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Question about odesk.com

by Richy Burns
6 replies
Hi,

I want to post a job on odesk and I want to choose the fixed price option instead of the hourly rate.

My question is:- if i am happy with the worker and the work done and want to keep him on long term, can i simply pay my worker like every 2 weeks the amount i owe him (its a set and agreed upon amount) through the odesk back office or do I have to keep reposting the same job?

Any answers welcome

thanks

Rich
#odeskcom #question
  • Profile picture of the author Audrey Harvey
    Rich, I haven't any experience of that as an employer. However, I have a writing client on Odesk, and she gets in touch with me whenever she wants more articles. I write them, and she pays me, and she's never listed anything other than that first job. This has been going on for over 12 months now. She also hasn't closed that job, so based on that, I think you'll be able to do what you describe with no problems just as long as you don't close the job.
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    • Profile picture of the author swi55tony
      Rich,

      There are a few options

      1.You can hire the employee on a task basis but can offer bonuses as well and can use these to pay for additional work. The employee will stay with you until you say the contract is complete.

      2.If you have a further piece of work you can offer it exclusively to that employee.

      3. Set up a contract that is hourly based and negotiate a fixed cost. The employee will then submit the number of hours required to make up that fixed cost. This way they remain on your books permanently.

      4.Take their employment offline and sign a negotiated contract with them. Pay them through Paypal.

      As you can see there are a number of ways.

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      Tony Draper

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      • Profile picture of the author Audrey Harvey
        Originally Posted by swi55tony View Post

        4.Take their employment offline and sign a negotiated contract with them. Pay them through Paypal.
        I think if you check, that this is a breach of Odesk's terms and conditions. You may not be caught, but if you are, you can expect at least a temporary ban on your account. Only reason I know this is because I did exactly that on another freelance site, not deliberately, just forgot and was careless. They intercepted my messages and my account was frozen for a while. Not worth the risk when it seems you can do the same thing, without doing the wrong thing.
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  • Profile picture of the author bogdan247
    Hey Rich,

    I work both as contractor and as an employer on oDesk. You don't need to re-post the job. Just hire the contractor on a fixed fee job and then use the bonus system to pay him. There are no limitations on oDesk about how much or when to pay the contractor on a fixed fee job.
    I do not recommend using the 4th solution proposed by Tony - it's against oDesk's TOS
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  • Profile picture of the author Claire Sharp
    Based on my experience, at oDesk you have to abide their rules and policy. If you broke their rules, your account will be banned.
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  • Profile picture of the author StatCentric
    Using oDesk protects you vs. Paypal. If they are properly logging their time through oDesk you will get screenshots of their desktop periodically. This isn't such an issue with a Fixed project, but definitely for hourly it gives you piece of mind that you are not being ripped off. Personally I think hourly is the fairest way to pay the workers. I've seen fixed projects where the actual hourly rate was 17 cents/hour because the budget was way too small.
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