New system aimed primarily at matching newer sellers with buyers
So now it seems I have to wait two hours before I can bid for a job. This is extremely unfair. Not only do experienced creatives/designers have to compete with an unfair playing field, ie people offered to do a job for £10 when it is clearly worth £100, we are now not allowed to bid for jobs as soon as they appear on PPH. What kind of system is this?!
Awful. Unfair. Unprofessional. Discriminatory.
Regards
C. Howe
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Today: "Soon Buyers will be able to send you a request for a hire based on the per hour rate you have set on your Profile. Therefore it is very important to make sure it is set to a rate you are willing to work for."
So now PPHers will no longer to price-differentiate between jobs because buyers will be able to filter according to the lowest price per hour.
So, if I set my hourly rate to reflect my rarest skill, I won't appeal at all to people wanting a simple job not requiring that rare skill. I mix my jobs and rates but now this is going to be a real problem.
Why does PPH always have to meddle?
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..more of the same..
http://blog.peopleperhour.com/blogroll/update-chat-support-suspended/#comment-63773
Now a chance for buyers get initial design work for free..
https://www.peopleperhour.com/contest/intro -
Hi Carl, although as a freelancer myself I can see why it seems unfair, it simply means that the buyer is matched with freelancers who are the most capable to do their job and have good cert/reviews/ratings....
It makes it hard for new freelancers on the site to build a client base or move 'up the ladder' but ultimately PPH have to walk a fine-line between keeping freelancers happy and ensuring clients receive good quality work at good prices or we all lose.
No clients means no work means no freelancers means no PPH.
Eventually the reliable freelancers will get the work regardless of cost as if you charge £10 for a £100 job then you are going to get £10 worth of work, clients will see this in the end.
I often get offered Express Jobs which I claim only for the client to say they didn't know what it was and wanted different proposals and I've had to cancel the job. No fault of mine or the clients really but there is no real solution so PPH are trying to come up with ways to make it work for all.
It's not perfect but I am sure they will get there and unlike other sites PPH certainly do seem to try new things to improve life.
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Hi Carl
I couldn't agree more. I find this new feature absolutely ridiculous. I have spent a year getting my CERT level up to 4 by sending professional, considerate and detailed proposals. This allowed me to 'climb the ladder' as i'm sure that buyers will filter out the good from the bad by themselves.
Not only do I find myself unable to bid for proposals that are exactly the kind of work I do through this site, I then receive offers to bid early on jobs that are totally unsuitable to me and do not match the criteria I have on my profile page.
According to PPH, people on CERT level 4 earn 4 times more than those on level 3 - since this new feature came in, I am earning knowhere near as much as I have done previous to this feature being added and my CERT level is falling if anything!
I feel any newcomers to PPH will quickly climb the ladder by sending proper proposals, simply because of the amount of spam proposals that get sent through and people trying to earn work through only using the clarification board section. PPH should concentrate their efforts in this direction.
I would love to hear other peoples opinions on this matter. To me, it is very flawed.
Mike
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Good, at last someone else who is prepared to stand up for what is right. The only way we can get anything done about this is to complain most strongly to the 'help' desk about these changes. Go to the 'contact us' in the header bar and tell them exactly what you think. Whats more spread the word.
Carlos
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I have already messaged them several times to register my concerns with this new feature and am looking to hear back from as many people as possible.
When they do get to match me up with a job I would like to make a proposal on, they then take a proposal credit from me when it is meant to be free! They have given me my credits back but it continues to happen and I have to raise an issue every time!
Mike
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I Agree,
A very discriminative algorithm that is blocking me from introducing myself to a client..
Not only is it a discriminative system (which might be illegal in the work place under the EU working laws, all be it online) I also find jobs I am qualified in but am still blocked? And if even that wasn't enough... I get sent jobs from PPH algorithm which do not match my skills.
I do not need you to manage my jobs PPH. I am not looking for a boss to tell me what work I can do and not do. I am a freelancer and not an employee of PPH.
PPH please stop blocking us from a free market place. Its as if you are standing in front of us telling us what work we can do and not do...
I'll be back to rant some more for sure.
