Upwork for Freelancers

I had been dreaming of pursuing my passion for 3D design but had never made any big move towards it (other than practicing my craft daily). I stumbled across Upwork and decided to make an account. In the beginning it was hard to find clients seeing as I had no professional experience … but within three months I was making more than I was at my full-time job and decided to go headfirst into it full-time. Thanks to Upwork I have a freedom I never thought possible and a self-guided career that brings excitement and security to my life. For me it was definitely the easiest way to break into freelancing and I would highly recommend it to anyone who wishes they could make a living with their interests. It takes research and effort to present yourself effectively to potential clients … but it’s a relatively enlightening process of self-exploration and it all has been worth it. The experience and portfolio-building on Upwork has also led to non-Upwork client opportunities (now I do both in tandem)—so it’s also not entirely insular either. To me this place was a critical step in opening my eyes to a different way of existing. Give it a shot … it seriously changed life when I felt like a dead-end job might really be my destiny.

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The web version is a little bit better and I like all of the features in messages, like the able to save attachments from a conversation, and to keep private notes about a customer. That is great. But on both platforms it's easy to get scammed and way too hard to report a scam. And it's nearly impossible to talk to a human. You have to send one message then wait two days, and hope they answered you, otherwise you gotta wait and wait.

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It's easy to set up and understand. I have managed to connect with employers easier than any other method I've tried. The biggest issue is that the search feature is a bit awkward and it seems like they don't screen jobs to make sure the experience level being asked for is correct. I've seen a few expert levels labeled entry.

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There is nothing better or more convenient than being able to talk with my clients while on the go. I have used this app and the app before this one for year without any complaints. However, in the last few weeks I have had more problems with this app than ever before. It does not notify me on my lockscreen or with a badge icon if I have a new message (it is set to have these notifications in my settings). This has resulted in me having late responses while traveling or in the evenings multiple times, my JSC has also dropped because of this issue. Also when I get job proposals now and view them on the app it no longer tells me the date or time I received them the app just says “invalid date.” Not the biggest problem, I can still reply to these proposals. This just was not a problem with this app before the last update. I had to completely delete this app from my ipad because it was incapable of even loading to open. (But somehow I was able to get notifications of new messages on my ipad, i just couldn’t open the app to view them.) As a freelancer who has worked with you for several years, I have come to respect you as a company. I love what you do and provide for us to be able to work online and with our own schedule. Please fix this app, it’s been good before and it can be better in the future. So many freelancers use this app for work everyday, it would mean a lot to us if it was as reliable as the company it represents.

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The biggest issue with this app is the messaging service. I often find myself refreshing the messages even though I've been notified about a message. The messages all so take a long time(relatively) to load and sync up. This is an issue because I use the app for when I'm away from the computer so timing is key.

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The app is SO SLOW. I don't know if it's an optimization issue or what, but the app is nearly impossible to use. Loading the app takes several minutes, and then even more time as you click through the tabs. Loading messages also takes forever. Another fun bug is sometimes you can't click on the job you want to view. If you can, applying for it is buggy, with some necessary sections often becoming unclickable. Some features are available in this app that weren't before, which is nice but still.

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First, my primary pet peeve is that the app will log you out after some time of inactivity. I understand that this is for security reasons, but the fact that Upwork’s site and mobile apps have poor integration with password managers like iCloud and Dashlane means I’m always having to reset my password. Tangentially, why are there restrictions on the characters I can use for my password? A second year computer science student can design a password input that accepts all characters. The second pet peeve I have is with the Freelancer app itself. There’s a glaring bug where individual search results are impossible to interact with. I can’t tap more to expand the summary section of the project unless I go back then retry the search. Overall, my experience with the poor app and lackluster project selection has lead me to move on past Upwork. It seems that freelancers can be successful, but only after significant effort to get started on their part. I wouldn’t recommend Upwork to anyone seeking to freelance part time.

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I have been trying to find a way to contact the web programmer for a while now, but there's no email listed. For weeks now I have been receiving emails that I can't read from upwork. They are pages and pages of html, css, and Javascript code. I want to read them since the subject sounds like great job leads... I hope this reaches someone there who can fix this problem.

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A client promised me a job, we had an interview and everything looked legal. Except the fact when they were trying to give me the materials for work that I needed for free and I knew that was suspicious. They had to send me the deposit so I could put it in my bank account and then give it back to them which was odd, I asked why they need to do that and they said their policies has changed after the pandemic. I was just curious to see if it actually works but I didn’t fully believe until the deposit was actually transferred successfully and bank confirmed it. I was scared that somehow I’m going to lose my money but I didn’t. After awhile they promised to send me a tracking number of the materials they “ordered” for me. And then they said they didn’t have enough funds so they needed to make another deposit of $1000 which they send to me and I had to give them back. I don’t even know why in the first place I trusted them. But I did it anyway. And then after a couple of days that $1000 of deposit was a chargeback. When I tried to ask them, they blocked me and that’s when I realized that it was a scam and i wasn’t even surprised. I knew that it could happen. Anyway, so now I don’t trust this app again. It was probably my fault but I still don’t get it how these scammers are on this app. Sorry to hear about this experience. We take security seriously at Upwork. Here is an Article that you may find helpful on how to stay safe in Upwork and how you can report this - https://support.upwork.com/hc/en-us/articles/211067668-Staying-Safe-on-Upwork - if there is anything we can check for you, please reach out to us at [email protected].

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So i’ve been using Upwork for about 6-8 months now as a freelance copywriter and my early days with the platform were great. I found easy jobs that helped me build my skills and land higher paying jobs (just as the platform promises), but i’ve noticed that, as of recently, SO many of the job postings are fake. Like more fake postings than authentic. It’s gotten to the point where you can’t even trust the “payment verified” jobs. I find it hypocritical because this platform claims to be about authenticity, safety, and fun for freelancers. Unfortunately i’ve noticed that they’ve either sold out to scammers or lost like 3/4ths of a team that handles this issue. If they ask you to talk on ANY other platform that isn’t Upwork, it’s fake. I’ve even seen stuff that looks like a kidnapping ploy where they’re ‘scouting models’ through upwork listings. Please be careful, don’t listen to everything you see as far as payment verification, high paying listings, or generally anything that seems too good to be true. Stay safe, and better yet... stay off Upwork.

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