oDesk and Elance Scams – Contractor Survival Guide
Posted by bogdan247 on March 30th, 2011
When I think about oDesk, I imagine a noisy oriental bazaar. Thousands of people looking to do business fill the alleys of this virtual bazaar. Some are loud and obnoxious; others quietly display their offer to the public. Some simply wander around, while others carry endless shopping lists filled with peculiar items.
Among the many honest people doing business in the marketplace, there is a fair share of thieves and charlatans. oDesk or Elance, like any marketplace, have their share of scams and frauds. Just make a search on Google for odesk scam or elance scam and you will find plenty of people complaining of being scammed on oDesk. As I mentioned in my previous post concerning oDesk or Elance scams, most of the people complaining about frauds are employers. This is perfectly normal when you think that the employers are putting their money on the table.
But this doesn’t mean that contractors are better protected and they cannot fall victim to a scam on oDesk or Elance. Contractors usually don’t invest their money in a project, but they do invest their time, an extremely precious commodity.
To avoid falling victim to an oDesk or Elance scam, all contractors should take a few basic measures of caution. Let’s examine them together:
1. Do Your Research
I know it’s hard to do this with every new application, but you should do a background check on the employer. At the bottom of the job posting, you will see the employer history (unless the employer is new to oDesk).
The history includes previous job postings and the feedback received by the employer. If you see negative feedback or comments made private, it could be a sign that the employer is not honest. Of course it could also mean that the employer is particularly difficult, but not a scammer. You should be cautious in both cases, especially if the project seems complex and labor intensive.
2. Ask Questions
Many employers use interviews, conducted via oDesk/Elance, Skype or other means, to get more information about you. Use this moment to your advantage – if you smell something fishy, raise your questions to the employer. Always be professional and polite, even your instincts tell you that you are dealing with a scam attempt.
3. Know When to Quit
What happens if you get hired for a job, but the gig turns to be a scam? oDesk and Elance provide a solution for these cases. As long as you didn’t log any hours for the job (if it’s a hourly fee job) you can forfeit the contract. You don’t even risk getting a negative feedback for quitting. This is a detail that few oDesk contractors know. Even if you did log some time for the contractor, the best way of dealing with oDesk and Elance scammers is to end all contact with them, as soon as possible.
4. Keep Your Eyes Open
Your alarm system should always be set to High… Look for suspicious conditions set in the job announcement. For example, some oDesk scam employers ask for certain deliverables before actually hiring you. This practice, called spec work, is sometimes just the employer’s way of screening candidates. Unfortunately, in some cases, dishonest employers use this trick to get their work done, without spending a cent. Just imagine a scammer receiving 15-20 pages on a subject, without spending a single cent.
Other scams on oDesk and Elance extend beyond the virtual world. Some fraudsters try to pitch their schemes to naïve contractors, and use oDesk or Elance as a mean of attracting potential victims. Be careful about scammers asking you to install an application on your computer, for testing or other reason. That app may be a malware designed to steel sensitive information from your machine.
5. Make Use of the Protection Offered by oDesk and Elance
Some oDesk or Elance scam employers may ask you to communicate outside the website, via email or instant messaging. Then, they suggest that you leave the freelancing site and work outside the system. This is completely against the terms of use of oDesk and Elance. It is also a good way to become victim to an oDesk or Elance scam. When you work outside the freelancing site, you have no protection against frauds. If the employer refuses to honor the agreement, you have little options left – at best, you can sue the fraudster, but in many cases it’s not worth the effort.
By contrast, working on oDesk or Elance offers superior protection. oDesk has a payment guarantee for every hour worked and properly logged with their tool – oDesk team. Make sure that you document your work with descriptive memos and you are pretty much safe from scam attempts. This doesn’t apply for fixed fee jobs, so you need to be extra careful with them.
The escrow system from Elance is even better at protecting both contractors and employers from scams. The employer places a fund in escrow when the job is posted. When the job is done, Elance releases the funds to the contractor. This goes both for hourly fees and fixed fee jobs.
6. Keep the Marketplace Clean of Scams
Once you encounter a scam attempt on oDesk or Elance, make sure that you report the fraudulent employer to the freelancing site, and also that you leave an accurate feedback, to warn fellow contractors about working with that specific employer. In this way, you will contribute to the general level of quality of oDesk or Elance and make them better for everybody.
These simple advices should be enough to protect you from oDesk and Elance scams. Apply them thoroughly and always keep your eyes open.
Photo credits: Flickr – RejiK
Flickr – jronaldlee
PLEASE DO NOT WORK WITH ELANCE.com.
My client posted a project on elance. Elance said they will guaranty escrow payments. I completed the work and in the end client charge back his funds. I talk to elance support. They said talk to elance dispute assistance. Dispute assistance said talk to billing. Billing said talk to your client. In then end I got no money. Its totally fraud.
Please be aware and do not use elance.com.