Just want to share with you guys what happened to me. I’ve had a payment dispute with one of my clients on Elance, so I have submitted a dispute in their system. The client responded saying that he has already paid me via PayPal. As a result of his words, Elance have closed the dispute and suspended my account, saying that I am not supposed to receive payments outside of their system. I thought this was too rough. The client did actually send me the money earlier, so it’s all fair and square in a way. But I was shocked that his words were enough for Elance to suspend my account.
Do you sympathize with me?.. With my client?.. With Elance?
When I was active on Elance, you weren’t support to send/receive funds outside of their system. There are obvious reasons for that, and the above situation is one of them. If they want to suspend your account for that, it seems reasonable to me.
Send them a friendly plea and they might reactivate you.
Sagewing, it’s easy to say “it’s your problem”, but the truth is Elance have been very successful and I think they take their providers for granted now. Their fee of 8.75% (+more fees you have to pay before you actually have the cash in hand) is very high, almost like if I had a salesman working for me. I am the kind of guy who respects the rules, but I think they could show more courtesy to me and at least ask the other party for SOME kind of proof before making their rather harsh decision.
I don’t see why they wouldn’t do this – they delivered a client and you failed to stay within their system to pay them for it. Could they have asked you for a response? Absolutely but in their business there’s really no benefit to keeping people who fall outside their agreement; the risk outweighs the benefits not just in lost revenue but in potential fraud. As a buyer who has used elance for larger projects it’s a risk using their system and I expect them to mitigate that risk as best they can.
From where I stand, they offer a reasonable fee because they are a sales person + a book keeper + a dispute manager. Consider the cost they incurr in obtaining a customer, handling the transaction, protecting the buyer against fraud and managing both buyers & vendors who fall out of their system. If you don’t like the fees by all means don’t use the service but obviously it worked for you to get business. If you can get enough work to fill your books at a lower cost, risk or impact than you should.
I disagree… What worked for me to get business were my programming skills, my people skills, and dedication to quality. Elance was just a tool. From where I stand I pay close to 15% on smaller projects and with the kind of support and ‘dispute resolution’ they provide, I will definitely try another system.
Ted, have you actually emailed their support for anything? And not for when you want to pay them and your credit card does not work (they resolve these pretty quickly!) but when you need something from them. Like changing your username, asking to extend project deadline to leave feedback, or something else. That’s when they start giving you irrelevant template responses one after another.
I respect where Elance are headed and what they have done so far, but in my opinion there is more work to be done before the level of their service reaches the level of their price.
You broke elance’s rules, and you are surprised that they suspended your account? It would be easy for the buyer to prove that they paid you outside of their system, so there really isn’t any need for your input (though it probably would be nice for them to confirm it with you).
I’m sure they get tired of providing a place where people can find work and then having to deal with cheapskates who try to get out of paying them their fees, so I can’t blame them for being somewhat harsh. If you can get enough work on your own, then that’s great, but if you accept a job through any service like elance, they are effectively your salesperson and deserve a cut of the revenue you generated.
Think about it this way: how much would you have made from that client without elance?
I see your perspective, but Elance is a private business and they can make their own rules. If their fees are too high, they’ll suffer for it. Instead, they are growing like crazy so it appears that there are many other buyers/sellers who don’t mind the fees or the rules.
Perhaps they could be more courteous, but that’s also up to them.
Like you said, Elance is just a tool and it’s not for everyone. Obviously it’s not working for you. I am a stickler for rules and structure so I actually like the policy that Elance goes for - stay within our rules/structure and we’ll try to help protect all parties. I have done quite a few Elance projects and have dealt with them for project conflicts, payments, fraud, etc. They have always been reasonably helpful.
They seem to feel that their service is well matched to their price point, and enough people agree with them to keep them going just fine.
Elance is a tool – a tool that gets prospective clients to you for you to close them. Without the tool you have to find said clients which isn’t free. Now if you can do that for less than 9% or 15% or whatever you are paying them then it would stand to reason that you wouldn’t use them.
I’m not advocating elance is perfect by any means but you chose to enter into their rules and knowing their service level. If it’s not working for you I don’t see why you are concerned about not being able to use them anymore?
Elance can do whatever they want with their business, no question about that. What I was really upset about is that their level of service turned out to be significantly below my expectations. Not that I am saying I should be using their service and not paying their fees. That would be crazy! And, no offense guys, this is what you want me to be saying because that would make things really simple. That would make me wrong, end of story. But what I am actually saying is - ‘beware of Elance’ - today I was treated by them poorly, tomorrow it can be you.
Most of the clients I found on Elance were paying without any problems. However, once before a customer did not pay in full and Elance could not do anything for me. I have delivered the product (of which there was a clear proof) and they did not even let me leave negative feedback for that buyer, so as to warn others! That was a really upsetting experience. And now, when I encountered another client who did not want to pay (but whom I made pay… barely!) not only Elance did not show me any courtesy, but I turned out to be the bad guy in the end!! I personally feel that the money I have paid them so far was poorly spent.
Oh, and to all you dear ‘mentors’ I want to say, that there is nothing I am asking you to do. All I want is to be heard. I feel that others have the right to know that someone does not care much for how Elance do business. I am not trying to prove that they are pure evil or anything. That’s just my opinion.
Your opinion is welcome and respected, and our responses are our own opinions. I can understand your frustration and I hope you understand our perspectives as well.
What you said in your original post and what you said in this post are 2 very different stories. I assume the truth lies somewhere in between.
If elance didn’t help you collect your payment after you successfully completed a project, then they were in the wrong, just like you were when you accepted payment outside of their system. Maybe you should focus on other sources of work if this one is causing you so many headaches.
because that would make things really simple. That would make me wrong, end of story. But what I am actually saying is - ‘beware of Elance’ - today I was treated by them poorly, tomorrow it can be you.