Upwork

Hello, Upworkers! I bought connects to apply for jobs on this platform. The platform is full of scams that everyone obviously knows about. A guy messages me for a small data entry role. They were trying to scam by messaging through telegram, another platform. Me, unknowing of policy tried to message this person because i did not know it was a acam yet as i am new to the platform. I report the scam after finding out it is a scam. The customer support puts a permanent mark on my account for scamming and forces me to reagree to the terms of service. I did not know it was the norm to punish the victim for scammers' activities, but alright. Save yourself the time and kindly avoid this platform. They are unprofessional and do not care for anything about you or your business. There are so many cases on the internet where people on Upwork got banned for little things and they are out of their money and time. They may even have ended up on the street because of their banning and bad decisions as a business entity. You cannot get refunds for scams on the platform unless they see it themselves as well. I have flagged several scams as scams and they sent me an email about seeing nothing wrong with the post. Several times. Please kindly, kindly, kindly avoid these people if you can. I fear for your your safety and well-being. I am very concerned that I put my person on this platform.

Stay away. I paid money to use their platform, and entered my demographic info so I could engage on their platform. They flagged my info as incorrect and suspended my account. The information is mine, true, and correct. I literally paid money to get suspended. How convenient they take my money, but I can't use the service I paid for. I tried to resolve the situation with their "Trust and Safety" team only to receive automated AI responses that stated, "Unfortunately, your account has been permanently suspended" with no specificity on what went wrong, why or actionable next steps.

I hired a freelancer through Upwork who placed phishing malware in the Google Sheet that I gave the freelancer editing access to. Luckily Google noticed the phishing malware and placed a big, yellow warning banner on the Google Sheet and Google also sent me a warning email. When I complained to Upwork and sent them the proof from Google, and asked for the money back that I had paid the freelancer, Upwork weirdly insisted that I enter into arbitration with the freelancer where he got a chance to "tell his side of the story". The freelancer infected my Google Sheet with phishing malware. You can't "negotiate" with him. Of course he's going to deny it. It's just a weird way to do business. Under the circumstances, my request for $150 back is extremely reasonably, considering I lost a day of my time trying to remove malware from the Sheet, re-doing his work, and delaying my project. As if this wasn't enough, the way the arbitration is set up, when I responded to the arbitration request from my professional email, my signature line showed up in the arbitration documentation. So now the scammer has access to my direct contact information, because he can see the arbitration documentation. And there is no way to delete that record from the arbitration. Upwork's disregard for security is pretty alarming.

It took me 20 minutes to find a place to review upwork as a company which i thought was frustrating. I didnt come to complain i came to critique because i think this issue you could easily change. Upwork support is very poorly ran. It uses Ai bots in a way that pro longs the experience for users and entrepreneurs. What took me 45 minutes to should've took 5 if i was able to speak to a human directly. When i try to leave a review , it keeos prompting me to leave a review for a freelancer. I want a leave a review for the actual company. Please fix the experience for people who want to resolve there issues. The robot doesn't no how respond to unique circumstances and it asks alot of unnecessary questions before it redirects you to an agent. I miss the hotline for upwork.

I used to get way more proposals for my jobs. I hardly get any proposals anymore unless I explicitly invite the freelancers. I think Upwork is trying to get more ad revenue by promising more visibility if the clients pay 30$ ad money for visibility. As a long term client this change of focus by Upwork has led to a very poor experience.

Very upset with them. I have used them on and off since the Old Elance/O-Desk days. They let me apply to jobs with no restrictions, and I bought connects from them multiple times, which you need to apply to projects on their site. Suddenly, without warning, they demanded that I verify my ID, and would not let me apply to any more projects, even though I paid them to be able to do so. THIS IS FRAUD. I also am NOT scanning a passport or drivers license, plus a bill with an account # on it, so some sketchy call center dude from 13 hours away can have access to my personal information. Upwork has allegedly been hacked multiple times, and I have ZERO faith in their ability to safeguard my personal information. Additionally, in the past they wanted me to download tracking software on a business laptop that takes pics of open files on my screen every X seconds, whether I am working for an Upwork client or not! Not going to pay them anymore and warning everyone that these guys are WAY too intrusive. Who are YOU to question my US citizenship??????

I am a client who hires freelancers from their site. I am locked out of my account and there is no way to contact anyone to help. I have time sensitive deadlines and they are simply non existant

They have a terrible reputation and I know too many freelancers that have been burned by them.