financial account was suspended and a big sum blocked

[mydes]

Hello! Hope someone can help me. Odesk suspended my account August,25 ("Unfortunately, we had to put the financial side of your account on a temporary hold while we review a certain transaction on your client’s account."). I have about $7,5k now which I can't withdraw. This money was earned from different projects and I worked hard to earn each dollar. I provided all information which was requested for current project. But haven't received any answer (only auto-answers) and any instructions how to unblock my account. I can't work also and afraid my account will be like a newbie without activity. At the earlier of September me and my family are planning a trip: booked hotel, bought tickets and made visa. But now when I see that such big sum was blocked I don't know what to do with this trip too. Please, can someone from oDesk stuff help me: clarify situation, provide instructions, and accelerate process? I really hope for your help, thanks! Best regards, Anton

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Joan,

I am happy to hear that everything was clarified and your account was reinstated. Thank you very much for coming back to let us know!

[karsheil]

Hello Valeria,

My financial account have been suspended and I cannot withdraw the available funds. I've been asking any update to upwork management yet they haven't resolved it. Will you help me on this matter. 

Thank you

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Karen,

It looks like your account was resumed before I could even check. Everything is sorted out and you should be able to withdraw your funds.

Thanks!

[jsutherland]

I'd like to ask a questions about these suspensions.

If a client's account gets suspended does that mean the freelancer's account is also suspended and all money in the freelancer's account cannot be accessed? It seems the freelancer did nothing wrong, yet all the money in their account from past employers is then frozen. 

Is this true and this is how it works if a client gets suspended?

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Jean,

Thank you for your question. It really depends on each individual situation. In some cases when the client's account gets suspended, only the contract is suspended on the freelancer's side. However, there are other situations when a transaction between the two has to be investigated and both accounts are temporarily blocked.

[prestonhunter]

Shanki, thank you for sharing you story with us. I'm sorry to hear that you're having trouble.

I hope you are understanding of the fact that when you let another Upwork contractor use your own personal PayPal account and your own credit card number, and that person did naughty and illegal things using you PayPal account and credit card, that this created some trust issues.

It is good to know that you have always followed all the TOS and all the agreement rules, but Upwork may need some time to consider your plea. I think the main question is this: Is that Internet cafe looking for any new workers?

[shanki161]

Dear Preston,

Thanks a lot for taking out time to respond to me.


I have been getting a negative response from the support team that made me go in depression a bit and leaded to my negative replies.

But we have to understand that we are in real world and all our actions are not controlled as per our wishes.I understand i have made a mistake,infact a big mistake.But i have never voilated any terms and condition knowingly.I have never tried to work outside of odesk and always had a good trust on odesk. If i had to do wrong things i would not have submited my genuine govt provided Identity verification and Bank Statements.

I have gone through a bad time because of the Cafe Manager,he use to bully me and create problems.I never thought he would do such a scam.I just thought i am helping him with the payments through paypal and he was helping me with free internet and laptop and also the amount which he was using from my paypal he used to pay me.

Is that Internet cafe looking for any new workers?

I am not very much sure but i think yes he will trap someone else now as i know his reality.He used to ask to work offline.He has other computers and ip switching software also.

I am ready to support you as much as i can.Please help me with this,i really need to come out of this as a fighter.My 140$ are strucked in my account 😞

Thanks and Regards

Shanki

[jslyvka]

Hello Valeria,

I really hope you can help me as well. I've travelled for my summer vacation to USA, and while staying there I have registered in Upwork, and sent a request to change my country of residence (it said I lived in USA, while I asked customer support to change it to my original country, and I sent all documentation). It has been 3 months already as customer support havent changed my personal information, I've sent all my documents to proove my country of residence. Later on my account have been suspended and I cannot withdraw the available funds. I've been sending requests but yet no actions have been made.

Can you please help me and clear to me why is my account still suspended.

Thank you,

Julia

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Julia,

I have followed up with the team and they will update you through the ticket as soon as they can. They will need to verify that you are currently residing in a country where you have a legal permit to work in order for you to continue using your Upwork account.

Thank you!

[vjgonz2010]

Hi. I have the  same problem and cannot withdraw my money on the account. Can someone help me out with this?

[lenaellis]

Ver John,

You received a detailed email explaining why your account was put on hold. I see that you recently reponded to the ticket. Please follow up on your ticket to try and resolve your issue.

Thanks,

Lena

[010337a5]

I have been using elance for over 6 years and recently merged the account. I am hiring people using this platform, not making money. I have hired over 500 projects. 

