Truelancer is an online marketplace connecting clients with freelancer workers all over the globe. Their platform is quick, safe, and you have the flexibility to submit single jobs or build up an ongoing working relationship with a freelancer.
If you want to find someone to carry out some tasks quickly you’ll find them on Truelancer. From IT and programming, to sales, mobile app building, and SEO, they have a huge database of freelancers (500,000 at press time) waiting to pick up your job.
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About Truelancer
Their headquarters are located in India, with all of the freelancers using the platform being based remotely around the globe.
The company has been in operation since September 2014, and is headed up by Dipesh Garg.
You can use Truelancer to either sell you own services, or buy services from a freelancer best suited to handle your tasks.
There are 3 different options when finding a freelancer or assistant.
First, you can browse freelancers’ pre-defined gigs under the “Buy Services” tab:
Next, they have a contest-based crowdsourcing option for logo design, web design, mobile app design, and more. This service is similar to platforms like DesignCrowd or 99designs.
And finally, you can browse freelancer profiles by skillsets, or post a job and sort through the applicants.
If you’re looking to work with a freelancer or have a task that you feel needs a deep level of understanding then don’t be afraid to open up a dialogue with prospective freelancers.
Truelancer encourages employers to communicate with their freelancers before committing. You can request samples of work, and even give them a small test project to see how well they understand your directions.
Still, I found the site confusing and not super easy to use. It’s filled with language written by non-native English speakers like “People’s trust knowing your physical presence.” What?
Services
If your job can be carried out remotely online, you’ll find a freelancer to carry out the work on Truelancer.
To give you a starting point, they group some of their services into the following categories:
- IT and Programming
- Writing and Translation
- Admin and Data Entry
- Social Media
- SEO and Blogging
- Music and Audio
- Finance and Accounting
- Multimedia and Graphic Design
Here’s a search I did for “virtual assistant”:
$1 an hour? That’s crazy cheap, even for India.
How Truelancer Works
Plans and Pricing
Truelancer charges the workers, not the employers. Though there is an 8-10% service fee charged on every project, which theoretically could be passed on to you, the employer, in the form of higher bids.
On the freelancer side, they have 5 membership plans offering the following benefits:
- Free – $0/month – With this plan you are subject to a 10% project/service fee, have a $75 bidding limit, and have a low cap on the number of skills, portfolio slots, and service listings
- Intro – $1/month – This plan increases the number of skills, portfolio slots, and service listings you can post over the Free plan.
- Basic – $5/month – This plan increases the number of skills, portfolio slots, and service listings you can post over the Intro plan.
- Pro – $10/month – With this plan the project/service fees drop to 8%, along with some upgraded privileges.
- Plus – $48/month – This is their highest plan and enables maximum listings, skills, portfolio slots, and proposals.
There are also some additional fees per transaction:
- Project Fees – Depending on your membership type there is a 3-10% project fee per transaction.
- Employer Payment Processing Fee – There are processing fees taken depending on the form of payment.
Truelancer Alternatives
If you’re considering hiring on Truelancer, I’d take a look at Upwork as well. The platform is much larger and well-established.
They offer a very similar model and you increase your options by checking out some profiles across other platforms to find a good fit for your tasks.
| FreeeUp | Upwork | Fiverr | OnlineJobs | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Established | 2015 | 1999 | 2010 | 2008 |
| Location | Worldwide, w/ concentration in USA and Philippines | Worldwide | Worldwide | Philippines |
| Customer Rating | ||||
| Size of Talent Pool | Thousands | 12 million | 830,000 | 250,000 |
| Hourly Rate | $5-75+ | $3-100+ | $3-100+ | $3-20+ |
| Platform Fee | 15% | 5-20% | 20% + processing fee | $69 a month |
| Worker Tracking | (optional) |
|||
| Pre-Screened Freelancers | (w/ Fiverr Pro) |
|||
| Best For | Quick hires, e-commerce | One-off projects | Smaller jobs | Affordable full-time help |
| Learn More | Learn More | Learn More | Learn More |
Since both are free from the employer standpoint, it might make sense to post your job on both to see what comes back.
The way you can browse services on Truelancer is also similar to PeoplePerHour and Fiverr. If you don’t want to go through the process of posting a job and fielding applications I’d give these sites a try.
Your Turn
Have you worked with Truelancer? If so, please leave a review of your experience below to help others with their decision.
I have tried to get some work from home jobs on Truelancer, but once the person was asking me to contact outside and then demanded some security deposit. I thought they are trying to do scam, hence I decided to not move forward with this freelance website. Also, there are most jobs that pay very little and the site charge some fee.
