ContraReviews of contra.com

Absolutely abysmal. I tried to use contra for some of my freelancing contracts given they were high value contracts. David and his team had significant overreach- reaching to my client (after they made a payment) without checking with me first and making them jump onto a call. On their own side- no accountability, no explanation for fees and delays and harassing my client without me on the call. Absolutely unacceptable.

My employer asked me to sign up on this site because withdrawals were "Free" and "Instant" to Payoneer. That was true for the first month and then out of the blue they added a 4 business day "security review period" and a 2% fee on instant withdrawals. So essentially they want to secure the platform but you can pay them extra not to. According to customer service they sent out an email notifying everyone which I was conveniently unsubscribed from though I am STILL receiving marketing emails... funny how that works in their favor. There are so many other platforms that offer faster payouts without a fee. Its deceptive and a money grab, I'd recommend going to Upwork or using Payoneers invoicing feature instead of this BS. The interface is clunky and confusing and they are constantly trying to force you to use features you don't need. The ONLY appeal was the free instant withdrawal and now I'd rather use Wise and cut out the unnecessary middle man.

Their service is absolutely pathetic. It's especially abysmal for new freelancers. I was interested in this platform and signed up a few days ago. I spent countless hours building my profile, posting portfolios, and purchasing a paid membership. But they permanently banned my account for sending messages to a few experienced freelancers through the platform's built-in messaging feature, asking about their experiences. If this is a violation, why does this feature exist?

EDIT for reply: no, i don't need technical assistance, i understand why you think it's smart to force a designer to reupload every study. I'm telling you that it's a useless feature and good designers won't engage with the redundant work. i'm not recreating my whole case study on your platform that can't even hold the intricacies i hard coded into my actual portfolio, just for a job. if an employer passes on me because they can't be bothered to click a link to see my full case study, I won't be upset missing out on the opportunity. there are plenty out there, i'm not desperate. your perspective is skewed because you think your platform is the real tool here and it's not. a good designer doesn't need this site, just like they don't need behance, wellfound, upwork or whatever else that's available. please stop acting like it makes sense to force us to recreate our entire portfolio. it doesn't and no one else requires that to simply apply. it's incredibly narrow minded ------------------------------------------------------- ORIGINAL REVIEW: honestly, i wanted to like this. i see the appeal but its operating way too close to a social media account and not a job board. it has virtually NO privacy for designers. i only want my case studies viewed by those i'm interested in roles for, not the whole word to view. but this platform forces you to keep things public and interact with this engagement feature. it's also a little weird it makes you recreate your entire portfolio before allowing you to actually apply. I spend hours on my portfolio outside of your silly little website. i dont want to spend more time recreating it there too just because you want me to. I feel i just got half way through uploading and it being buggy and slow where I started asking myself what I was even doing. Make it easier not harder for us? if we dont want to reupload all our shit onto your platform, don't force us? also its rather expensive too. 30 a bucks a month when i can source most roles myself on linkedin. pay all that and still not even get privacy or settings? no thanks

I wanted to post a job for a freelance SEO specialist. The first thing I didn’t like is that you can’t do anything — even browse the talent database — without registering, which is already annoying. Why would I create an account on a platform where I might not even find what I’m looking for? Still, I went through the registration process and decided to post the job. I wrote the description using their own AI bot. However, the budget selection was very inconvenient — I couldn’t find a way to set an hourly rate. I personally find it much easier to work with hourly pricing rather than big fixed numbers. In the end, I spent my time creating the job post, only for it to be rejected without any clear explanation. Formally, they wrote something like “check this, this, and this,” but in reality there was no clarity on what exactly I did wrong or what I needed to change for the post to be approved — especially considering the job description was created using their own AI tool. After this experience, I don’t want to come back to the platform. It’s easier to return to the websites I used before, where the process is transparent and clear. Contra definitely needs to improve their moderation process and overall usability.

You apply for jobs there is zero feedback on all of them. Ok that's fine, it happens on most freelancing platforms but the other platforms show you the number of applicants before you even apply and afterwards. The number of jobs is not that much for my niche (Branding Design), you could reload the page a number of times only to see a new job days later. I freelance on Upwork, I have to filter so that I only see the jobs I want. Unfortunately you pay first to view few jobs that probably have a lot of competition (because the number of applicants is unknown)

Completely useless. No leads for a one year since I started the plan with Contra.

BEWARE, DO NOT USE!! I used contra's escrow facility for a job, the contractor did not do the work and offered a refund as he did not complete the work and they are refusing to release the funds back to us as now the contractor is saying they did the work although contra have the messages on their platfrom where he freely admits he did not do the work and that he is happy to refund even asking me how to refund the monies.