Six Upwork clients to avoid
Six Upwork clients to avoid
WFFH: Part 1 of 2: Troubleshooting problematic freelancing contracts
Writer’s note: This post was originally published on Medium’s “We Need to Talk” on February 12, 2020. (“Work Fluently From Home,” or WFFH, is a series within “Window Shopping” geared toward entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, gig workers and startups.)
You’ve decided to make side money on a freelancing platform like Upwork. Or, you could’ve been a long-time freelancer who remembers the prior programs, Elance and oDesk. Maybe you’re testing Upwork out after less luck on Fiverr or Freelancer. Either way it goes, you want to find out whether you can use any of the 5,000 listed skills within the 70 categories of work offered on Upwork. Good luck!
The good news is you absolutely can. I’ve been working on Upwork since March 2014 and have a handful of long-time clients, in addition to my own private clients and outside work. As a top-rated freelancer with a 100% job success rate (as of publication date), I often have clients who reach out to me for work. This is a relief, considering I have never paid Upwork’s membership plans for Connects — nor will I. (Paying to apply to a job just does not sit right with me nor do I agree with this business decision that they made in May 2019, after multiple years of providing free Connects each month.) But even top-rated freelancers still deal with some of the same frustrating clients that a newbie does.
Some questionable Upwork clients are easy to spot. Others take a little more time — and unfortunately I’ve fallen into their work traps, too — to catch onto. Here are six Upwork clients you should avoid while applying for jobs.
Recommended Read: “Upwork client scammers who fly under the radar ~ Part 2 of 2: Troubleshooting problematic freelancing contracts”
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1. Upwork clients with no verified account
For college graduates and other job applicants who are new to the workforce, it can be painfully annoying to see countless job ads that require “experience only.” How do you gain experience if no one will give you a shot? The same level of exasperation can happen when you see Upwork job posts that prefer freelancers with hundreds of freelancing hours, or intermediate- or expert-level experience. But one thing that new and established Upwork freelancers should be aware of is that they may be on a level playing field when it comes to the clients having “experience” on the freelancing platform, too.