The major obstacle that keeps customers rather skeptical towards an advance payment is the fact that they are sending money to a stranger. The customer has only just met their contractor, and whatever conversations they had may not guarantee the customer knows their freelancer well and doesn’t yet know if they can be trusted. Overseas freelancers seem to be the most ‘suspicious’ when it comes to advance payments. Understandably. it is nearly impossible to return money sent abroad.
Yet the reason why freelancers request advance payments is quite clear, too. This is their way to take no chances of being scammed into free work. There is always a potential that a freelancer spends their time and effort on a project – only to see their customer give up their partnership and refuse to pay. That’s why experienced freelancers either ignore such customers all together or refuse projects if customers are point blank against advance payments.
Naturally, it is possible to find specialists who are ready to work without any upfront payments, but most commonly they are either newbies or low-qualification unoccupied specialists. If you choose to work with them, your overall project quality may suffer.
Occasionally, an advance payment is necessary to buy resources for the projects (for example, a software). Naturally, freelancers won’t spend their own money to complete a project. Paying freelancers then must begin slightly prior to the actual project beginning.