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vanthaung
Community Member

Unresponsive client who did not activate/fund further milestones

Hello everyone,

I was working on a fixed-price contract for a translation project with 4 milestones. First milestone was successfully completed and payment released. Client then promptly funded and activated second milestone.
However, when it came time to submit my work for second milestone and to request activation/funding of the last milestones, client became unresponsive and I had to wait the 14 required days before payment was released. And there is still no answer from client who did not fund or activate the current and fourth milestones.

So, I know I probably should have requested the funding of all milestones, but I did not continue working when I did not hear from the client and because the next milestone was not activated anyway. It has only been 2-3 weeks, and I thought the client might be on vacation or something, although communication was great at first.

I guess my questions are these:
- how long should I wait to hear from them and do anything at all about this if they're still unresponsive?
- what will happen when the current milestone in progress (but not activated) reaches the completion date?
- how will this affect my JSS if the contract stays open and become inactive, and what to do to avoid a potential negative effect on JSS/feedback?

Thank you very much in advance for your replies and your guidance!

ACCEPTED SOLUTION
michael_skaggs
Community Member

"how long should I wait to hear from them and do anything at all about this if they're still unresponsive?"

 

If you're not working on an unfunded milestone (good for you, btw), then there's nothing at all to do. Best to just leave it be. They may come back to it in a few weeks, they may not. But it's always better to allow the client to close the contract.


"what will happen when the current milestone in progress (but not activated) reaches the completion "date?"

 

Nothing. The dates on milestones are for planning purposes between client and freelancer only. Upwork doesn't take those into account for anything whatsoever. And it's not in progress unless it's funded, so it's out of your hands anyway.


"how will this affect my JSS if the contract stays open and become inactive, and what to do to avoid a potential negative effect on JSS/feedback?"

 

Not at all. It's an open contract, yes, but you've already made money on it, so that's a good thing. The only time open contracts affect JSS is if there's been no activity at all on them (including payment). And even then, there has to be more than a few of them for it to really hurt anything.

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9 REPLIES 9
michael_skaggs
Community Member

"how long should I wait to hear from them and do anything at all about this if they're still unresponsive?"

 

If you're not working on an unfunded milestone (good for you, btw), then there's nothing at all to do. Best to just leave it be. They may come back to it in a few weeks, they may not. But it's always better to allow the client to close the contract.


"what will happen when the current milestone in progress (but not activated) reaches the completion "date?"

 

Nothing. The dates on milestones are for planning purposes between client and freelancer only. Upwork doesn't take those into account for anything whatsoever. And it's not in progress unless it's funded, so it's out of your hands anyway.


"how will this affect my JSS if the contract stays open and become inactive, and what to do to avoid a potential negative effect on JSS/feedback?"

 

Not at all. It's an open contract, yes, but you've already made money on it, so that's a good thing. The only time open contracts affect JSS is if there's been no activity at all on them (including payment). And even then, there has to be more than a few of them for it to really hurt anything.

It looks like there's no funding in escrow on this, so I'm not sure if this will happen, but if there were I am positive Upwork would close the contract at the end of 90 days as it's happened to me.

 

Maybe as said above with no escrow money fixed would remain open with no JS problem. Because I believe the reason they close contracts is because legally they can't hold escrow money indefinitely. 

 

 


Jacqueline P wrote:

It looks like there's no funding in escrow on this, so I'm not sure if this will happen, but if there were I am positive Upwork would close the contract at the end of 90 days as it's happened to me.

 

Maybe as said above with no escrow money fixed would remain open with no JS problem. Because I believe the reason they close contracts is because legally they can't hold escrow money indefinitely. 


Uowork closes contract with money in escrow which are inactive for more than 30 days so the client gets his/her money back.

This contract can stay open forever without negative impact because money was paid.


Jennifer R wrote:


Uowork closes contract with money in escrow which are inactive for more than 30 days  so the client gets his/her money back.

This contract can stay open forever without negative impact because money was paid.


90 days, not 30



Petra R wrote:

Jennifer R wrote:


Uowork closes contract with money in escrow which are inactive for more than 30 days  so the client gets his/her money back.

This contract can stay open forever without negative impact because money was paid.


90 days, not 30


Your right. It's a typo

Hi Vantha. The client is under no obligation to proceed with unactivated milestones. Even if they had funded all 4 milestones in advance, you would have no grounds to dispute a refund of the escrow from milestones 3 and 4 if only milestones 1 and 2 were activated. You should make sure that each milestone is funded well enough to fully cover the cost of the work of that milestone, so you're not left out of pocket if the client chooses not to proceed with the remaining milestones.

jr-translation
Community Member

I second Michals advice but would like to add the following:

 

I had to wait the 14 required days before payment was released.

The money was release by the system. When submitting work always expect to wait 14 days and be happy if it does not take that long.

 

You could send a follow up message after the Easter holidays, maybe at the end of the month but only once.

vanthaung
Community Member

Thank you so much for all your replies!

It does confirm what I knew already; I just hope that if the client does come back, they won't get upset or something that I have not continued working on the project, close the contract and leave a negative feedback... In which case, I would still be in my right anyway, but I would hate for that to happen...

 

Thanks again all!


Vantha U wrote:

Thank you so much for all your replies!

It does confirm what I knew already; I just hope that if the client does come back, they won't get upset or something that I have not continued working on the project, close the contract and leave a negative feedback...

 

It may be a little late this time around, but in the future if this sort of situation arises you may want to consider sending a message to the client along the lines of, "I just wanted to make sure you were aware that the next milestone hadn't been funded/activated. No hurry on my end--I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page and you didn't think the project was moving forward. I'm happy to pick back up as soon as I get the notification from Upwork that you've activated the milestone."

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