I've been on Elance for about 10 months. So far I have earned a total of $45 on it. No joke.

Basically, Elance has turned the world into a giant sweatshop. I'm an artist who moved to India to do volunteer / charity work. I was thinking that thanks to the internet, I could continue to work for American and European clients while not having to physically be in those places.

I was wrong. Instead of opening up the world and breaking down barriers of distance, Elance has enabled some fairly dodgy people to hire desperate East Europeans / Africans / Pakistanis / Indians / Chinese / etc writers, coders, artists, programmers, designers etc for pay so low it really should be a human rights violation, and I wish I was merely joking or exaggerating about that human rights violation bit.

How bad does it get? Consider this:

A provider asked me if I could paint ten 8.5"x11" color paintings for him, in watercolor specifically. This is quite a bit of work. Even some kid fresh out of art school would charge at least $100 per piece, more if he is experienced and/or skilled. This provider wanted to pay me $50 for TEN paintings like this. To put this in perspective, the art supplies, watercolors, boards / canvas, etc. etc. ALONE would come up to about $50, conservatively.

Sadly, this was far from a unique story. Another time I was asked if I would illustrate a 200 page graphic novel. If you don't know, that's a very serious amount of work that requires someone especially skilled in that niche, which I am. He wanted to pay me $400 for it. That means that I would be writing the script (he only had a rough draft, no actual script); laying out hundreds of pages; pencil, inks and computer colors for 200 pages. Conservatively that would take me eleven months of non-stop, exclusive work, doing only this and no other work. For reference, a comic book artist's rates would START at $150 a page for pencils and inks, no colors. For pencils + inks + colors, the lowest possible rate is $300 or so. He wanted to pay me $2 per page, and that's including pencils, inks, colors and even writing the final script. The best part? I was tempted to take it because I was desperate for work. He ended up saying I was asking too much, and awarded it to another freelancer who charged $200 for it. Unthinkable but I swear it's true.

A fellow freelancer on Elance complained that she was asked to transcribe something like 50 hours of audio tape into text (I also do transcription so believe me, this is a metric ass-ton of work, no joke) and wanted to pay $100 for it. Breaking it down to how much time it would take to get this kind of work done, she had calculated that if she accepted it, she would be working for about $0.20 per hour. That's assuming the audio quality was good, which it wasn't.

The crazy thing is, even if you don't take it, someone else will - most probably some poor starving desperate freelancer in Africa or Pakistan or India. God knows how they can afford to pay for the internet connection / electricity bills / whatnot when doing that much work for that little pay. Even if they worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week, I can't see how they can possibly feed themselves.

Basically, what I described is what it's like for 95% of Elancers. The forums are filled with people bitching about the same thing. Those that bitch a little too honestly get banned and their posts deleted. There you go.

The free membership is just a come-on. I registered, took the various required tests, spent quite a bit of time filling out a profile and resume and taking several additional skills tests.

They stress that posting relevant questions in the public message board is a good way to hone & focus a bid or proposal for a job. They even stress this in the required tests. But once you are a member and ready to go, you find that you are unable to post unless you have a paid membership (minimum $9.95/month).

When I sent support an email about this on 9/14/09, I got a boilerplate response that read in part: "The Elance office will be closed on Monday, September 7, 2009 in observance of the Labor Day holiday. Regular office hours will resume at 8AM PT on Septmember 8th."

It looks to me like no one is minding the store. They are just there to skim off their commissions and their high credit card clearing fees.

I'm removing my profile today. There are other ways to go about this process.

For people who are willing to work for little money, and be slave labor it might be a great site but if you are a professional you should stay away from this site.

The clients at Elance are the worst people to work for, they expect you to underbid your peers and then they become "marketing experts" who think paying chump change allows them to become pure AS#H*LES. Sure if you are just getting started or are willing to dig your dignity out of the SH#T they shovel out then yes Elance will work for you. BUT WARNING WARNING... learn the lesson NEVER WORK FOR AN AS#H*LE. Fire them if you are putting in too much effort for too little payment.

Elance hooks up people who want something for nothing. Most of the people who have the jobs are middlemen so they want the most from their profit. It is a waste of time for any real talent to join.

Most of the "clients" want you to underbid your low bid and then on top of bidding an amount that would make your mother cry. The clients are demanding so if you are looking for work at elance you best be from india and be able to underbid everyone else or writing an article for a magazine about rip-off on-line companies.

Happy bidding and remember to pay your percentage of the rip-off. :)

I've noticed all of you posted negative reviews which is definitely the opposite of heart-warming. I've been a member for 9 months now. So far I had no rip-offs, stealing, fraud, and phone and email feedback neglegences by elance ... so do I still have to worry?

