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Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

Upwork needs to do a better job vetting potential clients

Don't waste your time responding to a "payment method not verified" client. Why Upwork allows potential clients to be unverified in the first place is beyond me. Upwork needs to start doing a better job vetting these scammers. Freelancers have limited time as it is, so we don't need to waste more time chasing a lead that goes nowhere.

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Tonya's avatar
Tonya P Community Member


Katy K wrote:

Okay, point taken then, thank you Jennifer. How do we fix this on both ends to make the Upwork platform work for both clients and freelancers?


Charge a fee to join the platform and a monthly fee to access it in order to cover the costs of  additional vetting. 

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76 REPLIES 76
Petra's avatar
Petra R Community Member


Katy K wrote: I personally take offense at your comments about "ignorance, greed or simple stupidity" on the part of freelancers.

Fact remains: The vast majority of scams only work if there is one or more of them (ignorance, greed or simple stupidity) on the part of the freelancer. It is very difficult to get scammed on Upwork without violating the terms of service and/or doing something stupid.

 


Katy K wrote:

Scammers are successful because they're able to fool even the most seasoned professionals at times,


Not at all. In fact, the opposite is true. The scams are kept (deliberately) detectable because the scammers are only after the low hanging fruit. They have no intention of wasting their time pn prospective victims who will wake up and smell a rat at the last minute. So the scams are kept deliberately dumb in order to weed out those who aren't likely to get scammed at an early stage.


Just about every scam I have seen mentioned here in the last over a decade would was pretty obviously a scam and required the victim to violate the terms of service and/or do something that they wouldn't have done had a modicum of critical thinking been applied.

CJ's avatar
CJ A Community Member

They don't 'vet' new clients at all.  Anybody with a fresh e-mail address can create an UW client account and begin 'posting' whatever they want on the Job Board immediately.  Nobody verifies who they are. Nobody reviews or screens what they post.  People just sign up and start posting stuff.  When their account gets banned, they just grab a new email address, create a new account, and repeat-cycle - beging 'posting' stuff again.  There IS NO 'vetting' of new clients.  If you can TYPE and create an email address, you can get an UW 'client' account.  That's all the 'vetting' there is on the client side.

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

Thanks for the info CJ. That's unfortunate. Perhaps if we can build a concensus among freelancers, Upwork might consider doing a better job at vetting potential clients.

Nichola's avatar
Nichola L Community Member

Katy, 

I am sorry you were scammed. However if you had read Upwork's terms of service before starting, you may have avoided the bullet.

 

The other reason for reading the ToS, is to make sure that one does not violate them in one's profile. For example, it is against the rules and regs to provide any outside contact information such as websites or social media etc. or to provide it in a proposal letter before a contract is in place. 

Maria's avatar
Maria T Community Member


Nichola L wrote:

Katy, 

I am sorry you were scammed. However if you had read Upwork's terms of service before starting, you may have avoided the bullet.

 

The other reason for reading the ToS, is to make sure that one does not violate them in one's profile. For example, it is against the rules and regs to provide any outside contact information such as websites or social media etc. or to provide it in a proposal letter before a contract is in place. 


According to Valeria, links to external portfolios in the presentation are allowed. I added an external link to my portfolio when she confirmed that it could be added.
https://community.upwork.com/t5/Freelancers/Links-in-profiles/m-p/918522#M570192
And, as far as I know, providing a link to a portfolio in proposals has always been allowed. 
Am I confused about this? 🤔

Preston's avatar
Preston H Community Member

Yeah... I don't think it is helpful at all to think that Upwork vets clients.

Peter's avatar
Peter G Community Member

Unfortunately, it's clear thay most new freelancers think that they do and therefore feel Upwork will keep them safe when it is really up to the freelancer to do that.

