How to close an hourly project suspended by a client on Upwork without damaging reputation and JSS?

Question

Freelance

Short description:
Worked for a month on an hourly project on Upwork with a client from France. At the end of the month of work, the client suspended the contract, that is, put it on pause, arguing that we had not achieved results. And at the same time, he did not ask to return the money, and the amount is not small - $1k+. Several months have passed, and the contract has not yet been closed. I've listed a few options below. What do you advise?
Full description:
Initially, we agreed with a client from France on long-term cooperation during our first Skype interview and that there are no deadlines, just take it and work. Our working communication did not take place directly with the Frenchman, but through a manager from another country, who actually led this project and reported to the client. And to be honest, there was always a feeling of a broken phone, and I often did not receive answers to my questions addressed to the Frenchman.
As I understand it, the Frenchman was constantly busy working in some company or in his own business, so we did not work directly. As a hobby, he decided to create his own mobile application, and I had to prepare it for publication in various Android stores and promote it. In reality, when I first saw the application, it was raw, with a lot of bugs, and most importantly, that it violated the copyrights of music, that is, it was pirated in the eyes of Google Market. Therefore, there was only one way - alternative Android stores.
I received a more or less working version of the application in the 4th week of work and was glad that I finally had something to publish and promote. But, when the last week of the month ended, I was even more surprised. The client, through his manager, conveyed that he wants to suspend the contract, since we have almost no downloads of the application. And this despite the fact that the task was not to get any number of app downloads per month.
In general, several months have passed, the project is still on pause from the client, and I want to close it without damaging my reputation and JSS. Or with minimal damage.
After reading the Toaster, the Upwork Forum, and the Upwork FAQ, I realized that I have these options:
First situation: I close the contract myself and do not say anything to the client
A)The client ignores this and does NOT leave a bad review, but this will affect the JSS
B) The client leaves a bad review (it is unlikely that he will be happy about this and his opinion will change in 3 months). Turns out I'm getting a bad review and a JSS downvote. Later it will be possible to make a Refund, but give $1k+ for the fact that my bad review will disappear and N-number of hours I don’t think it’s rational.
By the way, if you do a Refund after closing the contract, will it affect the JSS?
Second situation:I am writing to a client on Upwork with a proposal to close the contract and leave positive feedback. In return, I offer 1 week of free work. Also, I suggest leaving a 5+ review for him, which will help him find new freelancers. The peculiarity is that the client has been on Odesk / Upwork for many years and has not a single review from freelancers, but for that he himself sculpts 3-point reviews for all freelancers without comment.
Points A) and B) are the same as in the first situation.
C) The client agrees to my offer to work for free and leave positive feedback for this. It will be possible to ask him to take a screenshot of the review, so that for sure. This is probably the ideal option for me, but I don't know how realistic it is.
What do you think about my situation and what option should I choose to solve the situation?
Thank you very much in advance!

Answer 1

It is enough just to contact the client and discuss this issue without asking questions on the toaster, it is faster

Answer 2

"Don't be dashing while it's quiet"
What is the actual problem?
Why close a project suspended by a client?
Let yourself hang further.

Answer 3

Does self-closing a project affect JSS negatively? O_O Oh damn...

Answer 4

Now the situation is similar:
The customer created a project with hourly pay, I worked for a week and these hours were fully paid, but at the end of the week the customer asked for all the sources and asked for a timeout. Sources in the base camp, there is also a discussion of the timeout. Now I have an open project hanging. How terrible is it for the rankings that in an hourly project, days go by without working hours? How to solve this if the customer does not get in touch?

Answer 5

contact the client, if it doesn't work out, close it yourself, long-hanging work without activity harms jss