Further, none mentioned any positive experiences. Afterall, it wasn't you or I who made this website. Not to mention they provide you with free 3 connects so come on people wake up!
It almost feels like someone paid you to be that harsh. Let's be real. The website map and layout is very much so user-friendly. You get to do almost a hundred tests or so for free. Assume you're unemployed and your brain is rusty like a 1967 SS old ford truck- well they are inviting you to wipe your brain's dust for free! How? I tried so many of those free tests and they were awesome and expertrating.com would charge you lands and skies ... so what does that tell you?
Setting up the financial account, tutorials, profile, and escrow was smooth. I sent god know how many emails to elance support and I give them 90% for being prompt. Next are the down-sides and the conclusion.

Member since Nov 2008 and it didn't pick up up until I believe Mar 2009. Now, you are probably thinking either this guy is insane for posting this positive review or simply objective! Believe it or not I went through the hassle yet exciting process of signing up blah and then just left it idle ... By March I checked my email and I saw rediculous amount of invitations of proposals and things picked up from there. My first employer decided to award me because quote-on-quote he wanted to help jump start my online services and build my credibility on Elance. By now I was on top of the world! Bottomline, I had 3 projects in 2 months. HOWEVER
HOWVER

HOWEVER, (I bet now you're down for what I am about to say) > I got screwed from the third employer or rather "kid SCAMMER" who requested super quick translation to study for his exam test the following day and wanted the work done in less than 24hrs. This was back in May and he had just signed up for that purpose. Zero projects awarded Zero profile and simply all empty. Being the money hungry person I was I resumed. He complained about the work and I told him send it back WITH HIGHLIGHTED REASONS of what is wrong with it and he never did. I was professional all the way dealing with highschool mentality kid back at you the way. Finally, he posted me a horrible review and overall feedback score saying it was expensive (I charged him $50 bear minimum lol) and not worth it blah and that EFFED my overall score and now I'm in the 60's% thanks to him from 100% and it is too bad that Elance cannot do a darn thing about it. It was shameful that such idiots like that kid can enter Elance screw up someone's 9 months of hard word and simply get away with it. I think that's counter productivity and world synergy! (i.e. some providers make 100's of 1000's!)

Bottomline: SNAFU!

I've joined Elance some five years ago. I had great hopes on this site. Unfortunately, I've never received any assignment till now.

It appears that the site is more friendly towards the service users than the service providers. The biddings are so low that one shudders to think of taking up the jobs.

So many jobs appear on the site, but who actually gets the job is a big question mark. The terms and conditions of the service users are so tough, they expect a Sheakespeare to write for them for peanuts.

It is a great waste of time and effort to look at elance. It is better to concentrate on other sites to make money than elance.

Mogili

Elance is not a good resource for people who are really trying to make money from writing. I did a project, which was partially completed, the first article was satisfactorily done, after that the client complained without giving me any chance to make any changes to anything, and got a full refund. That doesn't seem fair since I did some of the work, which he liked and I'm sure is using. I asked for them to cancel my account. What a waste of time.

Elance is a joke if you are looking to provide quality work (and get anything close to a fair wage).

For buyers it's even worse. The whole site is chalk full of low-quality providers with glowing resumes and feedback. The thing is the providers make multiple accounts and "trade" projects within the accounts for that very feedback.

Elance turns a blind eye so they can collect their service fees.

Their escrow isn't a real escrow system, the website itself has errors all the time and if you are looking for any type of customer service or support you get a phone answering machine and an email support service that never returns emails.

Elance is by far the worst freelancing site I have ever had the misfortune of working with.

If you ever think of checking it out be sure and READ their 800 page terms of service statement. They are not responsible for ANYTHING. They can come back and take money you made months ago if they want (and they have citing problems and fraud)...even though their system is supposed to prevent these things.

Elance is a joke and a horrible affront to decent business practices.

ELANCE ARE LIARS AND THIEFS!

I signed up for Elance in early December. I followed their advice and took some performance tests (at $5 a pop) because they claim that when buyers do a search if you score high you will be high in the rankings for whatever skill. NOT TRUE.

My test results were top 5% in several and top 10% in others. But when I went and did a search for those skills there are people will lower and non-existent test scores way above me.

TOTAL waste of money.

I also paid ($15 a pop) to use their service which is supposed to verify your "credentials". They say verifying them shows you have reliable references to buyers.

More than 2 months later I am still waiting. 1 it said they couldn't verify, 3 they haven't even tried. They are all former employers and the one they said they couldn't verify told me they never got a letter, call, or email from anyone trying to verify past employment. Elance just took my money and did nothing.

