Why On Earth Should I Wait 7 Months For A $10 CDNOW Certificate?
Written: Jun 30 '01 (Updated Dec 30 '01)
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The Bottom Line
There are other services out there that are better. Use only as a last resort and only if you are prepared to never get your certificates.
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| Full Review |
Memolink is a service of points for clicks and purchases. Like others, such as Mypoints.com and the now-down Freeride.com, you earn points in a variety of ways: signing up for web services (the big points are for credit cards and other financial services) and purchasing from selected vendors. Lesser points are available for clicking through to sites, signing up for email advertising services, a daily trivia question and others. Supposedly, the points then can be “cashed in” for certificates for a variety of vendors: CDNow, Barnes & Noble, Best Buy and Target, among others. I say supposedly because I requested a $10 CDNow certificate on February 13 and now I am being told that it will be issued by September 1.
I am EXTREMELY dissatisfied with this service due to the length of time between when rewards are earned and certificates issued. I am also dissatisfied with their unresponsive customer service.
First, I’ll list my experiences and why I think you should not join Memolink. Then, I will go through a brief description of the site in order to provide a complete epinion.
Why You Should Not Join Memolink
Excessive length from when certificates are earned before they are issued
My own is now over 4 months without being issued. I am aware of a couple of other epinions members who have waited more than 6 months without the certificates being issued. Incidentally, I cycled through several recent epinions and none of them mentioned actually receiving a reward certificate.
Deteriorating point opportunities and offers
I have not paid much attention to the site after not getting my certificate. However, I did go through the site pretty carefully in order to do this epinion fairly and I noticed a couple of things:
First, fewer point earning opportunities. While most of the shopping points are still available, the points available for signing up for free services, like the defunct X-drive and Ithought among others, are fewer and carry fewer points.
Second, fewer opportunities for use of points and higher amounts are required. There are some but considerably fewer opportunities for $10 certificates.
These two points are chillingly similar to Freeride. The first time after Freeride came down, they came back up with fewer point opportunities and fewer and higher point certificates. However, unlike Memolink, I always got my CDNow certificates from Freeride within a day of when I
requested them.
Terrible customer service
It took me 5 weeks from when I charged my item from LLBean to getting the points credited. I was a little anxious because the LLBean points would put me over the top for the CDNow certificate. After two weeks, I was sending emails to their help desk 2 or 3 times a week. I even called them and the person who answered seemed clueless. I didn’t get an email response until after the points were credited, after several weeks of emails.
More recently, for some reason, I started getting daily quasi-spam emails from Memolink. You know, the ones announcing offers and such. For a long time, I hadn't received any. Well, from June 10 on, I sent several emails asking about my CDNow certifcate. I did not receive a response until June 24 and that was due to an inquiry through Planet Feedback. On my inquiry, I demanded receipt of the certificate by June 28. The response was that I would get the certificate by September 1. I replied that September 1 was not acceptable and received the same response.
So my recommendation on Memolink is Stay Away
Some readers might ask, What if there are points available on a purchase I’m going to make anyway?
My answer is to see if those points are available through one of the other services. I use Ebates and Mypoints. Each seems to be working well, but I haven’t received any cash (Ebates) or certificates (Mypoints) yet. I also check the availability of online coupons, through services like Coolsavings and Couponparadise. If none of those are available on the pending transaction and if the item is available for the lowest price from a vendor that credits Memolink points, then you might want to do it. Just don’t hold your breath waiting for any certificates.
Brief review for those still interested in joining Memolink:
You can sign up at www.memolink.com. You get 100 points for signing up and there are several low-point opportunities for earning points right away - through surveys and opt-in email advertising and through site visits, along with a daily trivia question.
Larger point opportunities are available for shopping and for joining charged-for services, like BMG Records, Columbia Records, FirstUsa Visa, American Express and others. Referral points can also add up - you get 5% of the points earned by your referrals and an additional 2.5% of points earned by your referrals’ referalls.
The points can be used for prizes available from several online and offline vendors, like Barnes and Noble, Amazon.com, Best Buy, Target, Bennigan's and more. My experience is that it takes more than 6 months to get a certificate, so convert your points early and hope for the best!
I have found the site to work well and to be easily navigable. You can navigate through buttons on the top of the page. There are buttons available for various ways of earning points, for prizes and for account history.
Like I said, I do not recommend Memolink.com
If you like mainstream and fusion jazz, check out my web site, www.jazzobsession.com. You’ll find information on my newly-released CD, The Power of Two by John Temmerman's Jazz Obsession Quartet. It is available through Amazon.com and www.cdbaby.com. I have a special discount available on sales through my web site. Come on by!
Recommended:
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About the Author
Member: John Temmerman
Location: near Chicago, Illinois
Reviews written: 698
Trusted by: 349 members
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