Module: Freelancer (freelancer / freelance)
Status: 🟢 Production (escrow-based; small real volume) · Last validated: 2026-09-06 · Priority: P0
Project marketplace: clients post projects, freelancers bid, work runs under milestone escrow. Validated against classs/FreelancerModule.php + schema.
A. Purpose
Clients hire freelancers; payment held in escrow, released per milestone. Revenue = 5% commission (platform_commission_settings.setting_key='freelance_order'; 2 processed rows in commission_transactions for order_table='flancer_escrows', 2026-09-06 — corrected from an earlier count of 1, a moving snapshot on an actively-tested environment).
B. Actors
Client; freelancer; admin. Enrollment freelance.
C. Entry points
/freelance.php, /freelance_bids.php. Also freelance_service.php (classs/FreelanceServiceModule.php, 41 lines) — correction: this is not a separate third implementation with its own tables; it is a 41-line backward-compatible façade that extends FreelancerModule (:13) and has no tables of its own — it shares FreelancerModule's real tables. Its own overridden methods (bookService :24, listServiceCategories :32, createService :37) are non-functional stubs that return "not available" / empty results, kept only so legacy pages calling them don't fatal. Treat it as a deprecated compatibility shim, not a data source — do not cite it for feature/table claims.
E. Feature registry (prefix FREE-)
| ID | Feature | Actor | Method | Tables | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FREE-001 | Freelancer profile | freelancer | getProfile/saveProfile :463/:475 | profile | 🟢 |
| FREE-002 | Create project | client | createProject :553 | flancer_projects | 🟢 |
| FREE-003 | Browse open projects | freelancer | browseOpenProjects :1090 | flancer_projects | 🟢 |
| FREE-004 | Submit bid | freelancer | submitBid :1253 | flancer_bids | 🟢 |
| FREE-005 | Project status / lifecycle | client | setProjectStatus :1002, closeProject :1190 | flancer_projects | 🟢 |
| FREE-006 | Milestone escrow | system | (escrow) | flancer_escrows, flancer_milestones | 🟢 (money) |
F. Flow
freelance.php → createProject(client) :553 → flancer_projects (open)
→ freelancers submitBid :1253 → flancer_bids
→ client awards → escrow funded (flancer_escrows) → milestones (flancer_milestones)
→ milestone approved → release → freelancer wallet + 5% commission + central ledger (module_key='freelancer')
→ closeProject :1190G. Data model (2026-09-06)
flancer_projects 8 · flancer_bids 4 · flancer_escrows 3 · flancer_milestones 2.
H. Financial impact
Milestone escrow (mirror of the Services escrow pattern). Wallet-first, 5% commission on release, central finance ledger. See ../../40-financial/. Note: the escrow-funding debit/credit pair (classs/FreelancerModule.php:2002 client debit, :2039 credit into CLASSIFIED_ESCROW_BUCKET_USER_ID) does not pass an acct_purpose in $meta, so both movements fall through to WalletModule::journalAccountsFor()'s historical default mapping (classs/WalletModule.php:952-983): the client's debit is journaled USER_WALLET_LIABILITY → REVENUE_GENERAL (booked as recognised revenue) rather than as an escrow-liability movement, even though the funds are only being held pending milestone approval. Same gap as Food/Hotels/Events — see those pages and this audit's cover report.
K. State machine
Project: open → awarded → in_progress → completed → closed / cancelled. Escrow per milestone: funded → released | refunded.
L / M / N
Errors: FREE-E001 escrow not released (milestone not approved). Depends on wallet, commission, escrow. Change-impact: escrow release affects held funds — re-test milestone release + commission.