Upwork

Once your profile has been approved, dive in and begin applying for the jobs you are confident you can handle. Like in any other business, you need to be consistent in communicating with your clients.

As a beginner, expect to send in a number of applications before you can clinch a job, because clients, like other business people, seek to work with contractors/freelancers who have been tried before.

Gladly, Upwork has a system that displays how you have fared with different clients. So, once you have built a favorable profile history, probably over some months, the going gets easier, and soon you may even find yourself being invited for jobs you did not apply for; because the clients consider you a great fit.

As long as you are diligent and honest with your clients, you'll be able to build great working relationships with clients from all over the world. I've personally had wonderful experiences working with individuals and businesses from the US, UK, Netherlands, Canada, Kenya, Ukraine, Australia, and other regions.

Remember: Any business place has its share of unscrupulous participants. You need to read a lot of the material the platform provides regarding how to avoid being scammed. And when your sixth sense sends you an alarm, share your doubts on the community forum, where the 'old guards' can advise you accordingly.

Finally, whatever skill you are paid for in the conventional/brick&mortar world, you can find a client willing to pay for it on Upwork. So I say - it's worth joining & getting to choose from thousands of clients online, especially because the payment system is secure.

As a freelance editor, proofreader, and voice over artist, it would be difficult for me to find work without my own website. Upwork provides a platform for people and businesses which need the services of all sorts of freelancers, from website designers and graphic artists to proofreaders and editors like myself. Other categories of work include writing, project managing, translation, customer support, design, marketing, cinematography, programming, and these are literally just a few drops in the bucket of work available. For better or worse, the U.S. is to a large extent a "gig economy," and Upwork provides a well run, responsible, and supportive virtual environment which brings employers and workers together for their mutual benefit. Moreover, Upwork provides seminars and administrative support for its workers, and price and payment guarantees for clients and workers.

Other helpful features include video calls, messaging that allows for transfers of multiple files up to 95 MB in size, spreadsheets of clients and earnings, and verification of work hours through a Time Tracker feature. I once worked with a client in Israel who was particularly fastidious, and we talked via Upwork's video platform for over two hours! So there's a lot of opportunity for exciting adventures on Upwork's platform as well.

For anyone wanting to find reliable, talented workers to help with a project of any sort--or for anyone wanting to start a career or "side hustle" to supplement income, or try his or her hand at a new talent--I recommend using the numerous services and opportunities that Upwork offers.

I've been working as a freelancer for a couple of years and I've worked very hard to build an excellent profile on Upwork. They take 20% of my earnings, while encouraging clients to pay as little as possible. However, I've met some great clients through their site, which is why they get an extra star or two as a review from me. Aside from their glitch-riddled software, they are a bad company. I've been an exemplary freelancer. Recently, they suspended my account, too, out of nowhere and for no reason. I squawked vehemently and they caved, but I really don't trust them. Recently also, a client (from India I think) refused to pay me. They made me jump through a lot of hoops only to declare that I violated their policy, so "no protection for you!" They gave no explanation and I didn't violate any of their stupid, micro-printed policies. It was just easier to let the client have his money back (if they did, in fact, give it back). Upwork claims to protect its freelancers, through some bogus "contract protection." It's a lie. You have to fight for your money when necessary and they are NOT on your side. It's really bad business since they seem to make most of their money by collecting a "vig" from our sweat, not the clients. Maybe you can connect successfully with good clients because Upwork takes our money and uses it for marketing to get lots of them. But, BE CAREFUL. Watch out for your money. And don't even engage with customer service unless you've got stamina because it's a joke. I hope this helps the really hard-working writers, who are doing their best to make a decent living.

Accounts & Support Standard
Appalling, lack of acknowledgement of overcharge on 3 transactions to my credit card that did not relate to any work engaged. I've been in dispute for nearly 2 months, and the response is like a bot that has no ability to understand simple reconciliation issues. On top of that, their general account methodology is in a world of it's own. It's so complicated, and appears to be designed in a way for purchases not to recognise the overcharge. There were so many unrelated charges, overcharges etc, that they repeatedly kept blaming my bank for. I've spent collectively probably 4 days of time trying to sort this out, and I receive the same lame response. It's outrageous and it's the reason I will NEVER use Upwork again and can't recommend them to anyone.
Work Quality
I engaged 5 contractors through Upwork, the work quality was varied with two of the 5 star rated failing abysmally. That's not Upwork's fault, as people being people, some just aren't what they make themselves out to be, or maybe their circumstances at the time didn't enable them to deliver. Only 2 of the contractors engaged were worthwhile.

Overall, not worth my time especially in view of their internal accounting issues. If you dare to use them, make sure you check your accounts thoroughly. With the repeated issues, I contacted the CEO direct and she did not have the courtesy to respond. That's tells you something doesn't it?

