A Client Taking Advantage of the Review System to Get Free Work

[krishnaaggar518]

I have a client who initially requested a small update on their website. I provided a quote, which they accepted. But instead of one, they listed four tasks in the requirements, even though I ended up completing most of those tasks as additional work, which I did for free. The order was marked as completed after three days of no response from the client.

However, the client continues to request more work through inbox messages, without leaving a review. I'm concerned that if I don’t complete all the extra tasks, they might leave a negative review. It’s also worth noting that they haven’t given any 5-star reviews to previous freelancers.

[uk1000]

You haven't said what gig they ordered, but in some of your gigs you have "unlimited revisions". You could change that to a lower fixed amount. You don't say how many revisions you gave in the custom offer, but I'd not offer unlimited ones.

You could try politely explaining to them what your original offer was and what was delivered. Maybe explain how many free revisions the gig offered (and say how many they've used and you could say further work will need a new order). Maybe depending on how much they're asking for, suggest a new custom offer or suggest they can re-order the gig (though you might not want them to but it should at least help stop them keeping asking for free revisions if you didn't offer that, or new free work).

Maybe let them know politely if it's outside the scope of what the original offer was.

Maybe what could have been done at the start of the order, when he asked for 4 new things that weren't in the custom offer, would be to have added a custom extra and explained it wasn't in the scope of the original offer/order but you can do that for for that extra amount if required.

You said:

Quote

I provided a quote, which they accepted. But instead of one, they listed four tasks in the requirements, even though I ended up completing most of those tasks as additional work

The "most" might be an issue there - you don't want it to seem like a partial delivery. But they are also asking for more than was quoted. So if you were agreeing to do their requirements then, then you probably should have done all of them (unless they said some weren't needed), or cancelled the order maybe if what they were asking was too much and outside the scope (but they might be able to leave a bad review?). In your custom offer though you can also set it to disable the ability for them to enter the requirements (if you already know them and are doing the quote and custom offer for the things they asked for. Though it's too late for that order.

You could contact CS and explain that they are continuously asking for new work while the order is already complete, and see what they advise, unless it might be risky because of the "most" bit above.

If they do leave a bad review then you should still be able to leave a public reply to it explaining what actually happened.

Edited Monday at 10:40 PM by uk1000

[abrarfahim1996]

Frustrating 😐

[krishnaaggar518]

6 hours ago, uk1000 said:

You haven't said what gig they ordered, but in some of your gigs you have "unlimited revisions". You could change that to a lower fixed amount. You don't say how many revisions you gave in the custom offer, but I'd not offer unlimited ones.

You could try politely explaining to them what your original offer was and what was delivered. Maybe explain how many free revisions the gig offered (and say how many they've used and you could say further work will need a new order). Maybe depending on how much they're asking for, suggest a new custom offer or suggest they can re-order the gig (though you might not want them to but it should at least help stop them keeping asking for free revisions if you didn't offer that, or new free work).

Maybe let them know politely if it's outside the scope of what the original offer was.

Maybe what could have been done at the start of the order, when he asked for 4 new things that weren't in the custom offer, would be to have added a custom extra and explained it wasn't in the scope of the original offer/order but you can do that for for that extra amount if required.

You said:

The "most" might be an issue there - you don't want it to seem like a partial delivery. But they are also asking for more than was quoted. So if you were agreeing to do their requirements then, then you probably should have done all of them (unless they said some weren't needed), or cancelled the order maybe if what they were asking was too much and outside the scope (but they might be able to leave a bad review?). In your custom offer though you can also set it to disable the ability for them to enter the requirements (if you already know them and are doing the quote and custom offer for the things they asked for. Though it's too late for that order.

You could contact CS and explain that they are continuously asking for new work while the order is already complete, and see what they advise, unless it might be risky because of the "most" bit above.

If they do leave a bad review then you should still be able to leave a public reply to it explaining what actually happened.

I don’t have a problem with offering revisions, but what he’s asking for now is outside the original scope of work. I should have clarified at the start of the order that these new tasks were not included in the offer. That’s my mistake.

I'm saying the most because the client said he would handle the second-to-last task himself, but then assigned me a different task, which I completed.

Despite multiple reminders about the scope of work and requests for a review, he has been ignoring me.

If he continues to assign additional work, I might have to explain the situation publicly in the review to clarify things.

Thanks for your reply