Spent a month and a half calling and emailing them. Even sent Elance a letter in the mail. They never answer their phone, never return emails, don't respond to voicemails and don't answer letters.

I basically wasted about $100 because of Elance lying and stealing my money.

Elance is the WORST thing in the world!

I wish I had seen all the reports on here and on all these other websites talking about the Elance escrow scam.

Figure I might as well warn people with my example. I see people have posted reports on here already. My story is pretty much the same.

I put a job out on Elance for workers to bid on. I awarded the job to someone I thought was a good bet. They had good feedback, had 4 of what Elance calls 'verified' credentials, and had good test scores.

Well it was horrible. I notice on one test score they scored top 5% on English Spelling and also on vocabulary. Well, their bid was perfect English. After I gave them the job you could barely understand what they were saying.

I put the $750 project cost into Elance Escrow because it said I would be protected.

The provider was horrible. They couldn't follow the project details or even simple instructions. They drug the whole thing out for like 3 weeks before they finally just said they didn't have the expertise to do it.

So it takes me a week and a half to get ahold of Elance before they tell me I have to download this huge word document and fill it in and upload it to the system. Then the worker is supposed to fill out his portion and upload it.

So I do my part. A few days later the worker does his part and he says the same thing I do in the file - agree to refund the escrow money.

After waiting about a week I start calling Elance wondering where my money is. I called for 4 days straight. One day I think I called 14 or 15 times. They never answer and never return my messages. They finally sent me an automated reply to one of my emails about a week or so after I sent it to them.

I was originally told that if the worker agreed to a refund in his report that I would be refunded immediately.

That was now 41 days ago. The money is still in Elance escrow and I have had to file a report with my credit card company for fraud.

And this is the kicker (why I say they lie). I was able to check on 2 of the references he had that Elance said were VERIFIED. They had never heard of the worker.

I've never had this kind of problem with places like Odesk or rentacoder. Problems with a project every now and then but never the company ignoring emails and stealing escrow money.

Wish I had done some research on Elance and their scam before trying them out.

But if one buyer saves himself from being a victim of the Elance scam then I guess this post is worth it.

Have been back and forth on this site and am finally leaving it for good. One good experience with a research job that I received 150.00 for. Even though I worked over 40 hours on it, at least the 'employer' was decent and chose me over 50.00 bids (which is the minimum). I did it to gain experience and some credibility on the site. Bid on another 4 projects that were never awarded and not chosen for many others. Most employers clearly state they want someone in the 1-2.00 range and it makes me sick. Great site if you are an employer looking for dirt cheap labor (with questionable results) - you don't pay fees - the contractors do and you don't have to award the job (further wasting the contractor's time). This is not the place for serious contractors with experience, references, etc. expecting a fair wage.

Horrible!!! In the same league as Guru. They put the screws to the contractors and suck up to the employers, who receive services for free!!! Elance is the worst!

Total waste of time for anyone who isn't an off-shore, fly by night group trying to pass themselves off as professionals who are willing to work for peanuts.

I am fairly new to Elance and so far have no complaints with the site itself. I do have complaints with the low bidding practices and for employers who want to pay 3-4.00 per hour (or less) for high level work. I'm not sure what type of professionals will work for that level of pay but I know I won't. I find it insulting and not worth my time. I can make more money freelancing on my own. And, I think employers should be ashamed of themselves for requesting employees work for less than minimum wage.

Hello every one!
i wanted to hire virtual employees for web designing and SEO. Actually i am looking for whole virtual team. Because now it's become very expensive for our organization to recruit employees :( And we need reliable and quality virtual employees.
We were prepared to post our requisite on freelancers site. But we have observed that it's very time as well as money consuming process. So, what next?
Our team comes out with conclusion to directly contact companies who are providing virtual employee services. But the question is "RELIABILITY and Hiring charges".
We have got replies from some forums and communities. So, now we have one option company www.marketraise.com. it's nice.
But we want best service provider with better package.

Thanks in advance
Sophia

Really mediocre. I've been using Elance for about a month and I find the charges outrageous. Elance takes huge cuts out of any projects you win, and I think most buyers are contacting the providers directly. Many sites like rent a coder just take a cut of your profits. But Elance, on top of this also strangles the number of jobs you can bid for to ten, until you pay them subscription fees. I'd advise any freelancer to go to another site with less overheads if you want jobs.

