Extremely Strange Experience With Upwork so Far

[454e98e0]

Logged in, created an account,  and then had AI create an ad, went to post, and then got a message my phone number needed to be verified. Looking everywhere and have no way to do this. Chatbot says upwork will email me when I need to earn the badge????? and have no clue what that means or how that is supposed to help. Is this a professional place to hire people who want work? In that case, should be able to create an account, verify ID if necessary easily and post. Not sure why I'm having to run around all over the website for support on something extremely simple. Also no way to get to the page where I'm supposed to be able to submit a help request for ID verification because chatbot can't help. Chatbot should directly link me to that page if it can't help me directly. Super weird. Upwork, the correct way to run this is as follows:

I make an account

I verify ID easily should that be necessary

I post an ad

Not sure why all these other strange and unnecessary bells and whistles and horrific navigation? Please fix.

[JoanneP]

Hi Michael,

I'm sorry for the trouble you had while trying to post your project. I've escalated your concern to the team. One of our agents will reach out and assist you directly via a support ticket.