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Comment by riffraff | Hacker News Reader

Isn't there some deliverable that proves the work was done?

Yes but Upwork wants a metric that doesn’t need a software engineer to adjudicate. If you say “this XHMTL validator works as specified because RFC 1913 was never formally accepted” it takes someone with a clue to figure out what you mean. Upwork would rather say “you types all day, you get paid.”

Still very easy for people to bypass. Just pushes the adjudication into the "interpret screenshot" layer. The screenshot can be a completely valid Photoshop mockup that looks exactly like the client's specifications for the Rails app they hired you for, showing that you pretended to do the work.

I'm guessing that that ploy would work once or twice before you got pushed off the platform anyway. Same goes for a client that regularly claims the work is incomplete.

But you still have to prove it to a court, get a judgement, and then find a judgement collector which is all very time and money consuming.

Of course, and if you're delivering work and that's working out all well for you, then great. And it appears that you can go that route instead on UpWork, agree on milestones, and no tracking required.

But, if like many people you are getting burned by non-payment, then turning this feature on seems like a pretty good route to go for stability in your wallet.

Could you explain a bit why Upwork, who are a company that have countless forum posts, blog posts, ... about non-payment, clawing back payments in entirely unjustified circumstances with zero recourse, ... I'm saying they have a very bad reputation in this regard.

Why would giving these people more power over you result in more payment ? They are looking to exploit these freelancers, and this gives them more power.

Why would any reasonable person expect that giving cheaters more power over you result in less cheating ? It will obviously increase the chance that you, as a freelancer, won't get paid.

https://hackernoon.com/why-you-should-never-use-upwork-ever-...

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.elance.com

https://entrepreneurs.maqtoob.com/a-top-rated-freelancers-ad...

https://screenshotmonitor.com/blog/how-to-avoid-scams-on-upw...

http://launchastartup.com/odesk-vs-elance/

I've used Upwork in the past with no problems (from Upwork, I've had problems with clients). I ready the links you posted and not one of them mentions Upwork cheating or clawing back payments. Only the first article is really critical of Upwork per se, and all the truly damning stuff, if it exists, has been removed, so it's hard to judge.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but you made a pretty contentious statement and your evidence is lacking. Do you have a more explicit link to what you're talking about?

Yeah, but lawyers are expensive

Not if the work is like that of a security guard or janitor. You can skip a night every once in a while and no one will notice

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