Truelancer is run by criminals. It’s fake and rip off and it is run by con artists and mofia, these criminals steal money from companies and they would say candidates got the money and cheated you, that’s not true, candidates never get any money, these criminals who work there con and cheat companies and blame the candidates, these criminals will get caught and spend many years in Jail including their CEO, They have written software which monitoring the activity of the companies, I am a software Engineer and I know exactly what they are doing, they are manipulating the rate according to their convenience, their software can block you if you try to send your contact information to the freelancers, I think they also have hired people to write good reviews about their company. I would say its run by Mafia , Looks like the CEO might be an EX mafia guy. Their software is displaying something to the company’s and displaying something else to the free lancers, I know how to do , because I am a software engineer. Basically these are real big time criminals whose main goal is to steal money from companies and get rich, However they will not succeed, Eventually they will get caught their CEO and their employees will be thrown into prison for many years. Investors watch out and be careful your investments will be stolen and wiped out very soon.
I was new to Truelancer.com and I signed in as a Freelancer (Web Developer). From the very next day Truelancer team started spam calling me to upgrade to annual PRO MEMBERSHIP which was around 100$. I tried not to fall for it but then they exaggerated the benefits of annual pro membership which tempted me to opt for it. I was working on a project of 500$ and SUMIT SINGH was the project coordinator assigned for this project on behalf of Truelancer. On completion of the project when the client approved it to be as per his demands this project coordinator deducted 15% of project budget and all that I received was 425$ . But since I had PRO membership Truelancer fee should have been 8% only. For clarification when I contacted their customer support then they said that coordinator can deduct their fee apart from Truelancer fee But this isn’t mentioned anywhere in Truelancer’s rules and regulations. Despite of such unprofessional behavior from them I started working on another project of 1400$ and once again it was SUMIT SINGH as our project coordinator so it was obvious that he’d be charging 15% once again. After the project was completed and successfully approved by the client Truelancer transferred 1190$ to my TL WALLET . After which I requested payout of this amount to my account. The very next day when I didn’t receive the payment I tried to check it on truelancer.com just to realize that my account was banned and I was scammed by them. I had to pay around 500usd to my developer teammate as wages for this project. Spent over a month of hardwork on this project and got nothing .
I lost 100$ of membership fee, 1400$ of project money, 500$ gone as wages and not to forget the extra commission SUMIT SINGH robbed me off.
I wonder what Indian Government is doing and how such scamming websites are still running there.
Very bad choice , developer cant understand the project & gives wrong feedback , i wasted money and time with them , i need my money back
A simple strong advise for you. Please dont waste your energy and money on Truelancer.com. They are money eaters by harrassing for upgradationand even after add on money paying they never do proper services.
Dear friends never go for it….
I have used Truelancer for 1 week or so, and that’s it. They will harass you everyday for upgrading your profile to pro-membership and keep tracking all your bids. If you are a free member, they will call and threaten you saying how your profile can be blocked if you accept bids (the employers here are fake,do not pay and get blocked every other day) of fake employers. Only if you spend money n become a member, they will work in your favour. The rules and regulations are not clear and everything runs on money. A truelancer official even told me that they dont care about my poor ratings given to them, as they have 2lakh happy customers. I wonder how can they say such things. There is zero security. Now when I am seeing the reviews here, I guess I was right.
Very pathetic site..full of cheaters in truelancer..without any reason they will block your account,
I would suggest don’t trust truelancerer
I have been working for some time now, If you are lacking skills, don’t waste every ones time.
I always got the reply from support. won 2 competitions in just 1 month.
getting regular jobs.
Saying the same things as Priya. So, paid & fake review. Tells me also enough about Truelancer.
Never use truelancer.com i have earn and spent money there and when need to ask for my money company block me and eat my 5000 rs . cheater company needs to arrest them and closed the organization.
Never user Truelancer.com !!!
The worst site and worst service that I have seen so far.
I created employer account and hired one developer for my project.
And I gave him money after checking his working.
But the next day, both I and he was blocked from the site by admin.
I was supported about this and requested to reopen my account.
They answered to me that they would reopen my account soon and did not respond anymore.
I will advertise as this site is the worst freelancer site in the world.
One of the worst freelancing platforms out there. Just another money making schemes just like any other money making schemes out there. they charge money every time you send a proposal. dont waste time!
I have been working for some time now, If you are lacking skills, don’t waste every ones time.
I always got the reply from support. won 2 competitions in just 1 month.
getting regular jobs.
yes they have some drawback, like lacking auto completion of order after a certain period of time.
bit unorganized but they will far ahead of any other site in the future.
one of the worst company in the world. Its been 15 days I haven’t received my payment. when I ask for support there is no double replay from them. they will just trick u to deposit for and more money there. one of the bullshit freelancing website..
full of waste
I’ve requested payouts but it’s been 7 days and I have not received.
I personally worked with Truelancer. This website is just full of junk. First I posted a project on which I got useless bids and then I became a seller for my services and that part also full of junk.
– No support available at all
– Your money need someone to approved to get back from truelance and since no one is available so you have to wait
– most of the project are fake and never recieve proper bids
– CEO sitting in USA is also dumboo who is not answering any of the queries asked about services
– About services marketplace : the services provided are not at all genuine. Once you paid and service delivered, you will find after some days they whatever you purchased is actually a illution and rollback you to the initials.
– Service providers, provider, staff, soultions, features are not at all good. Please consider going to a well established one instead of truelance or any other like wise.