Review Guidelines

Client Scout exists so freelancers can share honest, first-hand accounts of what it is like to work with a client - and so other freelancers can make better-informed decisions. These guidelines are the rules every review must follow. You accept them when you set up your reviewer pseudonym, you confirm them every time you submit a review, and you will be asked to accept them again if they change.

Reviews on Client Scout are the personal opinions and reported experiences of individual reviewers. They are not statements of fact by Freelance Mentors, and we do not verify or endorse their contents.

1. Who may write a review

You may review a client only if all of the following are true:

• You personally worked with the client as a freelancer or independent contractor - your review describes your own direct, first-hand professional experience, not something you heard from someone else.
• The engagement was real: work was agreed, performed, or substantively begun. Sales conversations that never became an engagement do not qualify.
• You are reviewing from your own account, under your own pseudonym, on your own behalf.

You may not submit a review if any of the following apply:

• You own, are employed by, or are otherwise affiliated with the business being reviewed, or with a competitor of that business.
• You were offered payment, a discount, or any other incentive in exchange for the review - positive or negative.
• You are submitting on behalf of another person.
• You are re-reviewing an engagement you have already reviewed. One review per engagement. You may review the same client again after a new, separate engagement (a different completion period), subject to a short waiting period between reviews of the same client. If something about an engagement you already reviewed changes — for example an unpaid invoice is later paid — update that review (see §9) rather than submitting a new one.

2. The truthfulness affirmation

Every submission requires you to affirm that your review is truthful. By submitting, you affirm that:

• Every factual statement in your review is accurate to the best of your knowledge and based on your direct experience.
• Every opinion you express is genuinely held.
• Your dimension ratings reflect your honest assessment of the engagement.
• Any payment-status report describes the situation as of the date you submit the review. If you report unpaid invoices, that means "unpaid as of my review date" - if the situation later changes materially, we encourage you to update your review.

Submitting a review you know to be false or misleading is a serious violation of these guidelines and may expose you to legal liability (see §7).

3. What belongs in a review

The most useful reviews are specific, factual, and professional. Describe what actually happened:

• How the client communicated, and how organized the engagement was.
• How scope was defined and how scope changes were handled.
• Whether timelines and expectations were realistic.
• How and when you were paid relative to the agreed terms.
• How you were treated as a professional.

State facts you can support, clearly present opinions as your own ("I felt…", "In my experience…"), and keep the review about the working relationship.

4. What is not allowed

Reviews containing any of the following will be rejected or removed:

• Fabricated, secondhand, or exaggerated accounts - anything that fails the affirmation in §2.
• Unsupported accusations of crimes or illegal conduct. Describe what happened factually ("invoices from March remained unpaid as of this review") rather than characterizing it legally ("this company is committing fraud").
• Private personal information about any individual: home addresses, personal phone numbers, non-public email addresses, financial details, health information, or the contents of private communications. This applies with particular force when the client is a sole trader or individual - review the professional engagement, not the person's private life.
• Harassment, threats, hate speech, or attacks on anyone's personal characteristics.
• Confidential information you are bound not to disclose - material covered by an NDA or similar obligation. You are responsible for knowing what your agreements allow you to say.
• Extortion or leverage - submitting, threatening, or offering to alter or remove a review to extract payment or concessions from anyone.
• Spam, advertising, or self-promotion, including links to your own services.
• Off-topic content unrelated to your professional engagement with the client.

5. Pseudonymity - what it protects, and what it does not

Your reviews are published under your chosen pseudonym. Your pseudonym is never publicly linked to your identity: no public page, profile, or review on this platform connects your pseudonym to your name, email, or account.

You should understand the limits of that protection:

• Pseudonymous is not anonymous. Freelance Mentors knows which account holds which pseudonym - that link is required to operate the platform.
• We may be legally required to disclose it. A valid subpoena, court order, or other lawful legal process can compel us to identify a reviewer. We cannot promise that your identity will never be revealed, and you should write every review with that understanding.
• Your own details can identify you. If you describe a project that only one freelancer worked on, the client may recognize you regardless of your pseudonym. Consider how much project detail to include, particularly for small clients.

6. Moderation

Every review is screened by a human moderator before it is published. You should know what moderation does and does not mean:

• Moderators screen for compliance with these guidelines only. They do not - and cannot - verify whether the events you describe actually happened.
• Approval is not endorsement. A published review means it passed guideline screening, nothing more. It remains your statement, not ours.
• Moderators never rewrite your words. If part of a review violates these guidelines, it is either redacted with a clearly visible marker, returned to you for revision and re-submission, or rejected.
• Freelance Mentors may decline to publish, or may remove, any content at any time at its discretion, as described in the Terms of Service.

7. Your responsibility for what you write

You are the author of your review and you are legally responsible for it. Freelance Mentors provides the platform; it does not adopt, verify, or stand behind the contents of any review. Your responsibilities — including your responsibility for claims arising from what you publish — are set out in the Terms of Service.

Violations of these guidelines may result in rejection or removal of reviews, loss of review privileges, or account-level action.

8. After publication: disputes and changes

Businesses can claim their profile and dispute reviews they believe are unfair or inaccurate:

• A disputed review normally stays public with a visible disputed indicator while the dispute is resolved.
• In limited cases - a dispute filed by the business's verified representative, or one raising legal allegations - a review may be temporarily hidden pending resolution.
• As part of a dispute resolution you may be asked to revise your review; revised reviews go back through moderation.
• Dispute outcomes are limited to restoring, redacting (with visible markers), or removing the review - no one, including our staff, rewrites your words.

9. Questions, removal requests, and legal notices

• If you are a reviewer and want to update or remove your own review, you can do so from your account, or contact us for help.
• If you are the subject of a review - or anyone else with a legal concern about published content - you do not need an account to reach us. Contact [email protected], which is also linked from every client profile.
• Our handling of your personal data, including the account–pseudonym link, is described in the Privacy Policy.

10. Changes to these guidelines

These guidelines are versioned. If we change them in any meaningful way, you will be asked to read and accept the new version before submitting your next review. The version you accepted, and when, is recorded with each acceptance.