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

I'm not a new freelancer Peter! I've been around the block, so to speak, and I was surprised to find myself the victim of a scam. I should have known better, but I let my guard down. Regarding your last sentenece, why wouldn't we assume Upwork should vet potential clients?! We are paying for credits, even though it's a nominal cost. Perhaps the service should be subscription based or we should pay more for credits? The system is broken or, at the very least, flawed.

Peter's avatar
Peter G Community Member

I was just stating the way things are, not the way I think they should be. I agree that they should vet clients and meant that new freelancers assume that that already do.

Wes's avatar
Wes C Community Member

I don’t want Upwork vetting clients any more than they already do. Three reasons:

 

1) It adds friction: anything UW does to make it harder for clients to post jobs means fewer legitimate jobs will be posted.
2) It’s intractable: They can never do enough vetting to eliminate scammers.
3) It’s expensive: UW doing more work to vet clients means they’ll likely need to raise the fees they charge freelancers, which means we need to raise the fees we charge clients, which will price out more clients.

 

To me, that second point is key. Some people might say that whatever they can do is good, even if it’s not everything. But If people think UW is vetting clients, they will assume anyone posting is legit. And that will never be true.

 

The responsibility to avoid scams has to be on the freelancer. Upwork has made it trivially easy to avoid the vast majority of the scams. If freelancers follow their rules and use contracts as they are designed, 99% of the scams go away.

 

1) don’t communicate off the platform before the contract

2) don’t exchange money outside the platform
3) don’t work without a valid Upwork contract

 

That takes care of the vast majority of scams right there. Commonsense, a bit of care, and awareness of red flags take care of almost all the rest. What remains for the most part are the people that do things like chargebacks or bullying on low-pay contracts.

 

Where Upwork has failed is in getting this information in front of freelancers BEFORE they start applying willy-nilly to jobs.

 

None of these scams are unique to Upwork or any of the other platforms. Almost all of them existed in some form or another long before Upwork did. What’s different is the large pool of freelancers who don’t know any better because 1) they haven’t taken the time to do basic research before they dive in and 2) Upwork hasn’t made the effort to get information about scams in front of them effectively before they get burned.

 

And again, the payment verification flag says absolutely nothing about whether the client is legit or not. Frankly, Upwork should just pull it from the job listings. It’s meaningless until it’s time for the offer, and seeing “payment verified” just gives some freelancers a false sense of security.

 

Freelancing platforms will never be a safe space. Freelancing outside the platforms will never be a safe space. It will always require the freelancers, no one else, to take responsibility for keeping themselves safe.

 

Peter's avatar
Peter G Community Member

"And again, the payment verification flag says absolutely nothing about whether the client is legit or not. Frankly, Upwork should just pull it from the job listings. It’s meaningless until it’s time for the offer, and seeing “payment verified” just gives some freelancers a false sense of security."

 

Agree.

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

Thank you Wes, first reasonable reply in favor of Upwork on this issue, and done without shaming well-intentioned and hard-working freelancers. I still think the platform could be improved, and maybe it is as simple as Upwork doing a better job of disseminating that information to freelancers. Interesting about the payment verification flag, if it's not meaningful then I agree, it shouldn't be there.

Thank you all for your input on this issue. One last comment before I put at least my input to rest...if this issue has been discussed over and over and over again in this forum (as some of the shamers and deflectors have mentioned), then that means there is room for improvement. I hope Upwork takes all the input on both sides to heart to make the platform better for both freelancers and clients. Good night and good luck out there!

Nichola's avatar
Nichola L Community Member

Upwork actually does try to take "all input on both sides to heart".  What it can't do is to force people to read its ToS.  

 

Nobody is "shaming" you Katy, merely pointing out that non-compliance with Upwork's rules and regs  invariably leads to disappointment and discontent, and at worst account suspension, which can sometimes happen if one provides a website URL  and contact information on one's profile or in proposal letters. 

