RentACoder (vWorker) vs Freelancer

If you’ve heard about outsourcing through Freelancer, but aren’t sure if it’s the best choice, take a look at this.

Here, we compare Freelancer to RentACoder (now vWorker) on some some of the most important points to the online outsourcer, so you can see how both Freelancer and vWorker stack up against not only each other, but against what you need as an outsourcer as well.

Fees

Freelancer limits project listings to 7 days, and requires payment to extend. That payment and project listing limit is just one of many restrictions that vWorker does NOT force onto its users.

Freelancer charges $3 to post a project. If you select a worker and pay Freelancer’s selection fee, this charge refunded to you. If you don’t select a worker, it isn’t refunded. Freelancer also charges 3% of a project’s cost (with a $3 minimum) to select a worker. It additionally charges Australian outsourcers a 10% GST tax. vWorker charges nothing. There are no charges to post a project, to select a worker, or to make a transaction at vWorker. vWorker simply appends 15% to each project final bid to cover costs.

Bid Limits

Freelancer workers can’t make more than 10 bids a month unless they pay a subscription fee. That not only reduces the number of qualified workers, it can additionally raise your costs since workers often pass their expenses onto you. The majority of sites, like vWorker, do not charge subscription fees.

Per Hour Monitoring

Freelancer’s time card doesn’t verify a worker’s labor through a real-time punch-in and out system, which means its workers can’t prove they were working and may bill you for unrelated tasks.  vWorker’s time card, on the other hand, uses screenshots and a webcam to visually demonstrate what workers do.

Money Back Guarantee

Current events can be found in our Freelancer News section.

Workers at Freelancer can’t personally guarantee a pay-for-deliverable project with a forfeitable deposit the way they can at vWorker, while the service itself, doesn’t guarantee hourly jobs and refund you if your worker misses a required status report the way that vWorker does. Both services will, however, guarantee a pay-for-deliverable project with arbitration, though Freelancer charges for 2% of a project’s price (with a minimum of $10) for this service.

Source Code Protection

Freelancer doesn’t offer source-code protection, but vWorker allows you to require all workers who bid on your project to be Chaperon enabled. Chaperon makes it virtually impossible for a worker to copy or pirate your source code by protecting it from creation and transport to storage and retrieval. See the vWorker website for more information regarding Chaperon.

Arbitration

Freelancer limits arbitration to projects with milestone payments of more than $30. If your project has milestones less than that, you don’t have access to arbitration even though your situation may warrant it. Moreover, Freelancer’s mandatory pre-arbitration processes let abusive workers stall the *start* of arbitration (and prevent you from accessing your money) for weeks. 

vWorker offers arbitration on all projects regardless of milestone payments, and it additionally prevents workers from stalling an arbitration’s start. 45% of vWorker’s arbitrations are completed under a day and 75% of them are completed under a week. You can even read how vWorker’s arbitrators make their decisions on its website.

Support

If you haven’t already, register a username for yourself so you can discuss this topic in our Online Outsourcing Services forum.

Unlike Freelancer, vWorker offers live support via phone service seven days-a-week. It also offers a requirements wizard and a project posting wizard to help you build a project that’s easy for workers to understand. And it’s the only service that offers one like it!

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