An Invitation to Rent a Coder

I was logged in on one of my hourly jobs over at oDesk when I received an email from Nicole from Rent A Coder. It's a site similar to oDesk and other freelancing sites, and there were certain points raised by Nicole which makes their site "better" than oDesk. Before you start reading the rest of this entry, I suggest you visit my post entitled oDesk February Earnings where the comment was left (which also reminds me that I need to post a screenshot of my earnings for March!). For reading purposes, here's what her comment was as it appears on the post I stated above:

Hi, this is Nicole from Rent a Coder. I'd like to congratulate your success as a virtual worker. I’d also like to invite you to try Rent a Coder because there are some important differences between our service and Odesk that could save you money and better guarantee your paychecks.” Rentacoder provides access to programming, writing, illustration, even data entry jobs. You can get a sense of the broad scope of work available here:

http://www.rentacoder.com/RentACoder/SoftwareCoders/BrowseWork.asp

First, oDesk requires workers to move their mouse/keyboard every minute or two, or they don't guarantee to pay you. This can be very difficult (or impossible), when you're doing things like planning, design or other mental work. To protect yourself, you have to try to remember to constantly jiggle your mouse (which can be like "trying to talk and chew bubble gum at the same time"), or choose to forego the guarantee. Rent a Coder pays you for this sort of work without requiring you to do this. In addition, Odesk only guarantees to pay you for the first eight hours in a day. If you're working hard on a project for a buyer and have to go over that time, you do it at your own risk. At Rentacoder, every hour is guaranteed.

Second, as chubskulit suggested, workers on Odesk cannot place more than 2 bids a month unless they take certain Odesk tests, or receive feedback on a certain number of projects. Experience tells us that it takes many bids to land just one job. With limited opportunities, you may not be successful with a service that limits your ability to bid. That's why Rent a Coder offers free and unlimited bidding so that you could earn even more than what you're earning now.

Third, on pay-for-deliverables projects, Rent a coder requires the buyer to escrow 100% of the funds upfront and protects your money with arbitration (and will force a malicious buyer to pay you). We will even go so far as to test the deliverables if necessary to prove you met the contract. But Odesk doesn't do any of these things. So you can do all the work and end up not getting paid a cent.

One more thing you should note is how our services differ in the way we handle arbitration. In short, oDesk's limited arbitration could prevent you from getting rightfully paid for the work you do. And they won't test your work to make sure it meets contract requirements. At Rentacoder, We offer arbitration on all projects free of charge. We also prevent abusive buyers from stalling the start of arbitration. As a result, 45% of our arbitrations are completed under a day. 75% under a week. We additionally publicize the detailed rules of how our arbitrators make their decisions.

There are other differences as well. I invite you and everyone to compare the 7 major services through this link to learn even more:

http://www.rentacoder.com/RentACoder/DotNet/misc/CompetitorInformation/WhyRentACoder_ForSellers.aspx

If you have any questions, please let me know. You can also call in to talk to a facilitator 7 days a week, or email us. 
(see http://www.rentacoder.com/RentACoder/misc/Feedback.asp).

Nicole

www.rentacoder.com

So that's her comment about working with oDesk versus working with Rent A Coder. I started working with oDesk back in May 2009, and I can say that I know the site fairly well including the many policies as I have been victim of bogus buyers as well as buyers who violate policies. Plus, since I spend more than half of my entire day with oDesk and often chatting with Customer Support for some questions I might have, I can say I already know a lot. Plus, as the saying goes, experience is the best teacher which is why I would like to point out some clarifications on Nicole's comment.

• First, oDesk requires workers to move their mouse/keyboard every minute or two, or they don't guarantee to pay you. This can be very difficult (or impossible), when you're doing things like planning, design or other mental work. To protect yourself, you have to try to remember to constantly jiggle your mouse (which can be like "trying to talk and chew bubble gum at the same time"), or choose to forego the guarantee. Rent a Coder pays you for this sort of work without requiring you to do this. In addition, Odesk only guarantees to pay you for the first eight hours in a day. If you're working hard on a project for a buyer and have to go over that time, you do it at your own risk. At Rentacoder, every hour is guaranteed.

