Knowing multiple business owners who have complained about remote employees faking hours, installing mouse simulators to trick time tracking software, etc, I'm not particularly sympathetic.
Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
81–90 of 121 posts
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Not in San Francisco" and "easy to exploit" are very different. I had great, professional work done in Russia on Upwork. It didn't cost $200 per hour, but it didn't cost $2 per hour either. The engineer who did the work was the vendor, and I was the client, so I was definitely the boss and treated as such, but he was clearly not hurting for work and if I started behaving inappropriately he could have easily dumped m…
20 US dollars per hour is already more than I make as a full-time SaaS salesman in New York City, and I'm not even hurting for cash either!
Are you working constant 80 hour weeks? Is everyone lying about big city costs? Or do you consider 3 housemates and a 2 hour commute to be not hurting for cash?
Something has to be up here.
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#83I've been using Upwork for side gigs since it was Odesk. The tracking system (which has scarcely changed in 5+ years) has always seemed fair and flexible to me. the tracker works well cross platform.. I can move from OSX to Win10 to Ubuntu (previously they supported Debian, and in the past I've managed to get it tracking successfully on Slackware) .. minimal downtime, good communication from their engineers. Being able to selectively trim the fat from my diary in 10 min increments on Sunday night is helpful in preparing clean weekly reports and reviewing my own workweek.
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
20 US dollars per hour is already more than I make as a full-time SaaS salesman in New York City, and I'm not even hurting for cash either!
Are you working constant 80 hour weeks? Is everyone lying about big city costs? Or do you consider 3 housemates and a 2 hour commute to be not hurting for cash? Something has to be up here.
40 hour weeks, 45 minutes to midtown one way. $20 pre tax pay, $15 post tax pay, roughly $2600 a month with even some shitty health benefits thrown in there.
Monthly expenses: $1,000 on rent (splitting with girlfriend) $300 on train tickets $500 on food, phone, internet, entertainment
I try to save about $1,000 every month, which is not very good. I could never dream to support a family or a mortgage like this, but at least I'm not struggling to make rent or going into debt.
I live in an area that would be described as "tough", but statistically, I think we have one robbery every week and one murder every season. By NYC standards, that's very safe :)
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
20 US dollars per hour is already more than I make as a full-time SaaS salesman in New York City, and I'm not even hurting for cash either!
Do not forget about Upwork taxes: Specifically, Upwork charges the freelancer a fee of: 20% for the first $500 billed with the client. 10% for lifetime billings with the client between $500.01 and $10,000. 5% for lifetime billings with the client that exceed $10,000.
God that's horrid. Not to mention the slew of taxes one pays by being a 1099 contractor. And it's not like the clients one attracts on Upwork are particularly good.
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#86I've been consulting off and on for the past five years and I've steered way clear of these marketplaces. It's a very obvious race to the bottom sort of situation they're plotting for which I get. I'd be optimizing for that outcome too if I were one of them. Here's my advice to developers who want to freelance: network and network some more. Write blogs, create content marketing material for yourself. Go to meetups,…
> Here's my advice to developers who want to freelance: network and network some more. Write blogs, create content marketing material for yourself.
There are many developers who can't do it because they live in Eastern Europe or Asia or Latin America and speak only conversational English.
Upwork has a lot problems but it's providing $25+/h rates for thousands of professionals who otherwise would get only $10-15/h or less locally. (I'm one of them.)
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#87I'm confused, why is this news? This is how its been for ever. I get my most interesting projects form upWork since I can check before applying what the job is about, which is something carder to do when you talk with a client of the street. Not to mention that you get guarantee pay every week. You don't have to spend time and energy to force the client to pay you. Which is the best part of upWork. Sure they get a 10% cut, but perennially is well worth it for the ease of mind.
And the tracking app also allows me to organize my work by living notes to the clients to let them know what I worked on. Which is always appreciated.
To sum it, up – not sure where the problem is. This is what it is, it works and if you are good you'll make plenty of money for yourself and upWork ;)
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#88We use 'TimeDoctor' as our tracking app at work, and it does an alright job. It also takes screenshots and checks for user activity.
A lot of people bitch and moan about it. But if you go work in a factory - for instance - you'll be clocking in and clocking out just the same.
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#89That doesn't even scratch the surface of Upwork issues though. Has anyone recently seen how much clients are willing to pay for work? I'm seeing avg pays of about 9-10$ an hour for mid-complexity jobs. Even see some clients willing to pay 600$ for fully functional IOS, Android and Web App iterations of an App.
I once worked on Upwork. Getting the 1st project is really hard. And seeing quotes of USD 500 for entire fully functional applications was depressing. There were people from India remote places like small city Chandigarh or small town in Kerala or people from Bangladesh who would actually bid for these. I finally asked Upwork for a feature where I could blacklist clients who I thought that the price offered was too low. I wanted a feature like - "dont show me any bids from this client" . But unfortunately Upwork didnt create such a feature
Re: Upwork Freelancers Who Want Guaranteed Pay Have to Opt in to Tracking Software
#90I've been consulting off and on for the past five years and I've steered way clear of these marketplaces. It's a very obvious race to the bottom sort of situation they're plotting for which I get. I'd be optimizing for that outcome too if I were one of them. Here's my advice to developers who want to freelance: network and network some more. Write blogs, create content marketing material for yourself. Go to meetups,…
> Here's my advice to developers who want to freelance: network and network some more. Write blogs, create content marketing material for yourself. There are many developers who can't do it because they live in Eastern Europe or Asia or Latin America and speak only conversational English. Upwork has a lot problems but it's providing $25+/h rates for thousands of professionals who otherwise would get only $10-15/h or…
Eastern Europe or Asia or Latin America and speak only conversational English.
It’s the opposite - they have access to markets that English-only speakers don’t. A Brazilian developer networking with Brazilian companies is going to be much happier than one scrabbling for work in a race-to-the-bottom marketplace like Upwork