Roger
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Hi Roger
Couldn't agree more. I am experiencing exactly the same problems. Don't expect this thread to stick around though. I started one last week and they then removed it to a 'Moderated Feedback' section which is for staff only! Seems as though they are trying to avoid removing this new feature for some reason. Probably in the hope that people will buy more proposal credits as there is now no way I can get the same amount of work as before without increasing the amount of proposals I send - and even then it will be for work I wouldn't usually apply for.
Mike
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Carl, Mike, Roger
I have commented on at least 4 different threads about this subject over the last week or so. All have been removed from the Community Q&A. I do not know why these discussions have been removed as I have been advised by Panos from the Helpdesk that:
"Please keep in mind that the Community Q/A isn't a place where PPH will provide customers feedback on new features. That forum was specifically created for users to discuss changes on PPH amongst themselves without any interference from the site's staff."
So, if it is a forum for PPH users to discuss changes amongst themselves (without interference from the site’s staff) why are these threads being removed on an almost daily basis? Surely that’s interference. Some of the information provided by PPH users about this change would have been very useful to other users who are confused and angry about it.
As well as raising concerns on this forum, I, like many others, have been in touch directly with PPH to voice my concerns and, in particular, to complain about being selected for jobs for which I am unqualified and are not in my skills list, whilst being barred from those for which I am highly qualified. This seems to be happening for a lot of people, so the matching system doesn’t even work. PPH appear to be adamant that this is not a ‘barring’ but a temporary delay in being able to bid. However, as most experienced users on this site know, if you don’t get your bid in early you are very unlikely to be in the running for the job, particularly in a highly competitive category like Design.
Only a few months ago, when the CERT system was introduced, PPH were encouraging us all to work hard to get to higher CERT levels. We were being told if you improved your CERT you would boost your earnings and for each CERT level you would earn x% more than those on a lower level (I can’t remember the exact figures here). I worked hard and went from CERT 2 to CERT5. Now it would appear that a high CERT level and 100% positive feedback is no guarantee of being selected early to bid on a job. If anything, it would appear to count against you as PPH now seems to want to give precedence to newer sellers, as an email I received from Panos at the Helpdesk states “This is a new feature we've put into place aimed primarily at matching newer sellers with buyers on the site so that they can have a better chance at winning work. Having said that, it isn't solely limited to unrated sellers, and we do try to add different level users to the mix each time.”
I expect there will continue to be a lot of traffic on this subject, very little of it positive, about the change. Whether it results in PPH removing the Selected Seller feature remains to be seen. And I don't expect this thread will remain here for long.
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Couldn't have put it any better myself Fiona. Not so long back, just as I was getting high up the previous performance charts they changed the system to cert levels which I have risen to level 4, but now this new system is beyond ridiculous. I too have been voicing my concerns with Panos and he told me the thread had been removed for staff only viewing which just contradicts everything this section is for! Should this particular thread be removed, Are there any links to other comment pages voicing the same concerns as ourselves? The more we can unite against this, the better. Mike
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Mike, at the moment the only one I can find that is still live is this http://support.peopleperhour.com/entries/75714296-Why-the-stupid-new-rule-
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This new system makes me feel like I am in the middle of and in the era of of some horrific late war/economic depression. Whereby you had to raise your hands at the gates in the hope and chance of getting noticed to win your self a job on that day. A system not based on skill or experience but just random luck if, you and your family could earn enough for them to eat or not for the day. However, I feel that this system would still work out better then what we have now. As it was less discriminatory and even though still random, it was not mixed with the pure chaos as what we have been left with. At the same time being offered jobs that you neither have the skills or the qualifications for.
This system will never be fair as it cause more problems then it can ever hope to solve. When you do get rare Job that is not outside of your scope as per usual. Then these jobs I get offered are at the low end bottom of the barrel. usual budget range I kid you not £6 to £15 more often then not. I am sorry PPH but I can not make a living on such ridicules priced jobs living here in Europe at least. At these prices it would be a struggle, as it would barley pay to keep my Computer running and the lights on. However when I do see a reasonable priced job, one the other day in fact that, had a healthy budget of £300 (which is very rare by the way). Yet I found my self barred from even entering and had to wait 2 hours to even be considered. And guess what by the time I had waited patiently and tried to enter a proposal for the project, it had already been snapped up. So How an earth is PPH ever going to solve this issue of offering Jobs based on budgets so that everyone gets a fair bite of the Pie. You see the new changes have cause more problems then it could ever hope to solve. Please drop this unworkable rule which penalises the very people whom have helped shape make the website what it was/is today. So please drop this very flawed ill conceived system that will never work. While in the meantime it is effecting a lot of us very badly!
