** scam

[a675375d]

I took an exam for **Edited for Community Guidelines**. It looked a little suspicious but had decent ratings. They had funded a milestone to be paid out to me once I completed their entrance exam. I completed the exam. It took 3x longer than they had told me it would. I sent them a screenshot of the completed page once I reached the end of the exam and requested payment. **Edited for Community Guidelines** ignored me for 10 days and then "requested changes" to avoid Upwork's automatic payout. They have done this twice now. They will not respond to me at all. I have reported them to Upwork. I doubt I will ever see payment from them. Clearly they are scammers. From what I can tell, they are getting freelancers to take their "exams" which are being used to train their AI. They have no intention of paying any of us. Just making a post here to warn other of their scam since I can't seem to leave feedback on their account yet. Make sure you vet your clients well. Even if they have decent reviews and verifyed payment. 

[celgins]

I think an Upwork moderator will eventually remove the business name (even though they're clearly scamming), but you provided plenty of information to help other freelancers recognize the deceit.

[rekasesh]

I guess, they are the same ones who invited me for the economics expert exam for AI training.

I mentioned that economics was just one of electives in my graduate and post graduate courses, and I was no expert.

But they encouraged me to take the "test". It's more like quality checking of two answers provided by their AI on various parameters. Going through their explainer videos was indeed time consuming.

I had the weekend free and I thought why not? Besides I wanted to know how AI is trained and its answering system perfected (after all it's supposed to render millions of people including writers and accountants jobless in the near future).

It's was an interesting experience. The not-so- fun part was the fake promise of payment like Shelby said.

I am pegging this "experience" to one of my bad decision making moments. 

The company, in my case, is an enterprise client, a category that is known to pay for work done and on time. 

Looks like the work practices on this platform are changing rapidly, and not to the benefit of freelancers.

[celgins]

I'm a bit a surprised to hear it was an Enterprise client. However, those clients--even large corporations--have their fair share of rogue individuals and teams, so it makes sense.

You're right--almost all benefits freelancers thought they had are slowly changing or disappearing.

[rekasesh]

Yep. I accepted the assignment because it's an enterprise client with 15021 hires and $13M payout. 

They had paid some maths experts in Sept-Oct as well.

 Although, I can't understand the logic of keeping money in escrow (hundreds of milestones) and then holding back payment.

Let's see if they clear it before the financial year ends.

[vishvatha]

The same happened to me. I completed the screening tests and the additional task, which took almost a day to finish. But there was no response when asked to approve milestones. I hope the necessary action is taken promptly to prevent others from being deceived.

[dad72421]

Thanks for letting us know about this. I am about to accept the offer but I think it's best to take a step back and be cautious. I am scared to grab this vague job offer and this might affect and cause my Upwork account to get tagged as fraud. 

[93464e09]

May I know any update regarding this? If you would not mind, were you able to get your salary or the payment by the end of the month or week?

[vishvatha]

Yes, I received a payment almost a month afterward.

[93464e09]

I recently received an invitation and I wasn't able to complete the onboarding tasks due to security reasons but they still paid me $5 for the "Placeholder" milestone until the contact expired without me being able to accept it

[tikus]

In upwork, everything is possible for 'both' parties since people can just hit and run, you really have to be careful, this is pretty much different with office jobs with varying levels of professionalism for both freelancers and clients. Reviews are also not always guaranteed, regardless they are good or bad. One time I got a client who had 5 ratings but he threatened me, along with guilt trips and gaslights, strangely wanted me to keep working under those conditions. Another time I had a client who was actually very nice, it's just that he had difficulty explaining what he wanted sometimes since he is not young anymore, had to ask again and again, but this polite client got a 4 stars rating only

[dad72421]

Thanks for sharing this information. I just received a response from them after I replied and submitted a proposal as they requested. The job offer is a little bit vague. I am also skeptical about the offer and I also tried to read comments, reviews, and even others' experiences on other platforms outside Upwork. I think I should just decline this offer before anything goes wrong with my account.