This is really a scam.

1. Bid the project and win
2. Complete the porject.
3. After 1 month project completed, customer complaint freelance chargeback,
4. Without nothing customer win. This site is really $#*!.

Freelancer is $#*!, they can reverse payment they can freeze your even delete or close you account anytime, no matter how hard you work for client no matter how long you are working no matter what is your membership. They take your money and then $#*! your account. Never work with freelancer, Please don't work with freelancer. I am being scammed thrice twice and there was still hope may be i did something wrong i open another account again i wasted money and again this same $#*! happen to me. $#*! freelancer.com

Well, i got the 5$ membership, if you are to try your luck always take projects or give projects to people who have more than 2 good reviews. 5$ bucks a month for 80 bids it's good but like i said it's like the Russian roulette, say you make 10 projects for a person and 10 months later they find him as crook like they are, they will automatically withdraw the money you got from that person. So good luck or try elance or odesk

If you know what are you doing membership upgrade may help, just evaluate pro/cons carefully, and remember that Freelancer.com is scammers paradise:
1. Employer starts $200 job, you bid on this job and then get this job.
2. Then Employer tell you that he want to get your job for free, you refuse, Employer cancel job via Dispute.
3. Voila you lost $25 fee (%10 of the bid for the job), that is going directly to Freelancer.com deep pockets.
Simple scam that makes profit for Freelancer.com, so such scammers supported by Freelancer.com.
Don't bid on high $$$ jobs, and always ask for RELEASED milestone, and then WITHDRAW it, and only after successful withdraw start the job. Or Freelancer.com may prevent WITHDRAW, after you complete the job, by simply stating that Employers profile "is not complete".

I must say that I agree; you just have to be careful. Safeguard yourself by making sure that the person has been on the site for a long time and that they have deposited money or that they do a milestone payment upfront before you start on the projects. Also, I did upgrade from the free membership but after 3 months of paying have gone back to a the free membership as there is really no need to have to bid on that many projects per month if you are good you will get repeat work from employers. I also always withdraw all my funds asap and only leave small amounts in my Freelancer account.

I can honestly say that Freelancer.com is ok with me... in the beginning I did have an issue with an employer who scammed me, but this was my fault. I reported it to freelancer and it was handled... there are things in life that go well for us and others that don't. All we can do is be more carefull. Been active as a freelancer since last year - nov - and still going strong. And as soon as I get my money from the employer, I withdraw it. ;)

Hello Nehaa, you can use freelancer for ever without upgrading. The problem in the upgrading is that when you upgrade they will set it automatic means they will charge you every month for this upgrading and you will need to go to stop this manually, and if you forgot like i did ones for several months your paypal account will get drained. You can upgrade if you want to, but immediately go to your set up and stop the automatic monthly upgrading. For the feedback 90% of them are fake, you too can create fake feedback just like most of them, they create 3 to 5 accounts and post simple projects from one account and win it in the other account in this way they can review each others so they will end with 2 accounts each one having a review. And when they block or close or delete one of your accounts, you still can use your other account and carry on scamming people :) Sorry i do not mean that you will scam but this is what most of them do.

Rabbit, PayPal DO NOT refund you!

Thanks everyone, what other sites are good to use instead of Freelancers?

Do not upgrade to anything and never fall to their trick of a free premium membership in exchange to your financial information. In short, do not make the mistake I did or you will regret it.

After accepting their free one month premium membership, I received a month later a notice from PayPal about charge from Freelancer.com. I was really surprised and shocked. I never authorized them to charge me nor did I actually subscribe to any paid membership.

You and others are warned about Freelancer.com tricks.

Good luck.

The only benefit to upgrading is to reduce the fees you are charged to accept the project. To get this though you need to be 3rd/4th level of membership so depending on the level you choose I'd say it wasn't really worth it for the lower levels.

Go on fiverr they are fully recommended from me and I use them ONLY.

Contact on paypal again. Paypal give you refund