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Not much more to add to this really, other than to say I now get inundated with people looking for "a professional poster design" for £12. It's pretty bleeding obvious from my profile, hourly rate and Hourlies that I am not the man you are looking for.
I think I heard someone on another thread mentioning something about being able to tell the invite was generated by PPH on clients behalf rather than coming direct, anybody know where to see that info, I can't seem to find anything to say it's not a genuine invite from a client.
Does anybody know if failure to reply to these requests has any effect on your ranking. Logic would tell me 'no' which leads me to the conclusion it probably does.
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Hi Steve
I just assume that if the invitation gives you the opportunity to accept or decline the invitation then it has come direct from a buyer. If it doesn't then I assume it has been sent by PPH under the Selected Seller system. The other way to tell is to look at the email you get about this.
The email from PPH will say something like "Hey [name],
You're one of the most qualified Sellers for the Job "[job title]" because of your skills in [skill keywords]*.
The Job is currently private which gives you a 2 hour window to be one of the first few to send a Proposal to the Job. Applying within the next two hours also means that you won't use any of your available bid credits. Be quick and get a major advantage against the competition."
I am ignoring most of these because they either do not match my key skills at all or the budget is laughably low, or the deadline impossibly tight. As there is no opportunity to decline the invitation I don't expect that it counts against your CERT score not to send a proposal.
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This feature is becoming more pathetic by the day. I tried to send 10 proposals and every one of hem I was blocked from. I received 4 invites to jobs which don't match my skills.
I have complained again but just seem to be getting ignored now. I have asked for one of the key decision makers behind this feature to contact me. I won't hold my breath.
Mike
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"...although as a freelancer myself I can see why it seems unfair, it simply means that the buyer is matched with freelancers who are the most capable to do their job and have good cert/reviews/ratings...."
Well, that would be great, but that's not what's happening. The 'matches' apparently take no account of CERT or reviews, and certainly don't match buyers with the sellers most capable of doing the job, even if that's what they're supposed to do. (I got invited to a Portuguese proof reading job the other day - I don't speak Portuguese.)
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Hi Emily
Have you contacted them to voice your concern about this ridiculous new feature? The more people who raise their concern, hopefully the more they will have to take notice and take action. My level 4 cert is slipping at an alarming rate, especially as it barely moves up when a job is completed and being paid for.
Mike
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Please look into this matter - as a secretary / proofreader I've been selected to bid for a builder's job, yes in construction not website building.
I have also been restricted for proofreading jobs for 2 hours, during which time I'd lost it. I'm earning nothing here now. This isn't fair on long timers who have earnt you money over the years. You're discriminating and actually illegal. A job is posted by a seller, you have no right to restrict who can see it for two hours. Check with your legal team, it is illegal, and furthermore it's like shooting yourself in the foot. Another crazy idea.
Please reflect on this and actually seek to assist your clients, not hinder them.
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Mike, thanks but I have - I'm very upset about it and have emailed direct, only to receive a standard kind of response that they're trying to help their new customers find work. Well, we were all new customers once and guess what? We progressed by perseverance. Just hoped to boost this thread up a bit really. Rest assured I have contacted them directly more than once this week....
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Your thoughts echo my sentiments exactly. I have mailed them several times and have not received the answers I am looking for. I worked myself to level four by working hard at my proposals for over a year and now I get this, and work has dried up.
They contradict themselves. When they introduced the CERT levels to replace the old rankings, here is the opening lines of their statement:
"Why did we introduce CERT?First let me start by saying that any ranking algorithm, in our view, is aimed at rewarding the highest quality and most relevant talent up the ranks, so they get more exposure to Buyers."
Hopefully this thread will grow and we can all voice our concerns on a daily basis until we get proper answers and action.
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