🐈
» Forums » Freelancers » Re: Should the power for clients to ruin a po...
Page options
syawedis
Community Member

Should the power for clients to ruin a portfolio be nerfed?

I recently had a bad experience that has left a bad taste in my mouth, and made me think the rating system might need some reform.


I worked on a project for a client (who actually hired me because I told her she was going to be extremely difficult and picky and I welcomed the challenge - she liked my assertiveness she said) and everything started off really well.

 

We went through 7 milestones, and she was super happy, saying how I'm her #1 guy and she wants to hire me full time.  Then on the 8th and final milestone, she was under immense pressure after one of her presentations didnt go the way she wanted, and she had taken on a high-pressure (and demanding) course which left her with very little time to focus on this project.

 

The milestone started off rocky, with her instructions missing lots of the basic information I usually need, but I powered on because she was in a hurry. Her feedback was no better, feeling rushed, contradictory and lacking detail. Time was being wasted on both sides and I was getting frustrated going in circles without clear direction. At one point I just sent her a small list of links asking her for quick feedback of which one she likes best so that it could help clarify the confusion - and she practically lost it on me telling me she didnt have time (3 minutes) to quickly review the links. I guess you could say I 'virtually spanked' her at that point, telling her she needs to get it together and be more specific with her feedback becacuse I can't read her mind, or we just can't continue working together. I said it a little nicer than that, but was firm. 

 

The next day we laughed it off as our 'first fight' and she came back with proper instructions and feedback, and I powered on. I presented a couple suggestions on color variations for the logo, as well as the original, which she did not take too well. But other color or background suggestions were greeted with open arms. It was kind of like walking on egg shells, not knowing what would trigger her.  Soon there after the project was complete! 


A couple days later I asked her for her feedback on how the project went. She made a huge deal about me giving her color options. Color options of a logo I had created just a couple days prior, after taking over the job because she fired the previous freelancer doing it. I was also blamed for some things that were not even my fault and not even my job, it had to do with the coding guy not doing his job, I was only doing the design work. So I shared some my frustrations too. I probably could have / should have accepted her feedback without correcting her or reminding her of my own frustrations.

 

A few days of silence, and I notice the website was finally up, but broken looking, like a first time coder had done it. The logo I wasn't able to touch was now stretched 150% in height. So I asked her what happened, and she immediately closed the contract and left me a 4.3 star review with no feedback, and single handedly dropped my job completion rate from 100% to 85%.

 

So question / conclusion is this:
How is it at all fair that a client can have a great experience with several milestones, essentially re-hiring you 8 times, but at the end they throw a tantrum and give you a bad rating because they were in a pissy mood that day.  You would think upwork would/should account for the fact that he/she re-hired you 8 times before considering  their (likely) 'would not recommend this freelancer' rating in full weight. I think it's really dangerous and unfortunate to give clients the power to single handedly taint your profile like this. 

A simple solution to this
might just be having clients give public/private feedback on every milestone, which is then accumulated into one 'final' public and private feedback score. Maybe the same could be done with weekly billings, too. 

Edit feel free to comment on the problem or solution and try not to get too caught up in your personal feelings about how the situation could have been handled. I know I have things I can improve on. 

45 REPLIES 45


Nathan A wrote:


This would also be nice for freelancers who 'do' end up in a situation with a terrible client. Maybe they are not as wise as me in the beginning and cannot tell the client will be a nightmare, and instead of being 'trapped' they could cancel a contract with confidence knowing the entire rating might not be based on the final interaction. 

 


That would potentially allow people to cancel contracts for bad reasons (for example, if a better opportunity came along they could leave their client hanging), or for upwork to get more involved when it's not really their business. Its our responsibility to manage our own clientele and sometimes poor experiences and mean clients just happen.

 

That being said - if you were top rated, youd have the perk of being able to remove one feedback every 3 months. Which is an amazing perk, and why everyone is saying at the beginning you kind of need to bend over backwards to become established and earn that perk.

That would potentially allow people to cancel contracts for bad reasons (for example, if a better opportunity came along they could leave their client hanging), or for upwork to get more involved when it's not really their business. Its our responsibility to manage our own clientele and sometimes poor experiences and mean clients just happen.

 

That being said - if you were top rated, youd have the perk of being able to remove one feedback every 3 months. Which is an amazing perk, and why everyone is saying at the beginning you kind of need to bend over backwards to become established and earn that perk.



Sure, but any one can still leave their client hanging. I hear it from time to time from clients actually, the poor experiences they have had. But I understand your point being they would get less lashback from it, its just not like it would leave the freelancer unscathed by doing that. It would also not prolonge their future on the platform if their motto is to jump from one easier job to the next. 

I am all for protecting the clients and upwork, but I think the freelancer gets forgotten. The idea is to have more of a fail safe to protect from crappy human behavior. No additional involvement from upwork, it could be calculated automatically.


I especially think only the top rated to have the ability to remove the feedback isnt necessarily fair. I don't know how upwork used to be, but maybe it used to be more lax and lots of people got to top rated through a 'grandfathered' system. Maybe not. But I can tell you me having 1 out of 16 eligible weeks for top rated doesn't seem accurate whatsoever. That's a discussion to be had at another time tho.

 


Nathan A wrote:

I don't know how upwork used to be, but maybe it used to be more lax and lots of people got to top rated through a 'grandfathered' system. 

 


No, it used to be more difficult - Upwork has recently made it a lot easier. Upwork themselves claim that the average freelancer here has a 4.9 star rating, so if anything, the system is far too lax now. 

Ehh I mean, I've been on the client side of upwork many times and I can tell you that's statistically inaccurate. 

petra_r
Community Member


Nathan A wrote:

Ehh I mean, I've been on the client side of upwork many times and I can tell you that's statistically inaccurate. 


You're stating that based on your sample of one client account you know better than Upwork, who have the actual numbers at their fingertips? 

syawedis
Community Member


Petra R wrote:

Nathan A wrote:

Ehh I mean, I've been on the client side of upwork many times and I can tell you that's statistically inaccurate. 

It's a bold statement and I am saying from my own experience that is statistically inaccurate. Common sense alone would tell you this. But go open a job and look over 100 freelancers, you will NOT see an average of 4.9 star rating.  I imagine  most "community gurus" here don't even have an average of 4.9 stars. 


I'm sure there's a caveat somewhere like
"we did not account for freelancers that have been removed from the platform with bad reviews"
"we did not account for all freelancers"

"we did not account for jobs with no feedback" (even tho they themselves view this as a negative and ding your JSS for it)

"this is not based on current data"

 

Side note I see the community thread that linked to an upwork landing page allegedly making that claim does not mention anywhere on their landing page the average rating is 4.9, and for good reason.  They even have a "top freelancers" slideshow on the landing page, and you can see from the very few on display the average is not 4.9

 

But thats not here nor there and irrelevant to the conversation

 

Latest Articles
Featured Topics
Learning Paths