I wish I could give zero star and do not believe the positive reviews because it's all fake. I hired a freelancer on Upwork who delivered a mediocre job in draft. Not only he took a month to deliver an incomplete bad job instead of 2 weeks as agreed, he submitted the work to a third party to do it for him. By the way, he failed to disclose this to me before accepting the offer which is a scam. When I complained to Upwork, the mediation person called" May" refused to cancel the job and refund my money even though I provided facts that I was being defrauded. Upwork is a scam site, freelancers tell lies about their knowledge, talent, expertise on their profiles, lure you in then submit the project to someone else overseas in India, Pakistan or Blagandhesh to do a poor job. Upwork fully knows about this dirty game but will do nothing because they are making money out of it. I will never use this platform again. I'm sure there will be a class action against Upwork someday because of this scam. Stay away! Be aware!

Upwork is a professional freelance forum. Its a great place to work with clients and experts. It gives numerous opportunities to interact globally. Secure and authentic way get services.

Upwork has hidden charges which will never be informed and they charge you inactive fee which is not fair at all. This way they are scamming a lot of people and steal your money Beware!

I was doing freelancing since 2012 in Odesk/Upwork, the first few years was more like building a name for my self and then things has started to be better and better in regards of experience in freelancing and in income, Odesk/Upwork has changed my life.
I LOVE UPWORK, keep up the good work.

Well, I have to say I have not been having good luck with freelancers. I posted a project on upwork.com and shortly after that I received an upbeat message from upwork.com saying "XXXXX is a great fit for your job." I had a quick look at the resume of XXXX and his experience looked great, hired him on the spot. Well since he had such a great reference from upwork I gave him the benefit of the doubt and let him bill a couple weeks of work without checking into it in much detail. Well $1100 later and none of the work is done. Reviewing his work log he was spending time looking for other freelancer jobs, browsing the net, not one screen of coding the features I was asking for. I cancelled the project immediately and wrote to upwork to check into it. They shrugged and said its been too long, I should have complained 'within the work week' which is four days.

Lesson learned: Don't give upwork.com the benefit of the doubt with their suggestions, even if the candidate looks good there are scammers operating on their site.

It's waste of time, please this is my humble request to all the freelancer never ever trust on up work because i had 4 month old account and I have verified my id with up work as well as slowly i have started earning and almost earn 200$ and every day i was applying for work and suddenly one day up work lock my account and sent one payment in review, when i tried to contact them then there were no reply at all and not giving my any answer. I am more than 200% sure I have not violated any up work policy, if violate then why up work not saying that so and so policy you have violated because it's useless, NEVER TRUST IF YOU REALLY WANT TO INCREASE YOUR BUSINESS.

I'm an Amazon Related freelancer working with seller and also with all E-commerce market place. I'm providing SEO service, all kinds of E-commerce services and others platform.

Working with me will take your business a long way.

I'm providing

Amazon A-Z

Verified Reviews (All E-commerce Site)

Walmart A-Z,

E-Bay A-Z,

SEO,

Product Rank,

Product Listing/optimization

Vote,

Q&A Post,

Product research,

Keyword Research.

My work is 100% safe and guaranteed. Because I work with real buyers and work sensitively.

I would like to work with you. I use Whitehat process & also I've a big team for work together.

Upwork claims "clients don't pay until they receive the work and are satisfied with it.". But not at any juncture did they support this claim - I didn't even receive the work from the freelancer much less get an opportunity to determine satisfaction. And yet at no time after I placed my funds into the escrow account was I able to retrieve them nor would Upwork return them to me. The freelancer breached contract, did not deliver any of the work, burned 3 months of my time, still demanded payment and Upwork SUPPORTED THEIR DEMAND. The freelancer's admission of failure to complete AND refusal to continue were captured via instant message within the Upwork site. And still Upwork would not return my funds. I am the only person in the equation who adhered to their user agreement. The only way I got my money back was via a dispute through PayPal as that was my original form of payment, and even that took 45 days. Thank you PayPal. Upwork is clearly just a tech startup looking to build up an illusion of a viable company boasting a large user base so they can sell and disband. Investors beware: do not fall for it. Upwork is a fancy front end with zero substance to back anything up.

An amazing platform to grow your business! They charge a fair fee for offering you a group of tools that will help reach your clients and do what you want to do.
At least it's worth trying!

I was very active on Elance before the merger and name-change. Elance was GREAT in every way. As soon as it became Upwork, it took MONTHS of issues only to migrate my profile, and after that, I was told I had to provide new bank information. I did so, and a day later, found three fraudulent withdrawals. I complained to the FBI (interstate commerce) with no help, and aside from my bank being nice about crediting me for the fraud, I still had to close all my bank accounts because of that. DO NOT TRUST THIS SITE!