This I would have to disagree on. When you are logged into an hourly job on oDesk, you do not have to click your mouse or hit the spacebar or any other keys on your keyboard constantly just for that hour to be billed. oDesk measures the activity level of your keyboard and mouse in an hour for it to be considered billable. I've been working on hourly jobs for a long time now and I do not spend an hour for mental work not touching my PC or my mouse. Even if I research, I am still bound to press keys on my keyboard and on my mouse when reading, so that's still an activity and that gets paid. Plus, I work more than 12 hours a day and all my hours are paid for, so I am not sure where you got the idea that oDesk only guarantees payment for the first 8 hours in a day.

Now, there is a thing that allows buyers to set weekly limits, especially if the buyer is on a budget to follow. The buyer can set a weekly limit for the project, like 5 hours a week for example. If you go over 5 hours a week, that's overtime and the buyer won't be billed for it. The oDesk time tracking tool constantly reminds you if you are over your weekly limit and if you need to log out - you can't miss it as this reminder is quite annoying and doesn't go away unless you close it yourself, making it impossible to miss. Common sense would guide you to stop logging time if you are over the weekly limit, or ask the buyer first if he/she would want the work done ASAP or if it can wait next week for the weekly limit to reset. At that point, you can request a bonus payment from the buyer or just wait until Monday when the weekly limit is reset.

• Second, as chubskulit suggested, workers on Odesk cannot place more than 2 bids a month unless they take certain Odesk tests, or receive feedback on a certain number of projects. Experience tells us that it takes many bids to land just one job. With limited opportunities, you may not be successful with a service that limits your ability to bid. That's why Rent a Coder offers free and unlimited bidding so that you could earn even more than what you're earning now.

Before you can even bid and get hired on projects, you will need to pass the oDesk Readiness Test. I am at 20 bids a week which is more than enough, as I can imagine how hard it would be to meet deadlines if you got hired for all of the 20 jobs you placed bids for. This limit is actually in favor of the providers in my opinion, so that you don't bite off more than what you can chew and get swamped with more work than you can handle. Bids for projects at oDesk are free, as well as keeping and maintaining a profile. I noticed in Rent A Coder you guys charge $2 for every PayPal withdrawal...oDesk only charges $1.

• Third, on pay-for-deliverables projects, Rent a coder requires the buyer to escrow 100% of the funds upfront and protects your money with arbitration (and will force a malicious buyer to pay you). We will even go so far as to test the deliverables if necessary to prove you met the contract. But Odesk doesn't do any of these things. So you can do all the work and end up not getting paid a cent.

Again I would have to disagree. oDesk might not have an escrow system, but it does offer an option for upfront payments wherein you can request for full or half of the payment or any other amount even before you begin working. I did experience a bogus buyer before, but that was my mistake, to not ask for anything upfront. However, if you ask for an upfront payment for $1 or more and the buyer doesn't pay, you can end the assignment yourself and leave the worst possible feedback for the buyer that everybody who views their profile will see. You can curse all you want and other people will be able to read it and will definitely think twice about working with that buyer. Even though oDesk does not mediate in fixed price projects, there are ways you can protect yourself as a provider.

For arbitration, I don't think there's a need to when it comes to hourly jobs. You get paid for every single hour you worked for following oDesk's payment schedule. For fixed price jobs, oDesk sends out reminders to both the buyer and the provider if the assignment is still active beyond the agreed time frame. Again, you always have the option to end the assignment yourself and leave the worst possible feedback whenever a buyer suddenly doesn't communicate with you, especially for fixed price jobs.

I might take a deeper look into Rent A Coder, but not in 2-3 months. I am very, very busy as it is and I am very happy with how much I am  earning. I feel I am earning what I deserve already. But thanks anyway.