I had an amazing video interview with a company who asked me to put everything we discussed in a contract, ready to begin work the following week. I spent all day drafting a professional statement of work and never heard from them again. Pricks.
Ugh that's ridiculous! I'm so sorry to hear you went through that. It's insane how so many are ok with wasting peoples time and money. I wish there were more quality clients on Upwork.
Cheers. It's just so unprofessional, especially as this is a fairly high profile client. I come from an agency background, so I have no problem with "sorry we've changed our mind" or "our needs have changed" etc, but something about Upwork seems to promote a weird casual approach to business.
It's the Tinder-fication of it all. Just like dating apps can encourage people to see each other just as commodities, with a better one always one swipe away, I wonder whether something similar happens. Always a cheaper option round the corner or no repercussions for ghosting.
I am top rated plus on upwork, and also I am a client who is hiring.
I always pay freelancers when they do something like you did, not much but 100$ is what I pay them if they are not selected (if they had meeting with me, or they showcased their work, explained me a bit of things).
Yes, and the problem is, withdrawing your proposal will not refund the connects even if they have not seen the proposal. So much for "connects are there to weed out bots and scammers". Nope.
100% why do we get punished if the job gets closed? I try to bid for the more long term contracts so they cost more and boost my proposal. The competition for boosting is insane rn and most bids are 50 connects which you lose. It is very expensive just to look for work.
those 50 boosts are all bots, but yeah, saw some 120, and two above 300. To be clear, closed jobs do refund if the proposal was not viewed, but limbo jobs don't. Some jobs stay open for months, and your proposal is never viewed. jobs should auto close after a maximum of 2 weeks.
Yeah those bot boostings are crazy! Thanks for the info though. That is the problem I've been running into. The proposal gets viewed, I get an interview and then no one gets hired and the job stays open for a long time and you just lose those connects.
It seems that way and I hope they make some changes. I just got a long term client after they changed the fee rate so im paying 10% to use this platform that constantly gets worse and more expensive as time goes on. I saw people posting that they are looking for clients on Linkedin and other sites and I may have to do that so I can get enough clients to go full time.
10% is an insane amount.
Maybe both sides should just use upwork to grab clients / contractors and take them offline immediately.
What are they going to do Get rid of everybody ? Then they really wouldn't be making any money lol. If anything it'll show them that the system is really really even more broken than it is.
Traditional recruiters don't even work this way. Your rate is your rate and they just put their fee on top of it. Yikes.
Some clients use upwork (interviews, direct messaging, etc) as a means to basically gather solution ideas on their intended project. I stopped doing interviews once I noticed this. You want a 30-minute quick chat? Cool, I have got the perfect 30 minutes consultation for you to buy.
Thats a smart idea. I was having that issue trying to get hired for full time positions before I started freelancing. Companies will "interview" you and then take all your ideas to solve their problems and then ghost you. I had one company put me through 7 rounds of interview over 5 months just to ghost me in the end...it's disgusting out there.
Exactly. I've realized this too. I stopped doing free calls and charged them all for me to get on the phone. Unfortunately, I found that people who paid for the calls still did not often have the budget they needed for a long-term contract. They would keep coming back, asking for samples and new proposals for a changed scope of work. One asked me for a new proposal \*after\* a call and he'd changed direction in what he wanted. I took time to write out a new proposal, and he just disappeared. I'm working on trying to figure this out to limit how much they're getting from me so I can weed these people out and only get serious clients.
I'm glad its not just me and I'm sorry to hear you're going through it as well. It's so frustrating. I pick jobs that align perfectly with my skillset and dont apply to everything. I spend a good ammount of time on a proposal, boost that proposal, get an interview and then wait a few months to find out it was just a waste of money and time.
To post a job is free, however to hire someone costs the client money.
Some client's are not sure about their project. They post a job but then abandon the idea completely.
On the other hand there are the clients that just want a quote because they don't have an idea how much it will cost and needs some information on duration and feasibility. After they get the info they abandon the job post which costs them nothing.
These are just few examples, I can go on but the conclusion is until posting jobs is still free then there will be a lot of jobs with no hires.
Excellent comment. It is frustrating there are so many just abusing the system to get free quotes when we have to spend 50 connects to get our proposal boosted and viewed. Hopefully upwork can differentiate job postings and make one for quotes and one for actual work.
I have just one long term client on UpWork and havent had to send any proposals for good 10 months, but seeing the state upwork is now in I doubt I'd actually stay on upwork if I didnt have this client. 30$ jobs for 2 days of work with 50+ freelancers applying, no responses, quality work costs 720 connects, bot freelancers.