Why did my account get suspended, I do not know. 

[vladag]

Hi Pulse,

We'll follow up with the team and update your open Support ticket soon.

[felisamallare]

Hello, I do have also same problem. There is a notification in my web page saying "Financial transactions for Felisa Mallare (6199572) have been limited. Please check your email for additional information or contact customer support." Please help me on this, I need the money now since this is the only source for my family needs.I have been contacting Upwork through Customer Support a couple of days now, but no reply received from them as others experienced. Thank you and I will appreciate much of your time to help.

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Felisa,

Sorry about the delay. I have folowed up with the team about your account suspension and they will update your ticket as soon as possible.

[felisamallare]

Hello Valeria,

Thank you very much for updating the team. Looking forward for immediate resolving the issue.

God bless.

[felisamallare]

Hello Valeria,

 Its really frustrating, until now there is no update from the Customer Support. I am in fear for going through with my existing job still work in progress since I do not have the assurance that Ill be paid. My clients are good and they are paying me but Upwork is holding it without any further explanation in my end.

Please do help. Thank you very much.

[felisamallare]

Hello,

Can I end our contract with my client, since there is a notification that "Contract is Hold" maybe because his account is suspended. And also, I do not have any project with him anymore since before the contract was held, I already finished and sent to him the output. But it seems that the client forgot to end the contract.

Thank you for your response.

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Felisa,

Please, don't end the contract yet as the team is still investingating certain issues with the contract. They will provide you with updates and further instructions once they are done with their review.

I apologize for the inconvenience and delay.

[felisamallare]

Ok,I will. Thanks Valeria. Do you think also that this must be the reason why, my financial  transaction have been limited?

[felisamallare]

Hello Valeria,

Kindly see my Open Request Ticket. After 6 days Support replied to me just accusing me that I have done someting which resulted to my suspension that I could justify I am not doing it which I konw it will take my account at risk later. What bothers me is why is Upwork making accusation without further details/evidences proving that accusation. They should provide details into it for me to justify it also. ow could I justify if I do nt have the info to justify with like the reason behind that accusation.

I already responded to them as you will see clearing them into this matter.

One thing made me disappointed with Upwork is they wanted me to respond within 48 hours and if no response they will make further action to my suspension? is this sound unfair? Since youve been making follow up with a couple of days and in my case it took 6 days to wait for their reply. What if I didnt open my account and 48 days lapsed?Sorry to me. This is really unfavorable to Freelancer. They should not do this to us since we are paying them 10%. They will have no business without us. We are doing our job right. Thus, we deserve to receive what we earned.

Please help Valeria to follow up this to Support ASAP. I really really need to get my pay. I had given much of my time, sleepless nights and efforts  to finish my job and satisfy my clients. My clients could verify that.

Thank you very much. I will appreciate much of your help.

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Felisa,

The team will review the information you provided in response to their today's message and will get back to you with more details. I understand this is frustrating, but I also encourage you to communicate with the team honestly and provide all the necessary information to speeed up the resolution.

Thank you!

[chandraashraf]

Dear sir/madam,

I have been working here frequently but once a client dispute against my ccount and the authority suspended my account. So, may I open a new account on the basis of same information, please?

**edited for Community Guidelines**

Regards

Ashraf

[stencil_media]

I'm no 'account wizard', but I'd guess that closing a suspended account so you can open a new, non-suspended account, would be very much against the rules. 

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Nowshon,

Please note that creating multiple accounts is a serious violation of Upwork policies thus you are not allowed to re-create an account. So in order to use the site, you will need to address the suspension of your account. I have checked the account you used to post this comment in the Community and it isn't suspended, please provide more details though the support ticket that has been created.

Thank you.

[grace2020]

Same problem here: "Financial transactions for ______ have been limited. Please check your email for additional information or contact customer support."
I can't withdraw my funds and I don't know if my account was suspended or what... I've been working for almost 2 years on Odesk before it become Upwork and this is my first time that upwork hold my financial account.. I have 2 more active client waiting for me to get back to work.
Please Valeria help me in this matter.

Best,
Grace

[vladag]

Hi Grace,

I'm sorry for the inconvenience. Please see Valeria's reply to Felisa, and note that you have to communicate with our team in order to review and resolve your case as soon as possible.

[grace2020]

Hi Vladimir,

Thanks for your reply...

That's what I'm doing now.. almost 2 days there's no reply from risk management team about my issue.

And now I lost my 2 active client because of this.

Is there any way to follow up my ticket?

