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sofiaha
Community Member

About freelancer closing a contract and client private feedback

Hello,

 

I hope that Petra can answer this, because I notice that she has great knowledge of the innerworkings of Upwork.

 

So, my friend has been in Upwork for about a year, she is fairly new, as am I. She is too shy to ask for help here in the community, so I am asking for her. Seriously.

 

She has finished 9 jobs in Upwork (spread fairly evenly within the last year) and her JSS is currently at 95%. She was looking at the various jobs and she can't find which one hurt her score. The score started at 94% and appeared right after the 7th job. After the 9th job, the score increased to 95%.

 

She was wondering if jobs that were closed by her have an impact (direct or indirect) in the JSS. For example, when a freelancer ends the contract, can the client leave bad private feedback without giving any public feedback (no stars and no text)? Also, can someone confirm that a contract ended by the freelancer when the client was under investigation does not have any impact on the JSS? Also, does a client's text feedback has any influence on the JSS?

 

Here are the contracts in order:

1. Ended by client, feedback given (5 stars, text)
2. Ended by freelancer, no feedback from client (no stars, no text)
3. Ended by freelancer, no feedback from client (no stars, no text)
4. Ended by client, feedback given (5 stars, no text)
5. Ended by freelancer, no feedback from client (no stars, no text)
6. Ended by (returning) client, feedback given (5 stars, text)
7. Ended by (returning) client, feedback given (5 stars, text)
8. Ended by client, feedback given (5 stars, no text)
9. Ended by client, feedback given (5 stars, text)

 

In jobs 2 and 3, those two clients dissappeared and she closed the contract after waiting for a while. By the way, in job 2, the client was under investigation by Upwork; it took five months for my friend to decide to manually close the contract. In job 5, it seems that the client was too busy to go back to Upwork to close the contract; after several weeks, she closed the contract herself.

 

Don't worry, she learned not to start contracts with clients with an unverified payment method and also she learned to politely ask the client to close the contract immediately after the job is finished.

 

Can we assume that the client that was under investigation is ignored by the algorithm? If so, then there are exactly 6 clients. But, currently, the "clients who would recommend you" pecentage is at 80%, which could only be 4 out of 5. The "long-term clients" percentage is at 17% which could only be 1 out of 6.

 

The fact that the "clients who would recommend you" pecentage only takes 5 clients into consideration might mean that one of the clients didn't bother to recommend at all (leaving that option blank). Any thoughts on this?

 

She can't know which one of the clients that gave good public feedback wouldn't recommend her. We know that this doesn't necessarily mean they click on the zero or one in that question, a partial recommendation (medium numbers), means no recommendation for the algorithm, right?

 

The two clients that dissappeared might have been unhappy and not willing to continue, we know that one was under investigation, but do you think that the other one is the culprit?

 

Or could a client that was apparently happy (giving 5 stars and great text feedback), was in fact unhappy in their private feedback and never had the courage to say it to her face?

 

Basically what my friend wants to know is which one job would you recommend removing from the JSS calculation (as a Top Rated perk) to try to increast the JSS?

 

Thank you very much for your time,

 

Sofia

3 REPLIES 3
petra_r
Community Member

Hi Sofia,

 

80% private feedback means that either a client gave her really poor private feedback, or 2 or more gave her not quite great private feedback. (it has several components and there are 1-10 scales)

 

Clients who don't give any private feedback are excluded from that metric but clients who close contracts or give feedback can not avoid giving it.

 

The text feedback is entirely irrelevant.

 

Feedback from clients who got suspended is excluded.

 

Q: "She was wondering if jobs that were closed by her have an impact (direct or indirect) in the JSS. For example, when a freelancer ends the contract, can the client leave bad private feedback without giving any public feedback (no stars and no text)?"#

 

A: No, that is not possible and provided (!) money has been paid the odd "no feedback" contract does not hurt. A very high percentage however might.

 

Q: "Also, can someone confirm that a contract ended by the freelancer when the client was under investigation does not have any impact on the JSS?"

 

A: Only if the client is suspended and stays suspended.

 

If I were your friend I would NOT use the perk. There is nothing wrong with a 95% JSS and after 6 month any "poor" effect falls out of the 6 month window. 

Tell her to save the perk for a REAL problem situation.

woiownikbuff
Community Member

I know this one.

 

"Can we assume that the client that was under investigation is ignored by the algorithm?" - nope.

 

I had the same issue. I have a contract open since 2018 - it they are under investigation, UpWork paid me money because apparently they used a fake credit card or something, I think they were verified though, and UpWork contacted me about this issue - all fine.

 

So then am like, why is this contract still open? I message them, and they said wait for the client. But am sure their account is banned or something. 

 

Its a bug or an issue UpWork needs to solve.

 

I know that if I end that contract, with no feedback, it will affect my score, so I just left it open there for the past 3years so far. 

 

Don't ever close contract. I had a guy that closed a contract when there was more work to be done after the weekend, so there you also have some lost oportunity - its easy to throw in some extra work when the contract is open. I dislike when dreelancers close the contracts, I guess I'll just search for someone else for the other bits, when you could have done it. 

 

So the client that was under investigation, with no feedback, is whathurt her score, am sure 100%. 


Aurelian S wrote:

I know this one.

 

"Can we assume that the client that was under investigation is ignored by the algorithm?" - nope.

 

I had the same issue. I have a contract open since 2018 - it they are under investigation, UpWork paid me money because apparently they used a fake credit card or something, I think they were verified though, and UpWork contacted me about this issue - all fine.

 

So then am like, why is this contract still open? I message them, and they said wait for the client. But am sure their account is banned or something. 

 

Its a bug or an issue UpWork needs to solve.

 

I know that if I end that contract, with no feedback, it will affect my score, so I just left it open there for the past 3years so far. 

 

Don't ever close contract. I had a guy that closed a contract when there was more work to be done after the weekend, so there you also have some lost oportunity - its easy to throw in some extra work when the contract is open. I dislike when dreelancers close the contracts, I guess I'll just search for someone else for the other bits, when you could have done it. 

 

So the client that was under investigation, with no feedback, is whathurt her score, am sure 100%. 


Jobs that end without feedback have no negative impact on JSS any longer. Since a few months now. 

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