Donna S.

Shipping is too expensive so I removed a couple of items.

Thumbtack used to be a decent investment of time and the occasional fees. Unfortunately, they've gone crazy with their fees, and the leads tend to be questionably legitimate. Thumbtack takes any astronomical fee they want to take for leads. The last straw for me was when they took a $20 fee from me for a very small job for which I only bid and was paid $30! They took 67% of my income for that job! Even 20 percent wouldn't bother me much, but 67%? Gouge me once, shame on you... gouge me twice, shame on me... There will be no second time! Nobody warned me, but now YOU'VE been warned!

I had a 90+ % job success score with Upwork. Eventually my shoulders started hurting a lot and I couldn't work at the computer much. Finally, I had to have surgery on BOTH shoulders. They only do one shoulder at a time and you have to go through all the physical therapy and get your range of motion back before they do the other shoulder. Anyway, I finally got to the point where I could take serious editing jobs again and I went to my Upwork account and found they had downgraded my success score to 75%! As you can see from my attached photo, I was a "top rated freelancer" with Upwork. Apparently, they got tired of not being able to take their exorbitant 20% fee from my earnings for such a long time, so they lowered my score, but you can check my job history - nothing but good client reviews. Upwork refuses to make any allowance for my being legitimately incapacitated by surgeries even if I send in documentation of the surgeries and lengthy PT. Word to the wise: If you value your professional reputation, stay away from Upwork. If you use their platform, youd better not have a lengthy illness or injury. Do yourself a favor and find another freelancing website. Better yet, build your own website and invest in marketing it - that way you can keep 100% of your earnings!