Vote - Original 15%-3,5% service fee VS new 20% Fee structure.
Hello Everyone.
PPH wants to know whether the new fee structure suits the majority of sellers or not? please vote and comment (Comment is important)
If you don't know how to vote, click the Up arrow button next to the post title.
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CS Response :
If you want your buyers to vote go here :
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Agreed - it should have been a clear pop-up after login, taking up the WHOLE screen. There's no excuse for such terrible communication - except to say they probably anticipated a backlash.
And now they have us all in a nice thread talking just to each other. I've been on the blog looking for notification there, and any discussion - nothing. I've been on their fb page, but we can no longer post there, and they seem to barely update that.
Communication from PPH seems to have taken a massive nose-dive. It is not the company I remember from when I signed up in 2008/9. I really hope they listen, and we can make ourselves heard. -
@Jamie i totally agree - i have been saying exactly the same thing in my now (very) long customer support thread. To add insult to injury, I had a buyer who refused to pay for an hourlie that was delivered in full ahead of time and his only message has been "raise a dispute". I raised a support ticket and even though the CS agent said that it was clear the buyer was being non-cooperative, i'd need to raise a dispute. Which i got charged £5 for. So my 20% commission payment doesn't even provide me with any kind of seller protection or mediation? Just more money needing to be spent. Of that £40 hourlie, if it gets paid, i'll probably make about £10 after that, the commission, VAT etc is taken into account. Disgusting doesn't even begin to cover it.
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I have the feeling that they are desperate. At a Christmas do, I was invtied to, one of their employees told me that they only made a profit for the first time last year. I don't think their actions are those of a thriving and succesful company, more the desperate last gasps of a dying entity. If they really wanted a thriving marketplace they would make the site a place that people could not resist being on, that they would bring clients to, that they would fee supported and valued by. Not constantly put up barriers and actually make the people they depend on so pissed off that they are driven to this sort of action.
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I think PPH also need to take a look at what their customer service staff are telling people. I have been trying to find out about my Workstream I have been working on since March that will now make a loss because of the fees.
I just keep getting copy / paste replies, but today I got this:
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The fact that you made your proposal according to the old fee structure, does not mean that this proposal and invoice should be paid under the old structure. I hope you can understand that the system changed automatically for all invoices that would be paid after the 1st of July, hence all invoices after that will be under the new structure.
We would advise you to not mention anything to your buyer since you are afraid that he might not pay the invoice at all. You can increase your price for the new proposals from now on.----
So now I shouldn't mention the fee rise and how it will affect the job in case the buyer doesn't pay me for the work I have done?
Why are they wasting their time copying and pasting irrelevant replies that just waste my time and theirs?
For the record, this buyer was more than happy to pay me directly for the job but I requested he used PPH instead.
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A lot of people here (myself included) haven't received a proper update about the fee structure change. Is it even legal to push such a major change to T&C without informing the community members (users)?
I believe that most companies are now legally bound to prominently indicate the T&C updates with pop-ups etc (not some spammy emails), and may face repercussions for failing to do so. -
Hi @Nick :) Well, that shows how long it's been since I had a dispute. I've only ever had two before now, one as a seller and one as a buyer - and I found it a very useful fair tool. But as a base reason for the site, not as a paid service. Crikey. If I wanted to pay for it I'd find a cheaper escrow system, especially now.
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"Not constantly put up barriers and actually make the peopke they depend on so pissed off that they are driven to this sort of action."
I agree. A positive growing company would keep fees as low as possible to maintain a competitive advantage over other businesses in the market. They have made themselves one of the most expensive freelancing companies online and have the worst support system.
They are unfairly squeezing profit from freelancers. A race to the bottom really. Still no official blog post or notification. I think we need to move on to greener pastures -- this company is being run into the ground.
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"Has anyone else gone crazy quiet since the new fee structure has come into place? "
It's because they also changed the site's menu. New clients are pushed towards "Post Job" and the hourlies section is hidden in a drop down menu.
Presumably, they want new clients to post jobs to increase revenue. They want freelancers to buy proposals.
The problem is -- many buyers don't want to have to write a job listing, then wait for proposals, then review 10-30 applications, then FINALLY get the job done. So we are seeing a drop off.
The management is having a crisis. We'll have to see if the site survives. All freelancers need to find alternate income sources.
