Aug 24, 2022 02:48:33 PM by Melanie A
Hi,
I had a client contact me regarding a proofreading job, and asked some preliminary questions that sounded very professional and reasonable.
However, I'm unsure of how to respond to the next question. She wrote the following:
"""
Complete the short form sent to you in the next message so I can put your interview up for consideration
Full Name:
Email:
Skype profile link:
Phone Number:
""""
My understanding is that Upwork doesn't allow sharing direct contact information. Is that correct? How should I respond to this client?
Aug 24, 2022 04:06:15 PM Edited Aug 24, 2022 04:07:22 PM by Jeffrey B
Going by Upwork's Terms of Service (TOS), until a contract is in place you are only allowed to speak with a potential client through Upwork's message center. Once a contract is in place you can talk to that individual anyway you would like. As far as the information they are requesting they do not need any of it, and quite frankly I would be suspicious of anyone asking you for such information.
How do you respond? Simply tell them you will speak to them on Upwork. If they truly like you and are a legitimate company, they will have no issues with your requests.
Aug 24, 2022 04:56:45 PM Edited Aug 25, 2022 05:43:23 AM by Preston H
Melanie:
It really is not your choice.
Upwork does not allow you to provide that information to the client until you have been hired officially with an Upwork contract.
I regularly have clients who want to communicate with me using Skype or phone or email or other means.
I simply tell them about Upwork's rule. If they are a serious client, the quickly hire me so that they can talk to me using the method of their choice.
Aug 25, 2022 05:14:36 AM by Luqman M
Does not sound legit. A client does not need all those information to hire on this platform.
Lets say we give it the benefit of doubt - what would a skype profile help with recruiting anyway.
I think these people are data miners, they are collecting user information that they can sell off once it gets large enough.
Ah, sorry its not really an answer to your questions.
Aug 26, 2022 09:09:44 AM by Melanie A
Thank you all for your replies! I agree, the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was suspicious that they would require this information.
I responded that I am not able to provide my contact information per Upwork's Terms of Service and said I continue to communicate via Upwork's Message Center. They never responded. 😕 Later I applied to another listing and got the same initial message, saying they were from the same company, though the name of the contact was different. Definitely smells fishy to me.