 

 

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

Re: "shaming," you obviously haven't read through all the comments, Nichola! Regardless, there is VERY CLEARLY an issue on this platform with SCAMMERS. There should be a better vetting process in place, as it WASTES OUR TIME as freelancers (and apparently clients) to respond and follow up. I could read the ToS all day long, and I'm still going to be wasting my time responding to scammers if they are not vetted first. 

 

Anyone know how I close up this thread that I started?! The conversation has reached its end. Thank you for all of the thoughtful and well intentioned responses.

Phyllis's avatar
Phyllis G Community Member


Katy K wrote:

Re: "shaming," you obviously haven't read through all the comments, Nichola! Regardless, there is VERY CLEARLY an issue on this platform with SCAMMERS. There should be a better vetting process in place, as it WASTES OUR TIME as freelancers (and apparently clients) to respond and follow up. I could read the ToS all day long, and I'm still going to be wasting my time responding to scammers if they are not vetted first. 

 

Anyone know how I close up this thread that I started?! The conversation has reached its end. Thank you for all of the thoughtful and well intentioned responses.


It's a public forum, you don't get to determine that "the conversation has reached its end" just because you disagree with comments being made. None of which were ill-intentioned, by the way -- just direct. If you think about it, I'm sure you will understand how longtime,  steadily earning UW FLs might be a bit short on patience when people (you're far from the first) who have yet to earn their first dime on the platform arrive with pronouncements about the need for changes which, if implemented, would invariably cost us more of our hard-earned money without actually solving the alleged problem. (I say "alleged" because the real problem is not the scammers--they're endemic to FLing--the real problem is the target-rich environment.)

 

If the UW platform is not a good fit for your business, then don't use it. In the meantime, while imperfect, it works well for thousands--likely tens of thousands--of us who use it to find great clients and earn good money. We're succeeding because we invested heavily in time and energy to figure out how to optimize it within our own business models. Anyone who parachutes in advocating disruption of that has gotta expect pushback. 

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

I keep getting reeled back in, lol, but I feel compelled to reply to your comments, Phyllis:

- It was just a question. I've never participated in this forum before. I just want to end getting responses sent to my inbox. I'll rephrase the question: Does anyone know how to turn off responses from this thread sent to my inbox?

- I wasn't ending the conversation because I disagreed with the comments, I love public discourse and welcome all opinions! I just have work to do, lol, and this issue appears to be bigger than all of us, or else the conversation would have died out by now.

- Some comments were ill-intentioned, it's the essense of social media, unfortunately. 

- I can see why you would have assumed I was a newbie, but this is my second time on Upwork. The first time, I cracked the code, so to speak, and found some satisfactory success and return on my effort. This time around, it feels completely different. Something has changed. 8 proposals that I had taken the time to reply to were closed in less than 24 hours, that's closed, not that I wasn't selected for the work. So from my perspective, in the two years since I last dabbled on Upwork, I see cracks in the platform. I haven't changed, my product and process haven't changed, so I can only assume Upwork has lost control over letting scammers proliferate.

- Good point on the "target-rich environment," but again, that kinda makes my point for the need for change.

- Good point on expecting pushback. In any struggle for change, pushback is not only expected but necessary for open dialogue.

Thank you for listening!

Amanda's avatar
Amanda L Community Member


Katy K wrote:

I keep getting reeled back in, lol, but I feel compelled to reply to your comments, Phyllis:

- It was just a question. I've never participated in this forum before. I just want to end getting responses sent to my inbox. I'll rephrase the question: Does anyone know how to turn off responses from this thread sent to my inbox?


Yes, click on your pic next to your name on the top right hand corner of the screen and you can sift through a variety of preferences for forum notifications. 

 

- I can see why you would have assumed I was a newbie, but this is my second time on Upwork. The first time, I cracked the code, so to speak, and found some satisfactory success and return on my effort. This time around, it feels completely different. Something has changed. 8 proposals that I had taken the time to reply to were closed in less than 24 hours, that's closed, not that I wasn't selected for the work. So from my perspective, in the two years since I last dabbled on Upwork, I see cracks in the platform. I haven't changed, my product and process haven't changed, so I can only assume Upwork has lost control over letting scammers proliferate.