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@Caroline - glad it's not just me! Honestly it's like a ghost town around here. Really quite terrifying. I commented a few days ago to say I am of course against the new fee structure. It was concerning enough to think so much money would be taken from us, but the platform seems to have really nose dived all together!
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@Paul - eeek I didn't know that! What's the point in having hourlies then! I've always done well with my hourlies, I've billed over £20k through my most popular one alone, seems like a very strange move to make.
I've also heard that the buyer rates have been put up to 10% too. It seems like it's creating a terrible mess, for freelancers, buyers and PPH themselves!
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The numbers of posted projects are down as well. They have been declining for months and those there are usually have small budgets. I assumed the increase in buyer fees were to blame for that. It is difficult keeping a buyer on site as well because once they get hit with an extra 10% they don't want to pay it.
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I've noticed a huge drop in quality in terms of the projects that are being posted and the budget available. As a copywriter I charge £40 per hour/per 500 words, which is pretty mid range, but I'm finding that buyers are increasingly telling me I'm too expensive on here, an issue that has developed only recently.
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@Eilidh
It's exactly the same for me too. My sales figs for this month are shocking and i range between #3 and #5 on PPH overall. Our hourlie sales are almost non existent this month and several clients have complained after going to buy an hourlie - with our £75 PR writing and distribution service actually costing the client £99. Galling when the money that hits our wallet is just over £50 after we do all the work and we have to take 20% VAT off that. Plus spend almost £13 to promote the hourlie in the first place.
It's absolutely mind blowing how they have got this so wrong, have created such a disaster for both buyers and sellers and still 18 days later haven't actually made any comment or posted an update.
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@Rebecca - it's actually terrifying isn't it! What's more is that they gave us two weeks notice via email. When you're running a business two weeks is not enough time to plan ahead, and work out how you're going to manage this huge blow financially. Going from 5% rates to 20% is completely absurd, what business could cope with 4 times their original rate being taken off of them!
The most concerning thing for me is that this whole change was sold on the idea of loyalty, and that we should be building loyal relationships with our clients. What about the loyalty of PPH to their sellers? I've been selling here for over five years, and this scheme shows there is no attempt to stay loyal to those that bring in money for this platform every month with out fail. I imagine you feel much the same being in the top five sellers on the whole platform! I'm ranked between 70-80 each month, and I feel completely let down by PPH.
There's no possible way to manage this - I can't put my rates up as I said above I'm already finding the quality of buyers is going down and they're not willing to pay for a decent service. I mean realistically, is there any point in even trying to put them up anyway, if the work isn't coming through anymore?
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Here is something for comparison,
In 2016 Upwork introduced a similar pay structure (for sellers), however they engaged with freelancers in advance using blogs, webinars, video etc.
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So I was curious as lots of people were saying their sales had dropped off this month so I went back and had a look at the last 6 months. These are the figures I billed and the percentage of commission I paid in total...
Jan 18 - £2125.49 (4.5%)
Feb 18 - £3144 (4.1%)
Mar 18 - £3890.50 (4%)
Apr 18 - £3047.50 (4.2%)
May 18 - £3782.60 (4%)
Jun 18 - £2505 (4.3%)
Jul (so far) - £756.2 (15.1%)
I have already paid more commision in July already on £750 than I paid last month on £2500.
And this nonsense about it being summer affecting sales. Last July when I took some holiday I still billed £2421 (4.3% commission).
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PPH need to sort out all the poor sellers on this site and communicate. Buyers are put off my the amount of low skilled broken English third world seller who don't read the proposal and just send a few words such as I can help. I set an advert as a dummy and despite putting Uk only I had 40 buyers mostly India and Pakistan offering rock bottom prices, with poor or little English and no real skills for the job. At the end of the day Freelancers are struggling because of this as well as the commission. I must stress I am not against foreign sellers whatsoever, but there needs to be a level of professionalism both with a good pitch and fair pricing. Buyers are being put off and hence why traffic is reducing. High fees people expect top services
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Re sales and fees. This month tbh after looking at my statement we are paying 50% fees so far that includes PPH service fees, proposal credits. So much pressure that we have to work two to three times and still the earnings after fees are not on par with the months before them.
Any one has any ideas what to do?
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@adam I agree, I also did a tester myself, the thing is they are charging Upwork prices but Upwork have a screening process unlike PPH. With Upwork if they have too much of one skill already they will reject the application (I've tried), PPH just allow anyone to work on here then your proposal just gets lost amongst the rest.
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