other disparaging comments are not allowed in this Community.

~ Valeria

muachristinagade · ‎03-13-2020

Thank you so much for raising awareness about this 👍