How Upwork protects your payments

To help protect your payments, we offer several levels of protection.

For clients:

You can monitor your freelancer's Work Diary to see work-in-progress snapshots and confirm what work is being invoiced to you
If your freelancer logs hours not related to your project you can file a dispute for the previous week's hours. You will be refunded for any hours that do not qualify for Hourly Payment Protection
Upwork Hourly Payment Protection doesn’t apply to bonuses or fixed-price projects. See the Upwork Terms of Service and Hourly Escrow Instructions for full terms and conditions

For freelancers and agencies:

On hourly contracts, you will invoice your time by logging it with the Upwork Desktop App
As long as your hours meet Hourly Payment Protection criteria you will be paid for the time you invoice
Upwork Hourly Payment Protection doesn’t apply to bonuses, manual time, or fixed-price projects. See the Upwork Terms of Service and Hourly Escrow Instructions for full terms and conditions

For clients:

You and the freelancer agree on deliverables in the form of milestones and you deposit funds (minimum $5 per milestone) into escrow
Work is submitted for your approval before funds are released from escrow
You can ask for changes to the work or request an escrow refund if necessary

For freelancers and agencies:

Your client deposits funds into escrow before you start working and you submit work for their approval
Funds are automatically released to you 14 days from submission if your client does not approve the work or request changes
You can file a dispute if your client refuses to release the payment for a completed milestone. See the Upwork Terms of Service and Fixed-Price Escrow Instructions for full terms and conditions