Best,

Grace

[grace2020]

Hi,

Anyone here help me to follow up 

1st ticket:  suspect behavior that violates our Terms of Service or that could negatively

2nd ticket: my client did not successfully complete payment to you for the week ____.

I already emailed the Risk management team and the Dispute team about this.

(1st Ticket)I asked them what I've done wrong that I violates the Terms of Service on Upwork.

until now there's  no reply it's almost 4 days waiting for any update.

(2nd Ticket) is this why my account was on hold? because my client did not successfully complete the payment?

The project was completed and I already send the screenshot.

I'm really frustrated now,I can't get my hard earn money and my account was totally down because I lost 2 active client yesterday because my account was on hold. Now I don't have any active client so Upwork will review again my account.

Every single day that there's no response from the 2 active tickets I'm worrying so much that I can't get back my account and the remaining funds.

Grace

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Grace,

I have followed up with the team about your account suspension. They still need to review a few things and will get back to you as soon as possible.

As for the message about the Upwork Hourly Protection, it was meant to provide you with additional information about how it works and how to avoid payment reversals.

Than you for your patience.

[grace2020]

Hi Valeria,

Thank you for followed up my tickets.

I received reply from risk management and they want me to complete all the contract before I can get an appeal.

This means I have to message all my inactive client to end our contract?

and what if my client was no longer active for almost a year? I'm going to suffer and not get my remaining money?

I'm totally hopeless now to resolve my issue.. If Upwork decision that my account was totally close it's really unfair because I'm cooperating to sort this out.. 

What about my remaining money?

Best,

Grace 

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Grace,

Yes, you will need to follow the instructions in the ticket and complete your active jobs in order to appeal for reinstatement. The team will also communicate with you regarding the balance on your Upwork account.

[grace2020]

Hi Valeria,

My request ticket was status "solve" but still my financial transaction is limited..

I don't know what to do next, should I send a request again to follow up or what?

I'm trying hard to be cooperative but given me hard time to figure it out what's really

happening to my account it's unfair.

Thank you so much for helping to follow up my tickets.

Best,

Grace

[felisamallare]

Thank you Valeria,

Yes,that is what I am doing right now.Still waiting for Support Representative's reply.

[mvrazon0480]

Hi Valeria! 

I read the discussions here and I've seen that you've been a great help to many freelancers. I hope you can also help me on my problem with my account. This morning I received an email from Upwork Customer Support informing me that they noticed some possible issues with my contract to one of my clients and they have to put it on hold. This contract is a fixed price contract. I already finished this job last Sept. 13 and my client even had a fund transfer for payment to Upwork on the same day.I received another email from Upwork Risk Management Team informing me that they had to put the financial side of my account on a temporary hold while they review a certain transaction on my client’s account. Because of this I can't widraw a certain amount in my Upwork account which I earned from my other client. Another problem is I have another job in progress which is hourly job and I have a few hours left to work and I promised my client that I will finish it today, can I still work on this job even if there is some issue with my contract from my other client? And if ever there will be a new client who will hire me will I be able to accept the job?.I already asked this questions on my reply to the  email of the Upwork Risk Management Team but almost 12 hours had passed still no reply. I answered their questions on the email and I even said that I could provide my chat conversations with the questionable client if ever they need it for their investigation. I am really confused about this predicament I hope you can help me on this matter. Thank you in advance. 

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Maria Victoria,

I am sorry to hear that there are issues with your client's account. You may continue working on the hourly contract you have with another client. The team will review the information you have provided about your working relationship with the first client and update you when possible.

Thank you for your patience.

[mvrazon0480]

Hi Valeria, 

Thank You for your reply. My client's Upwork account is already okay and the payment he made already reflected on my available balance but still I can't widraw my hard earned money. The warning that my Financial transactions have been limited still appear when I login to Upwork. It's been 24 hours since I replied to their email but still no reply from the Upwork Risk Management Team. What can be the problem? This is really frustrating.

Regards, 

Maria

[felisamallare]

Hello Valeria,

Thank you for your help. Upwork Risk Management Team already emailed me that as os today my account has been reinstated after following their instruction. But the question is, why notification in my account page that my financial transaction has been limited still appear and still I cannot withdraw my money?

Thank you for your response.

[awanthawickrama]

My account was suspended. I really don't know why. I am working on two projects. I have a pending payment. That is the money which I was going to feed my family this month. So now we will have to keep starving. I am only sad about my parents. Please reactivate my account. I already sent a ticket. But no replies. I don' t know to whome I am going to tell

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Awantha,

Thank you for submitting a support ticket. The team will update you as soon as possible with more information about your account suspension.