Online Jobs FAQs – Part 3

Who will pay us for the work we do?

The creator of projects called the buyers will pay you for the work that you do for them. After you won the project, the buyer put the funds in escrow and only buyer can release escrow where you the service providers are the ones who have the only power to cancel an escrow, unless project is in arbitration.

What is Arbitration?

The system at freelancing sites is very simple. That is, buyers create Online Jobs and service providers place bids. Then buyers choose one or in some cases, more than one service providers. After acceptance from the buyer, the service providers also have to accept the offer. If both, the buyer and the service providers accept each other’s offer, the project begins. The money for the whole project is put in escrow and the service providers start the work. In the given timeframe the service providers complete the work and then deliver it to the buyer. The buyer than check the quality and other requirements of the work and then finally the buyer releases the money from escrow. This means that the project is finally finished. The service provider gets the money for which they have done the work for the buyer.

But wait: what if the buyer is not satisfied with the work done by service providers?

What if the service provider actually failed to do the correct work that the buyer required?

Well, at this point we see some involvement of the freelance site’s team members in the project. If the buyer is not satisfied and he doesn’t want to pay the service providers then he just click on the arbitration option. This puts the project in arbitration phase. Both service providers and the buyer then have to wait for few days. As there are few projects entering arbitration each day, you have to wait for your projects turn. In the first phase of arbitration, the freelancing sites team checks the whether the service provider have completed the work in time or not. Incase he hasn’t, then the arbitration simply ends in buyers favor as according to terms and conditions, service providers have to complete the work in time no matter what happens.

Incase service providers fail to complete in time, they loses not only money but also, they earn a bad review (feedback) too. So what ever happens, never be late in delivering work to the buyer or else you will be in big trouble. In second phase (incase work was completed in timely manner), freelancing site team will ask the buyer to tell the reason for which he or she entered the project in arbitration mode. After viewing all the details from the buyer, they then ask the service providers, what they have to say about the arbitration reasons told by the buyer. After listening to both parties, the team then does some investigation. They first check the requirements specified by the buyer in the project description. If buyer had entered the project in arbitration for any requirement that was not specified in the project description then it is very much possible that the arbitration will end up against the buyer’s favor.