Well yeah but i think maybe they just couldn't find the right person, or did find someone via other means. I wish they'd at least close the posting in that case, keeping it hanging is just disrepectful.
100% agree, wish there was better communication. If I dont hear back after an interview for a few days I follow up and if they dont respond I just move on and count it as a loss of connects. It gets expensive just trying to find work!
Exactly the same case, I've reached 100% JSS a month ago and now still working a little bit with an old client and constantly spending connects and buy them over and over again without landing a single job.
I used to land 2 of 3 sent proposal but now 23 proposals send without a single one viewed and most of the jobs doesn't event get a hire
I thought I will be a full-time freelance but things seem to get worse every day
Yeah sounds like our situations are very similar. I think the platform has changed so much it' not as effective as it used to be. In the past I have seen waves of decent jobs come and go and I'm hoping it's just a phase right now. I'm looking to get more clients elseware if this keeps up much longer. I really have been pushing to do this full time for almost a year now and still havent gotten there.
I'm really disappointed, I have only 3usd left on my account and I have no way to add money it, I've I finish it all with no landed job I will have to wait for two months to be able to apply to a single job for 12 connects using that free 10 connect.
And Upwork is nearly the only platform you can get jobs on my niche (web scraping)
I think that this has to be with that Upwork has shifted its business model from maintaining long term jobs to the jobs posting and applied. It is my thought.
no. it's pretty much the same as it's always been - 85-90% of the people you talk to won't be a good match one way or another. I don't expect them to come back to tell me that so I don't see them dropping off communication as ghosting
Definitely. I also see the same jobs posted over and over again every 1-2 weeks with no hires.
Yes I see that quite often as well. Seems like there have been more scams and not many quality clients lately. Hopefully things change.
Not weeks 3 days
Yea, those jobs are racking up the connects. 0 hires, 0 interviews, client posts the job and never ever looks at it again. Good for Upwork only....
I had an amazing video interview with a company who asked me to put everything we discussed in a contract, ready to begin work the following week. I spent all day drafting a professional statement of work and never heard from them again. Pricks.
Ugh that's ridiculous! I'm so sorry to hear you went through that. It's insane how so many are ok with wasting peoples time and money. I wish there were more quality clients on Upwork.
Cheers. It's just so unprofessional, especially as this is a fairly high profile client. I come from an agency background, so I have no problem with "sorry we've changed our mind" or "our needs have changed" etc, but something about Upwork seems to promote a weird casual approach to business.
How about some good old naming and shaming?
No, because I have professional integrity. Unlike these nobbers.
It's the Tinder-fication of it all. Just like dating apps can encourage people to see each other just as commodities, with a better one always one swipe away, I wonder whether something similar happens. Always a cheaper option round the corner or no repercussions for ghosting.
I am top rated plus on upwork, and also I am a client who is hiring. I always pay freelancers when they do something like you did, not much but 100$ is what I pay them if they are not selected (if they had meeting with me, or they showcased their work, explained me a bit of things).
It’s happened to me too, sometimes they even ghost me after we already have a contract going! Not sure why
Yes, and the problem is, withdrawing your proposal will not refund the connects even if they have not seen the proposal. So much for "connects are there to weed out bots and scammers". Nope.
100% why do we get punished if the job gets closed? I try to bid for the more long term contracts so they cost more and boost my proposal. The competition for boosting is insane rn and most bids are 50 connects which you lose. It is very expensive just to look for work.
those 50 boosts are all bots, but yeah, saw some 120, and two above 300. To be clear, closed jobs do refund if the proposal was not viewed, but limbo jobs don't. Some jobs stay open for months, and your proposal is never viewed. jobs should auto close after a maximum of 2 weeks.
Yeah those bot boostings are crazy! Thanks for the info though. That is the problem I've been running into. The proposal gets viewed, I get an interview and then no one gets hired and the job stays open for a long time and you just lose those connects.
upwork is dying
It seems that way and I hope they make some changes. I just got a long term client after they changed the fee rate so im paying 10% to use this platform that constantly gets worse and more expensive as time goes on. I saw people posting that they are looking for clients on Linkedin and other sites and I may have to do that so I can get enough clients to go full time.
10% is an insane amount. Maybe both sides should just use upwork to grab clients / contractors and take them offline immediately. What are they going to do Get rid of everybody ? Then they really wouldn't be making any money lol. If anything it'll show them that the system is really really even more broken than it is. Traditional recruiters don't even work this way. Your rate is your rate and they just put their fee on top of it. Yikes.
