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lawrencewright
Community Member

Upwork is Very Odd Lately

I guess Freelancers is the right location to post this. I'm not a client, I'm a Freelancer, but I suppose Upwork can't tell the difference. I did try the client experience a year or two ago, but I didn't like it at all. Maybe that's why I got these emails.

 

Not too long ago (maybe a few days), I got an email with the following subject.

 

**Edited for Community Guidelines** ** This was an email subject - Larry **

 

It explained that I can now use my local currency (which is USD). I thought this was strange, because the only local currency I use is the USD, and I reside in The United States. Okay, nothing different, nothing changing. No big deal. This doesn't affect me.

 

Then I get a follow up email.

 

**Edited for Community Guidelines** ** This was an email subject - Larry **

 

In this email, it elaborates that using my local currency (The USD) in The United States for Credit Card payments is no longer valid. I find this highly unusual, because this page says "Prices on Upwork are always in U.S. Dollars (USD)". That, and I haven't used the client features in a long time. I did check, and my currency is actually in USD, so that adds more to my confusion.

At this point, I'm very confused as to what Upwork is doing these days. I've only ever lived in The United States with my only currency ever being The USD. I'm not sure why another country, in another currency would ever play any affect on my account. Maybe I've been flagged as someone who doesn't live in the US.

 

I'm VERY glad that I cashed out what little stock I had before it tanked below $20 (now almost $13 per share). My stock broker (helping me save for retirement) advised that Upwork stock will likely be traded as a penny stock by 2022, and I always heed his financial advice. His financial advice has been right for most of his life (at least 7/10 of the times).

 

upwork stock.jpg

 

Anyway, has anyone else noticed Upwork acting a little strange lately? Getting odd or unusual emails, or has Upwork been going swimmingly for most since the recent changes? Are most of the freelancers still here? Is anyone else concerned?

 

This 133 page thread seems to have finally died. Does anyone else feel that Upwork has gotten better since the connects have changed? I haven't been keeping up with Upwork news recently, is there any chance this will be rolled back to the way things were?

 

Looking forward to all the interesting responses I'll get here for my first thread.

11 REPLIES 11
kfarnell
Community Member

I'm in the UK and although primarily a freelancer, I've hired a few people in the past.  So when I received that email saying about hiring in my local currency, I thought "OK."  And then it was followed by the email saying it had been an error as only selected countries were included as shown on a link. I took a look.  The UK was included.

 

When I raised it with CS, I had an email apologising that I was confused. Because, obviously, the email couldn't have been sent to me in error. At least it's being escalated to technical support so someone qualified and less confused can point out it's a mistake. 

 

These emails are going to the wrong people.

AleksandarD
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Lawrence and Kim,

 

I'm sorry about the inconvenience this has caused you. Our team was able to identify why this happened and is working on fixing it as soon as possible.

 

Lawrence, one of our team members will reach out to you directly via a support ticket to assist you further.

 

Kim, I already followed up with our technical team and someone will reach out and follow up on your ticket in a timely manner.

 

Thank you.

~ Aleksandar
Upwork

I've modified my original post to annotate what was removed by a moderator which was a violation of the community guidelines. Yes, the subject of the email is highly classified information which would warrant a 20 year prison sentence for disclosure, but I feel that everyone should know that it was an email subject, which was probably sent to tens of thousands of other recipients. Not indicating what was removed may cause mass confusion. I hope you could spare me any penalties for mentioning that the removed content were email subjects.

 

Thank you for understanding and keeping this community as unambiguous as reasonably possible.


Aleksandar D wrote:

Hi Lawrence and Kim,

 

I'm sorry about the inconvenience this has caused you. Our team was able to identify why this happened and is working on fixing it as soon as possible.

 

Lawrence, one of our team members will reach out to you directly via a support ticket to assist you further.

 

Kim, I already followed up with our technical team and someone will reach out and follow up on your ticket in a timely manner.

Thanks for your response and I have indeed received a follow-up. However, it states that it is to be investigated further and I have to send a copy of the email and screenshots. That contradicts what you say above about the error being identified. I am due to go away so I'm not able (even if I were willing) to get involved in a dialogue about this.  Please don't ask them to respond to me again. 


tlsanders
Community Member

To me, that sort of thing is about the same. I've always gotten the stray random or incorrect email from Upwork, gotten message notifications 12 hours after the fact on occasion and not at all other times, had messages get eaten by the system, seen times like "this milestone was approved four hours from now."

