oDesk

I'm amused by another reviewer who wrote, 'Beware of coders that insist on hourly work. It is mostly a scam that is easily manipulated.' I guess he isn't among the legion of oDesk users who will only hire contractors with 100 oDesk hours. My 85 hours at $22/hour ought to count more than somebody with 100 hours at $2/hour, but hey, what do I know? I didn't think contractors could insist on hourly pay -- it's those who do the hiring that decide how payment is made.

Hello, I am a freelance recruiter and want to check with you about the services offered by oDesk? Can you please let me know how i will be benefited out of its service?

Situation in 2016.
They blocked my client and blocked me. I did a lot of work, but they decided to suspend client (ugh...). Then they unblocked me. But me and this client we decided to move to another platform.
Then I did some jobs for other clients on UpWork. At some point with next client I faced situation of weird refund operations performed by UpWork support team. This is when contract was in Suspended status. So UpWork support first suspended my contract with this client, then perfromed some refund operations with my account, returning money to this client. And then I had lesser money, than I had when started this currently suspended contract (this is all when job was completed and client looked satisfied according to communicatons we had).
I do not uderstand what is rotten more - their support, their routines or their software (platfrom itself)...

Update from 2017.
They improved a lot, support is much better, more interesting projects available... I think they significantly improved a lot of things in this platform.

I’ve gotten hired for several jobs on ODesk as an article writer, and I’m generally happy with the site. But it freezes me in some options, I prefer SEOClerks.com over odesk or any other freelancing site.

Good difference between oDesk and Elance is that oDesk doesnt have a paid membership option. But oDesk fees are 10% compared to Elance 8.75% fee. When you register you can submit 2 job applications at a time.

I found it tough to compare Elance vs oDesk, because they are owned by the same company and in overall oDesk or Elance – there is no big difference. The biggest oDesk competitor basically is Freelancer with PeoplePerHour being new disruptor in market.

Pros:

- Free registration, no paid membership ensuring you don't have to use limited version of website.
- Anybody can find work on Elance because of big user base.
- Secure place to get paid as Odesk takes part in money exchange, by asking client to put money on Escrow before project is started.

Cons:

- oDesk charges is 10% for every completed project. Fee on 4k/per month = $400 + 1.5% fee for withdrawal.
- Unreliable corporate support – reviews indicate people had very bad experience with support. People were suggesting not to waste time with support and that you will be better off by trying to solve issue on your own.
- Tough place for creative professionals, web developers and WordPress experts – usually lower bidders get the project and quality is not being appreciated. (Ok, quality is always appreciated, but price doesnt indicate that).

We did massive research about top 8 biggest freelance marketplaces out there, comparing their fees, pros, cons and how to make it out there.

Different marketplaces are for different people. You can read the research here - http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/best-freelance-websites/

Nice site to seek for a job, personally I like Elance more but oDesk gives me very good contracts thus I'm working on both sites.

ODesk's advantages:

- Lot of clients, many clients who are willing to pay good money for very good service
- When you have a rating people keep inviting you to projects. Some invites are very lucrative!
- Overall experience is good, there is no catches on a site, it's fair, it's not overcharge you or take money for example if you just won a project, like freelancer.com does.

Odesk's disadvantage:

- Support answer tickets very slowly. I've written ticket 5 days ago still no reply. No urgent help expected.

- LOT of competition, some project may have 50-200 bidders, it's very pity when you see a project you may do better then anyone else but you understand that it pointless to bid - client most likely stop reading proposals after 30-40 bidders

- Much more then on Elance (but much less then on Freelancer.com) very cheap clients who seeking someone who will work for them for rate 1-3$ per hour and expect to do Google like projects.

- I find system for searching projects and overall experience too simple, it's not functional, for example I can't even sort project by amount of bidders to find projects where bidding is reasonable. Everything too big and contain just portion of information. Working area little more complicated then I would like to see it.

-HUGE waiting time before you may withdraw funds - 6 days. I then withdraw them to my bank account and from time to time it takes up to 12-14 calendar days before I can get funds I've earned.

- Too much attention to numbers, oDesk hours, tests, scores. Examples:
I am fluent in English but write with lot of errors, I have 3/5 points in English, while some guy from Asia had 4.5 point while he can't say a word on Skype and understand just small portion what is written to him (real story told by my client).
I'm Ruby and Rails expert, I may do and did almost anything on those languages but I'm unable to pass their test because they questions about how to make one thing in 10 different way while I know only 3 of them. What does this question tests? Memory? I'm able to achieve a goal and don't feel like I need to know all methods to do that.
Odesk hours - I'v been rejected on several very lucrative projects because client thinks that quality of product comes with 500-1000 oDesk hours, while I work always with fixed price and have no hours at all.

But despite of those disadvantages I'm still oDesk's client because they have I think the biggest market share and despite of everything it is possible to find very good contracts, but experience of finding one could be frustrating.

You really need to do your homework and ask them a lot of questions bfore they do the work and have the keys to your castle.

Things to look out for:
1. Not communicating
2. Stories about why it's taking too long
3. See what price others are charging for work similar to yours
4. If it's something specific, set an amount for it, and wait for them to complete before paying.

I have mostly loved working from oDesk and I have had some wonderful jobs and wonderful clients. ODesk recently changed its interface, which if a little complicated at first, is actually very workable and it looks great. However, I have experienced some serious technical difficulties which has resulted in a serious setback to my normally 100% profile. ODEsk's help desk and chat system has gone completely down the drain. The agents haven't a clue what they're talking about, and refuse to admit there is any problem at all. It is extremely frustrating and oDesk is certainly not doing itself any favours by adopting this attitude. I wonder if I'm the only person to have experienced problems when trying to contact someone on oDesk's helpline. Chats used to be pretty well immediate; now there is a minimum of 20 minutes wait, if you are lucky.

Although their Customer Service is available 24/7, their "Investigation process/procedures" are very poor. They need to double their efforts in resolving resolutions.

Supposedly, the website should've had a great online reputation. But if they continue this kind of process, this might be the end for their good online reputation.

Odesk has a really good concept. My company hired a Freelancer from Odesk and the best part is that i can check his activity level any time and also can see monitor screenshoots from the freelancer's computer. 5 Points for the site and 0 for the support. I am waiting from 20 days to change the company owner name, because now the name is wrong and invoices are also wrong. They sad to me verification process takes between 7 and 10 days but now is the 20th day and still nothing. I have also tried to reach them on the phone but nobody answer. After that i write with live support chat and they take my phone number and told me after 1 or 2 hours they will call me back. It was 4 days ago and still nobody connect me.