Our own product
Open Lance: a marketplace that charges freelancers nothing
Freelance marketplaces take between five and twenty percent of what a freelancer earns, and hold the money for days after the client has already approved the work. We built the version that does neither, then had to make the economics work without the commission everyone else depends on.
- Client
- Brilliant Systems, in-house product
- Timeline
- Live at openlance.io
- Built with
- Escrow ledger, milestone state machine, instant payouts
The problem
Both sides of a marketplace are asked to trust first.
A freelancer starts work on a promise that the client has the money and will pay. A client pays out on a promise that the work will arrive. Whichever side moves first is exposed, and the platform usually charges both of them for the privilege.
The standard fix is commission, which funds the dispute process but is charged on every job whether or not anything goes wrong. On a long engagement it becomes the largest single deduction a freelancer faces.
Bidding systems compound it. When proposal credits scale with contract value, the freelancers who can afford to bid on big work are the ones who already have money.
Where the money is
Committed before the work, released on approval.
The whole design turns on this sequence. Because the money moves into escrow before anything begins, neither side has to trust the other for the job to be safe, and the platform does not need a commission to fund that guarantee.
-
1
Funded
The client funds the milestone before any work starts. The money leaves their account and sits in escrow.
-
2
In progress
The freelancer works knowing the budget is committed rather than promised.
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3
Approved
The client reviews and approves. Approval is the trigger, not an invoice.
-
4
Released
Funds move to the freelancer, in full. No commission is deducted at any point.
The product
What it actually looks like.
openlance.io
openlance.io
openlance.io
openlance.io
What we did
Move the money first, and stop charging for the work.
-
01
Escrow before anything starts
The client funds the milestone before work begins. The money leaves their account and sits in escrow, so the freelancer can see it is committed rather than promised.
-
02
Approval is the trigger
Release happens when the client approves, not when an invoice is raised and chased. The state machine has one path from funded to released and no manual step in the middle.
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03
Zero commission as a platform rule
The freelancer keeps one hundred percent. Revenue comes from optional paid tiers rather than from a cut of somebody else’s labour, which was the whole point of building it.
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04
One flat bid, any job size
A proposal costs the same whether the contract is worth two hundred dollars or twenty thousand, so reputation decides who wins rather than who can afford to bid.
Every marketplace says it is on the freelancer’s side. The test is what it deducts.
Outcome
What it proves.
The trust problem is solvable without a commission
Escrow plus approval-triggered release removes the need for either party to move first, and it costs the platform nothing per transaction to guarantee.
Instant payout is an engineering choice
The clearance wait most platforms impose is a treasury decision rather than a technical constraint. Where both parties agree to instant release, funds move on approval.
We run our own product on the same rules
It is the clearest statement we can make about how we think platforms should treat the people doing the work.
Next step
Talk to the engineer who would run your build.
No discovery call with a salesperson, no deck. A senior engineer reads what you send and replies with a real assessment, including when we think you shouldn’t build it.