I found Elance to be a competent and the best outsourcing website to give me an exposure of 40 international freelance projects. From September 2007-December 2008, the buyers used to be very good and even used to pay without being asked for. I got almost Rs 75000/- for the first 20 projects. But after wards, when they changed their bidding structure, there are bitter experiences only. Once the project is awarded and the buyer delays/refuses to fund the escrow, he is free to give any type of alibi and all the documentation fee to the tune of 8.75% are landed on the provider. They should refund the number of bids if the buyer cancels the project or declines the offer. I have at least 50 such cases and not even a single bid was refunded. I think majority of buyers and providers out there are using elance to get connected over a petty sum and then deal directly avoid making payment to elance. I even reported their security and reputation flaws but they were thankless and even deleted my report in the forum. They even refunded the money I deserved back to the buyer. Now, they are just concerned about absorbing as many providers as they can and since it is an internet industry, they should do it. But they should not forget their old providers too who are their backbone. I have seen many talented providers are actually leaving elance and going to other sites. Elance should take action against those buyers who are contacting the providers directly. It should not disclose contact details and make it mandatory for all the conversation via PMB.

I've been using Elance for close to a month. I bid on several projects and continued to develop my portfolio. Last week I won two bids, and then I won another. I made the mistake of not requesting a portion of an assignment up front and got burned by a buyer who asked me to do her resume. It was $50 but hey, $50 bucks is $50. Her name is Kathy Dodd, avoid her or request your money in thirds. The second assignment I was paid on time and had no problems. I am working on a 3rd project and have bid on a few others as well. There is work here, you just have to be good at what you do and persistent. Always request a portion of the fee up front. If the buyer isn't willing, chances are, they don't want to pay you anyway. I am trying to recover my $50!!

Completely awful. Elance was worth using years ago at its inception, before it charged outrageous subscription fees and took unreasonable cuts from any of the projects you managed to win. When they realized they were really the only site out there like it with a growing base of freelancers, they took advantage of this and began charging monthly fees. Then they began charging a project percentage in addition to the subscription, which went from unreasonable to ridiculous, given the lack of quality control in the marketplace. They additionally placed a limit on number of bids allotted. Elance tailored itself from the get go to lowballers willing to design logos and websites for under $100. Elance has favored its buyers over its providers from the get go in order to woo businesses in to post their projects, most of which went unawarded. The feedback system is unfair and unbalanced, leaving professionals wide open to feedback extortion. Elance consistently disregards legally binding contracts and does not protect its providers--the very ones who generate income for the site. I jumped shipped over a year ago and abandoned that mess of a site for Guru.com, which is far superior to Elance in quality. I would advise any true professional to steer clear from Elance if they value their livelihood and their sanity. 

I was a first time buyer on Elance and hired Rich Morgan at Heavysystems.com to create a database driven website for my business.  It was supposed to be just like a dating site except it was to connect seniors with self-employed caregivers with online applications,  viewable profiles, shopping cart, etc. I used Elance's "Escrow Services" believing that it offered me protection against internet fraud.  Rich sounded extrememly professional and seemed very competent. To make a long story short, he was paid $2,500 and convinced me to write up a review for him before theall the pages of the site were actually uploaded to my hosting company.  He had assured me that the code was working perfectly and that the site would be finished uploaded "any day now".  I, foolishly, believed him when he said that he was almost finished with the site, and that a review needed to be written before Elance closes the window to do so, since Elance had written me an email saying the same thing.  Well, once payment and review were completed, I never did get the website I paid for (go to www.caregiversdirect.net to see the incomplete site he provided).  He refuses to refund my money since the "review" and full payment were proof that I was a very satisfied customer!  I contacted Elance and told them what happened.  They told me that even though I used their Escrow Services, there were NO REFUNDS but that I could use their "mediation services" in order to get us working together again.  As if!  I'm already sore and never did get kissed.    In my opinion, I wouldn't use Elance or any other site like it until there were assurances that a buyer could get their money back if the service provider fails to complete the contract.  I'll admit that I was completely guileless, but whenever I had doubts about the progress of the work being done before sending in final payment, Rich Morgan convinced me that it was all written in code and would merely show me separate files of the template uploaded to his own server.  Little did I know that it's very easy to create a fake template which looks as if work is being accomplished.  And I was made to feel as if I was paranoid and a distrustful person as if it was a character flaw.  He is the smoothest talker and the most convincing person I've ever encountered.  I may never get my money back, but if I can help prevent more victims of internet fraud by  Rich Morgan and Heavysystems.com, at least I'll feel as if I've done my part to lessen such abuse..  For the entire, torrid, story see my Elance review at www.MouthShut.com.

If it was an option, Elance would receive zero stars from me. They don't go after non-paying buyers and claim they can't "get involved." I'm sure if a writer failed to provide the good for the buyer they'd "get involved." Freelancers--you can do better on your own!