after reading the reddit thread linked to below, i wouldn't go near freelancer.com; the reddit thread caused me to wonder whether it's even a legitimate business. Three things really caused me to blacklist freelancer.com: (i) the CEO's remarks--never disputed a single fact alleged by Dustin (OP) if anything appeared to corroborate them, and concluded by saying that's how we do things here at freelancer.com; (ii) more than a few people posted to the thread who had also been treated the same way by freelancer.com--ie, cases in which the developer had completed the work, the client was happy with it and <i>wanted</i> to pay, indeed had in fact paid freelancer.com but freelancer refused to pass the money along to the developer; and (iii) the timing of freelancer's byzantine documentation requirement--in Dustin's case like at least a couple of others mentioned in the reddit thread, freelancer.com's requests that the developer supply redundant documentation to verify their account only occurred <i>after</i> the dev had done some work on a project and the client had had paid freelancer.com for that completed work.