 

Overall, Upwork just doesn't work very well from a technical perspective. I'm not seeing any difference in that aspect one way or the other.

chasb
Community Member

As to the second part of your original post, Larry, the *real* value here lies in top rated freelancers and quality clients - who together account for the lion's share of revenue generated (at least according to an oft-cited, exec-level, public statement of yore).

Although monetised connects are a major gripe for freelancers (all the 133 pages you mention, more or less), the real game-changer has been the removal of basic client-side features, albeit restorable at a minimum $50/month.

The 'volume' clients certainly seem to have taken up on this fee, whereas the occasional, yet 'high quality', clients have obviously not. And then there's the eternal low-budgeteers who see no issue at all with the fee - and never did engage with the top raters anyway.

Just a brief scan of the subject headers in this freelancer section here will show you that freelancers across the board are now reporting a slowdown in clientele - but most telling of all is the increasing number of top raters amongst them.

tlsanders
Community Member


Chris P wrote:

 

Just a brief scan of the subject headers in this freelancer section here will show you that freelancers across the board are now reporting a slowdown in clientele - but most telling of all is the increasing number of top raters amongst them.


That's not entirely true. I've seen at least one thread talking about receiving more and better invitations since the change took place, and that has been my experience as well. 

chasb
Community Member


Tiffany S wrote:

 

That's not entirely true. I've seen at least one thread talking about receiving more and better invitations since the change took place, and that has been my experience as well. 


I wouldn't dispute the one such thread at all, nor your own positive experience.

The vast majority of threads, however, point to the exact opposite - namely, declines in hire rates, lower budget clients and abandoned job postings.

These points are further amplified in the dozens of threads about 'why don't I get my connects back for no hires?', which without fail create some resonance here.

I'm glad these recent changes are going well for some here, but would strongly contend that this is by any means the majority view.

 

 


Chris P wrote:


 

The vast majority of threads, however, point to the exact opposite - namely, declines in hire rates, lower budget clients and abandoned job postings.

 

I'm glad these recent changes are going well for some here, but would strongly contend that this is by any means the majority view.


The vast majority of threads are always about the same old complaints. Go back any number of years and you'll see posts that start with "Lately I've noticed..." followed by the exact same observations about unresponsive clients, lowball bids, this website sucks etc. Such comments traditionally spike in August, too.

 

As for having to pay for connects, of course some freelancers are going to be upset about having to pay for something that used to be free, especially if their profit margins are so razor-thin that they don't allow for a marketing budget or business expenses of any kind. 

 


Christine A wrote:

Chris P wrote:


 

The vast majority of threads, however, point to the exact opposite - namely, declines in hire rates, lower budget clients and abandoned job postings.

 

I'm glad these recent changes are going well for some here, but would strongly contend that this is by any means the majority view.


The vast majority of threads are always about the same old complaints. Go back any number of years and you'll see posts that start with "Lately I've noticed..." followed by the exact same observations about unresponsive clients, lowball bids, this website sucks etc. Such comments traditionally spike in August, too.

 

As for having to pay for connects, of course some freelancers are going to be upset about having to pay for something that used to be free, especially if their profit margins are so razor-thin that they don't allow for a marketing budget or business expenses of any kind. 

 


So, nothing has changed, is what you're basically saying - followed by the idea that anyway it's all because of the summer holidays, yet here we are in mid-September.

 

 


Chris P wrote:

Christine A wrote:

Chris P wrote:


 

The vast majority of threads, however, point to the exact opposite - namely, declines in hire rates, lower budget clients and abandoned job postings.

 

I'm glad these recent changes are going well for some here, but would strongly contend that this is by any means the majority view.


The vast majority of threads are always about the same old complaints. Go back any number of years and you'll see posts that start with "Lately I've noticed..." followed by the exact same observations about unresponsive clients, lowball bids, this website sucks etc. Such comments traditionally spike in August, too.

 

As for having to pay for connects, of course some freelancers are going to be upset about having to pay for something that used to be free, especially if their profit margins are so razor-thin that they don't allow for a marketing budget or business expenses of any kind. 

 


So, nothing has changed, is what you're basically saying - followed by the idea that anyway it's all because of the summer holidays, yet here we are in mid-September.


I'm not saying that "nothing" has changed, but I AM saying that people have been making the exact same complaints since I joined Elance/Upwork in August 2000. And yes, the summer holidays for the majority of Upwork's clients have just ended. 

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