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dream89
Community Member

What happens when a client files a dispute regarding hourly work?

I am a Professional Rails developer and I recently got a contract for some UI work (hourly).
It was a straight-forward, one-time job so I made a offer which is somewhat less than my usual rate.

 

I got the contract but when hiring me the client tried to reduce the rate even further.
I didn't agree to this so they hired me since they were convinced about my previous work.

Except for trying to reduce my rate they communicated very well with me so I was convinced the job will be a success.

 

The job was to install a third-party theme to Rails and I finished it successfully.
Then basically the client told me that they wanted some UI elements to be a little different and that is what they expected from the beginning.
The changes they wanted were trivial and could be done within an hour. It might even taken less time than that.
I tried to explain that. But they didn't want to listen. They critized my work without any basis, but I didn't stop co-operating with them.
They stopped co-operating by finally saying to me below. Either fix these (without logging time) and you keep your money or we close the contract now and file a dispute with upwork.
Then I said okay and I closed the contract myself since I didn't have a choice.

 

Anyways I'm wondering what would the upwork's policy be in a case like this.

 

- Chanaka

ACCEPTED SOLUTION
prestonhunter
Community Member

Chanaka:

The client's options for disputing your hourly work are limited.

 

Upwork has Hourly Payment Protection.

 

If you followed the rules for protected hourly work (no manual time; adequate activity levels, memos, screenshots show work on the client's actual project, payment-verified client), then Upwork will make sure you get paid for the time you spent working on this contract.

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3 REPLIES 3
prestonhunter
Community Member

Chanaka:

The client's options for disputing your hourly work are limited.

 

Upwork has Hourly Payment Protection.

 

If you followed the rules for protected hourly work (no manual time; adequate activity levels, memos, screenshots show work on the client's actual project, payment-verified client), then Upwork will make sure you get paid for the time you spent working on this contract.

And for the record, this client was being an unprofessional, unreasonable bully.

 

You did the right thing by behaving politely, but you shouldn't need to put up with that kind of behavior.

 

Upwork will be doing the right thing if it politely explains to the client that he can't dispute the time you spent if your work diary clearly shows you working on the project, documented with adequate memos.

Thank you for the reply Preston. I really appreciate it.

 

Yes, this was my thought exactly. They were trying to bully me.  That might be how they are used to communicating with people. I also think some clients don't understand they are working with real people. 

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