 


This is very confusing to me. Upwork users are only allowed one account ever per the TOS. You cannot close accounts and open a new one. If you were here 2 years ago, why are you not using that account, which would show the jobs you completed 2 years ago. Obviously I don't know the details of why you have a second account, but I highly recommend, as others have, that you re-read the TOS and potentially reach out to support to address the two account issue so you don't have any issues related to that. Again, obviously I don't know the details, just giving you forewarning in case you need to deal with this and have not. 

 

Regarding what has changed, it's not just you or Upwork changing. The world has changed dramatically in the last two years. Even if you and Upwork each have not, the global environment in which we are all living and working HAS changed. Upwork has made a lot of changes to TOS in the last two years to try and protect freelancers as much as it can. I would suggest that you consider the changes in the world the last two years and consider the changes you need to make to your products/services/business model to keep up. Times changes, and we all have to adjust. 

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

This is great information, thank you Amanda!  No idea why I wasn't able to keep the same account, that certainly would have benefitted me to have a work history on Upwork. Thanks for letting me know, I will follow up with Upwork.

And yes, the world has changed, which again makes my point about Upwork stepping up to meet those changes. Best to you!

Amanda's avatar
Amanda L Community Member


Katy K wrote:

And yes, the world has changed, which again makes my point about Upwork stepping up to meet those changes. Best to you!


Upwork HAS stepped up to meet those changes, and to protect freelancers like you, to the detriment of many of our businesses. Example 1: the new TOS rule, enacted in 2020 that we cannot communicate with clients or share outside contact info prior to a contract on Upwork being in place. Many of us now lose clients because we cannot email with them to negotiate or use Calendly to set up appointments and simple things like this. So I had to adjust MY business to deal with Upwork changing to protect freelancers like you and making it harder for many of us to do business. But that's fine, because I can change with the times. 

 

Upwork has been changing. And you are missing the point, which is that you need to look at your business model and shift accordingly. Upwork no longer operates how it did 2 years ago. You cannot continue to operate however you did 2 years ago and expect it to be the same. 

Nichola's avatar
Nichola L Community Member

Katy, 

You have clearly not read the terms of service. If you had, you would see that by adding your website URlL and contact information to your profile, you are also violating Upwork's rules and regs. 

 

Katy's avatar
Katy K Community Member

Thank you for reviewing my profile Nichola! I have removed my website url, thank you. I don't think I have any contact information listed, unless I'm still missing something? Any other input would (I'm completely serious here) be greatly appreciated.

Tatevik's avatar
Tatevik G Community Member

Scammers don't hurt Upwork, in fact freelancers waste connects on scammers, there is a symbiotic relationship there. 

Maria's avatar
Maria T Community Member


Tatevik G wrote:

Scammers don't hurt Upwork, in fact freelancers waste connects on scammers, there is a symbiotic relationship there. 


Scammers do hurt Upwork.
Scammers make customers mistrust other freelancers and the platform.
Freelancers, Upwork has more than enough here, what is needed is more clients (real, not scammers, of course)

Tatevik's avatar
Tatevik G Community Member

If you're referring to scamming freelancers, sure, agree. And since I haven't used Upwork to hire, I don't have experience with that to have anything to say on how much more vetting Freelancers should go through.

 

Scamming clients is what I was referring to, since the OP seems to refer to them as well. There is absolutely no vetting for clients, and most freelancers here don't seem to even support the idea of having some vetting, and put all responsibility on the freelancers to know enough not to get scammed.

Jamie's avatar
Jamie F Community Member


Katy K wrote:

Don't waste your time responding to a "payment method not verified" client.


I love this advice.

Unverified clients are an absolute gold mine and the more people who keep clear of them, the better it is for me.