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lysis10
Community Member

Upwork, we need to know when a client card fails on Monday for hourly contracts. Here is a use case.

I know Upwork people read this, so I'm hoping to get you guys to consider making it so that we know when a client card fails on Monday before we start charging more on a card that does not have funds the next week. Please consider this use case, as I'm going through this now.

 

WIth hourly, you only cover $2500 payment protection, which is great and why I use hourly contracts, but some of us have high hourly rates and blow through that money the first week with a client. We have no idea the client payment method failed, so we continue working the following week and can completely blow through the $2500 before we have any idea that the charge failed. I'm currently in the issue where I billed ~$3500 (this is the contract: https://www.upwork.com/nx/wm/workroom/31935137/details). As you can see, I billed about $1200 last week and his charge failed. He's now telling me he has no funds, so the ~$2500 that will hit his card next week will fail. I had no idea until this morning that it failed after I'd already billed an amount over payment protection. There is no way for me to verify that the client's card charged before I am out money. Can someone at Upwork please consider letting us see in the contract details when a card fails on Monday so that we can act accordingly? Then we can hold off on more work and protect our funds (and Upworks for that matter, because it's unlikely we will work any further until the client fixes the issue).

13 REPLIES 13
bobafett999
Community Member

Good luck with that.  They don't do anything for freelancers that costs money.


Prashant P wrote:

Good luck with that.  They don't do anything for freelancers that costs money.


Well, it does cost them money when we use payment protection, so it's win-win for us both. If I know the card failed, I'd halt production until the client fixed the issue. I think I can safely guess that most freelancers don't want to risk non-payment on payment protection even if we do know that we're covered. There is a chance that Upwork won't cover some segments, but in the case of the higher hourly people, we also need to know when the card fails so that we can protect our funds.

 

I'm not really here to bring this up to freelancers. I know that Upwork reads here, even silently, so I'm hoping they see this and consider this use case, as I am sure I'm not the only person this affects.

bobafett999
Community Member

May be if you were to suggest that you would pay some more connecteds for that service they might be tempted 😉 

 

Throw a bone!!

AndreaG
Moderator
Moderator

Hi Jennifer,

 

Thank you for sharing your experience with Hourly Protection and this particular case. We'll be sure to note your feedback and share it with the appropriate team.

 

~Andrea
Upwork
lysis10
Community Member


Andrea G wrote:

Hi Jennifer,

 

Thank you for sharing your experience with Hourly Protection and this particular case. We'll be sure to note your feedback and share it with the appropriate team.

 


Thank you for acknowledging my thread. I know that Upwork employees lurk here, so I hope they will consider this problem and request. I've gotten very close to going over the $2500 on other contracts, but it was only a matter of time before it happend and here I am.

I hope they do more than just consider solving this problem; I hope they commit to fixing it.

 

I have no interest in working with, much less billing, clients whom Upwork already knows can't afford my services, even if Upwork does cover some or all of the shortfall in these clients' payments. That $2,500 lifetime limit is not hard to reach on some projects.


Will L wrote:

I hope they do more than just consider solving this problem; I hope they commit to fixing it.

 

I have no interest in working with, much less billing, clients whom Upwork already knows can't afford my services, even if Upwork does cover some or all of the shortfall in these clients' payments. That $2,500 lifetime limit is not hard to reach on some projects.


I don't think more payment protection is the answer either. I think it's important for us to know that there are payment issues immediately so that we can stop charging. It should also be clear that Upwork will continue to make more attempts to charge the card so that we can just be aware of it. I think it's pretty terrible we have no idea if we are billing on a dead card for 4/5 days.

I wouldn't argue with more payment protection, but just setting up transparency for us freelancers who do larger value projects would be a big help. To Upwork, as well as us freelancers.

 

The issue of whether collected amounts on rebilling counts against the $2,500 lifetime came up in this thread:

 

Solved: Hourly Payment Protection - Lifetime Limit of... - Upwork Community

 

 


Will L wrote:

I wouldn't argue with more payment protection, but just setting up transparency for us freelancers who do larger value projects would be a big help. To Upwork, as well as us freelancers.

 

The issue of whether collected amounts on rebilling counts against the $2,500 lifetime came up in this thread:

 

Solved: Hourly Payment Protection - Lifetime Limit of... - Upwork Community

 

 


Oh dear this is interesting. If I'm understanding correctly, you (?) went over the $2500 and the client eventually paid up, but because you used protection, you no longer qualify for any amount even though the client paid off their debt. Is this correct? This is quite the predicament I'm in then, because I already know this client is working with no capital and even though it's good money, I have zero protection after this and probably should just end it. ooooooof. He will owe me $1200 after the payment protection, so this is gonna be a nice balancing act to get my money paid as a bonus.

Jennifer,

 

If I remember correctly, this particular client did make good on all arrears with Upwork and afterward I still saw an indication on the project page that hourly payment protection was still in place after all was said and done.

 

But I never heard from the client or tracked time on the client's project again, so I can't say for sure that I could have continued to bill the client using TimeTracker and been assured of payment by Upwork, if not the client.

 

But I do specifically remember seeing an indication the project continuing to be eligible for hourly payment protection. To what amount? I don't know.

I once had a flaky client tell me in writing on the project message board she couldn't afford to pay me to complete her project, despite the fact we were coming in under budget.

 

I told her I couldn't continue to work if she couldn't afford to pay me. She filed a dispute saying I didn't complete her project and Upwork actually let the dispute go forward, despite the fact Upwork would have had to step in and pay me when they discovered she didn't pay in full for my services.

 

I was looking out for Upwork's interest in not working further for her. Very odd, but the dispute was eventually denied by Upwork for the work I did do because my TimeTracker billings met Upwork's provisions.

6bfcdaf8
Community Member

I totally support this. If we are independent service providers and customers, and upwork is just the marketplace, then there's no need to delay conveying this information.

 

i know customers may re adjust balances or change credit cards and pay this amount, but i also deserve to know how often and when such cases are happening.

 

Also i have to say i dont like the "contract on hold" message wording. Because i'm not upworks employee, i'm an i dependent vendor here so i deserve to know what's happening

lysis10
Community Member


Alper D wrote:

I totally support this. If we are independent service providers and customers, and upwork is just the marketplace, then there's no need to delay conveying this information.

 

i know customers may re adjust balances or change credit cards and pay this amount, but i also deserve to know how often and when such cases are happening.

 

Also i have to say i dont like the "contract on hold" message wording. Because i'm not upworks employee, i'm an i dependent vendor here so i deserve to know what's happening


Yes, I've had clients get on it quickly. IME, if they fix the issue quickly on Monday, you still get the money early but if they wait too long after that, you won't see the money until Tuesday. The only way you know if they fixed the problem was if the contract *is not* put on hold and the payment goes into pending instead of being available like it should be. Those two clues tell you that the charge initially failed but the client fixed the issue at some point. 

 

The hold message is vague, but you know 100% if you get it on Friday that their payment failed. This isn't clear to freelancers until they trial and error through the system. I think they should be more transparent too, because this is our money and new freelancers only know that they didn't get the money and now the contract is on hold.

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