A client I worked with recently on a project using an hourly contract threatened that he would give me a bad review on that project (After it was finished but the contract was still active) if I didn't accept a second project based on a timeline and budget he set.
I have respectfully declined that project not only because of the budget that was lower than the estimate I provided when he asked for it but mainly because I wouldn't be able to finish it within a week as requested since I had other projects I'm currently working on and it would affect my ability to work on those projects unless I somehow manage to work 24/7.
I reported the message that included the bad review threat and created a dispute ticket, but he proceeded after that to act on his threat gave me a bad review, and requested a refund based on false accusations that questioned my integrity and the time logged.
Every minute logged on this project was actual work done on his design, in addition to me working an extra 10 hours offline to make sure I was charging him fairly for whenever my CAD software was lagging or whenever I felt that something was taking too long to be done, in addition to paying a graphic designer to fix the logo he provided so that it can be applied in his design when he refused to find a graphic designer to fix it.
This was my second project on this platform and it was the worst experience I ever had since I started freelancing, it is making me feel like I was treated as a slave due to the way he ordered me to accept this second project when I respectfully declined it more than once and stated my reasons, thus he proceeded to threaten me and act on his threat later on.
I'm not sure how this will affect my profile on Upwork, but I had to stand my ground against an abusive client.
