Credit Refunds!
I am actually new to PPH, but this is the first freelance website I have had to pay to bid on jobs. I get it its another stream of revenue for you. But us freelancers are what make you money by giving you a percentage of our bid and doing all the work. I don't think it is unreasonable to ask for you to support us by refunding proposal credits for jobs that are never awarded, or if the client never logs back on after posting their project. Why should we have to pay to bid on jobs that the client never really wanted done in the first place, doesn't have the money for the project, or somehow got pursuaded into talking to developers on skype and decided to award the job through channels other than PPH. This penalizes everyone including PPH besides the one lone developer who conned your/our customer off site to finalize the project. Why am I paying to bid on a job that is never going to be completed through PPH?? Why am I being punished for a third parties actions??
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I was about to post a topic along the same lines. We do a lot of work through People Per Hour and enjoy the platform. I accept if a job is awarded to another freelancer but when proposals are lost by buyers simply not buying that isn't right as we are in the same situation of having to purchase more credits.
I think that 7 days is plenty of time for a buyer to choose a freelancer or else cancel their job. If it is clear that they are going to do nothing then there should be an automatic job cancellation policy whereby freelancers who bid on these so-called 'dead projects' get their credit back. Buyers who do not intend to buy should not be allowed on the platform.
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Point shared. I no longer purchase credits because of exactly this problem. PPH sometimes tops up my account with free credits. Only then do I use the site. I don't like wasting money on sellers who don't follow up their original posting; not in addition to the ten minutes or so it takes to make each proposal in the first place. The rates sellers are offering at the moment, it's not worth it. Not even half the projects I propose for get awarded. (I'm also beginning to wonder whether 'featuring' my proposal even makes a difference. I've won plenty of work without it.)
If, say, there was a minimum project cost for different types of work (£250 per web page/£500 for a video etc...) I would definitely consider purchasing credits. It would make perfect sense. But not as the way things stand.
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I agree with the above feature requests. Please shorten the standard bid period to 7 days and refund bid credits taken for jobs that come to nothing, to cut out the time-wasters. After all, we get a refund where a job is cancelled; if anything it's more frustrating to get to the end of a 30 day bid period and have the job fizzle out - at least cancellers are showing some common courtesy.
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I agree with all of the above and have another issue that bugs the hell out of me. When I receive an email alert that I have been selected to bid on a job due to my skills in whatever this message is always included in the text; " Plus, applying now means you won't use any of your available bid credits!" but it DOES use one of my credits, every single time! Is anyone else having this issue?
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Re: Deb -
Regarding the 'answer this now and you won't lose a credit'
That is actually a misleading factor on the site and with the e-mails. If you are the first freelancer to apply for something you won't lose a credit, so when you get that notification in an e-mail that is what it is referring to. The trouble is, by the time you actually get the e-mail people have already applied and so it negates what was said - hence the misleading part.
But hope that helps.
On that point however, I am always surprised by some freelancer's ability to apply for jobs so quickly. Clearly it is just a standard proposal, going on volume and quantity over quality but it is frustrating nonetheless, especially if you believe you are first, get a good proposal in and then click send and see you are third, fourth in the list.
Anyway, hope that answered your question.
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The problem appears when the EMPLOYER doesn't hire anyone and we still don't get our credit back!
So let's go on this page and vote the comments of Sotiris and Munaeem Because they suggest SMART solution to this problem.
http://support.peopleperhour.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/214988627-Proposal-credit-refund-if-job-not-awarded-in-3-days?page=1#community_comment_115003744248
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