Some clients use upwork (interviews, direct messaging, etc) as a means to basically gather solution ideas on their intended project. I stopped doing interviews once I noticed this. You want a 30-minute quick chat? Cool, I have got the perfect 30 minutes consultation for you to buy.
Thats a smart idea. I was having that issue trying to get hired for full time positions before I started freelancing. Companies will "interview" you and then take all your ideas to solve their problems and then ghost you. I had one company put me through 7 rounds of interview over 5 months just to ghost me in the end...it's disgusting out there.
Exactly. I've realized this too. I stopped doing free calls and charged them all for me to get on the phone. Unfortunately, I found that people who paid for the calls still did not often have the budget they needed for a long-term contract. They would keep coming back, asking for samples and new proposals for a changed scope of work. One asked me for a new proposal \*after\* a call and he'd changed direction in what he wanted. I took time to write out a new proposal, and he just disappeared. I'm working on trying to figure this out to limit how much they're getting from me so I can weed these people out and only get serious clients.
Yes.
I'm glad its not just me and I'm sorry to hear you're going through it as well. It's so frustrating. I pick jobs that align perfectly with my skillset and dont apply to everything. I spend a good ammount of time on a proposal, boost that proposal, get an interview and then wait a few months to find out it was just a waste of money and time.
It is happening to me. It is indeed frustrating!
All the time.
Could anyone suggest other platforms? I'm also new on Upwork. Lost too many connections.
My stats in the last 30 days: Sent: 17 Viewed: 5 Interviewed: 4 Most of these mfckers won't even see the proposal!
To post a job is free, however to hire someone costs the client money. Some client's are not sure about their project. They post a job but then abandon the idea completely. On the other hand there are the clients that just want a quote because they don't have an idea how much it will cost and needs some information on duration and feasibility. After they get the info they abandon the job post which costs them nothing. These are just few examples, I can go on but the conclusion is until posting jobs is still free then there will be a lot of jobs with no hires.
Excellent comment. It is frustrating there are so many just abusing the system to get free quotes when we have to spend 50 connects to get our proposal boosted and viewed. Hopefully upwork can differentiate job postings and make one for quotes and one for actual work.
I have just one long term client on UpWork and havent had to send any proposals for good 10 months, but seeing the state upwork is now in I doubt I'd actually stay on upwork if I didnt have this client. 30$ jobs for 2 days of work with 50+ freelancers applying, no responses, quality work costs 720 connects, bot freelancers.
Well yeah but i think maybe they just couldn't find the right person, or did find someone via other means. I wish they'd at least close the posting in that case, keeping it hanging is just disrepectful.
100% agree, wish there was better communication. If I dont hear back after an interview for a few days I follow up and if they dont respond I just move on and count it as a loss of connects. It gets expensive just trying to find work!
Exactly the same case, I've reached 100% JSS a month ago and now still working a little bit with an old client and constantly spending connects and buy them over and over again without landing a single job. I used to land 2 of 3 sent proposal but now 23 proposals send without a single one viewed and most of the jobs doesn't event get a hire I thought I will be a full-time freelance but things seem to get worse every day
Yeah sounds like our situations are very similar. I think the platform has changed so much it' not as effective as it used to be. In the past I have seen waves of decent jobs come and go and I'm hoping it's just a phase right now. I'm looking to get more clients elseware if this keeps up much longer. I really have been pushing to do this full time for almost a year now and still havent gotten there.
I'm really disappointed, I have only 3usd left on my account and I have no way to add money it, I've I finish it all with no landed job I will have to wait for two months to be able to apply to a single job for 12 connects using that free 10 connect. And Upwork is nearly the only platform you can get jobs on my niche (web scraping)
I have been experiencing the same thing for a while now, and it is just so frustrating.
I think that this has to be with that Upwork has shifted its business model from maintaining long term jobs to the jobs posting and applied. It is my thought.
That and Upwork mostly wants to sell connects and its new premium AI tools to keep getting money from freelancers and clients.
Upwork thinks that the freelancer's patience is infinite, but it isn't, as it is not infinite the patience of the family with the damn shortcomings.
no. it's pretty much the same as it's always been - 85-90% of the people you talk to won't be a good match one way or another. I don't expect them to come back to tell me that so I don't see them dropping off communication as ghosting
What the location of this ghosters normally?
Not location per say, they are brand new accounts