Powerdimes True Face Has Emerged-More Info Added
Written: Oct 05 '00 (Updated Oct 05 '00)
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I just got an email from Powerdime informing me that the new rule is ONE account per household. The first person signed up through your household will keep their account. All other Powerdime household members will lose their accounts. These members will also lose any points accumlated in their individual accounts. Powerdime claims they will not be paid for these accounts from their merchants and thus can not pay their members.
Powerdime goes on to mention fraud by their members i.e. clicking for someone else,multiple accounts. They say their merchants have a special way of tracking the Powerdime members activity. I will attach my copy of the email at the end of this review,they explain their case in a way I just can't.
I don't believe a word Powerdime is saying. They have made a heck alot of money from clicks that they now claim to be invalid. I consider myself and others who click away to be providing a service to these internet reward companies. They are not running these sites out of the goodness of their hearts. This is very profitable. I want my pay. I don't care whether or not they got paid-which I am sure they did however. Whatever financial agreement that was made was between them and their merchants. I know what they promised me for clicking-I WANT PAID. I acknowledge they have a right to "fire" me without notice. Just give me my points or transfer them into the account that is allowed to remain open in my household.
Powerdime was at one time a decent-never impressive-program. It took little effort but took forever to accumlate enough points for a decent gift certificate. They had recently added a gaming option to play Skif for 100 points every ten question set. I had no luck with the game-easy enough trivia questions that could be found on other merchants websites-but was constantly receiving error messages as I was trying to submit the game for me 100 points. I never did receive the points. You can also earn points by shopping through the site,trivia questions-three new ones on a daily basis(mycoupons.com members give you the answers on the rewards board)and responding to different offers-some requiring a purchase and some not. Altogether I could make anywhere from 100-200 points a day because I only do trivia and clickthroughs. I also would respond to no purchase offers. With an Amazon ten dollar gift certificate costing 15,000 it would take a long,long,long time to get a certificate. This program is really no competition for Freeride where I earn a Amazon gift certificate every few days.
I am not usually a vindictive person but I plan to report this to every message board,complaint website, and Attorney General I can think of. I also urge you to do the same if you are affected by this. Internet reward programs MUST be held accountable for their actions. By speaking out I hope we can change these programs for the better and keep the frauds at bay.
Here is the letter received:
At Powerdime, we are constantly exploring new ways to improve our service for both our members and merchants. This has led to a very, very important change in Powerdime policy.
Effective immediately, Powerdime will only allow ONE account per household. This was not an easy decision to make, particularly because we started the site with no household limits whatsoever. Our first policy change allowed for two accounts per household. It became immediately clear, though, that even this policy was being abused by some individuals using two or more accounts, or signing into and using another family member's account.
This "sharing" of accounts is not at all attractive to our merchants. You see, when we enter into an agreement with a merchant, they expect us to deliver high-quality traffic. What exactly does this mean? As an example, let's use dotcomX. If Powerdime members click through to dotcomX 32,000 times in a given month, that is fantastic! However, as soon as dotcomX sees that those 32,000 clicks were only actually 12,000 people, they are very, very reluctant to pay for those clicks. This means that our merchants will not pay for the prizes you want, and this is unfortunate for all of us.
There are other rewards programs that allow more than one account per household. Originally, we did not want to set any household limits, either. We have learned that advertisers are really beginning to pay attention not just to the amount of clicks programs like ours generate, but also what kind of clicks they are. We feel that the only way for Powerdime to continue to grow, to continue to offer trivia questions, to launch our upcoming lottery and radio station, is to pay close attention to what our merchants want.
So how, exactly, does this work from here? For households with more than one account, we will begin disabling all but the account created first. This means that if you joined Powerdime on July 24, and your daughter joined on July 25, your daughter's account would be disabled. We realize that all points earned in those accounts will be lost. However, these points were all generated by taking advantage of offers that we have absolutely no chance of earning a commission on. If our merchants will not pay for prizes, then we cannot possibly pass those prizes along to you.
Thank you very much for your understanding of this need for a policy change. Powerdime has grown due to the complete support of our members. We can only continue to grow our community stronger with your ongoing support. We have many, many new opportunities coming soon to the site, that we sincerely hope you will take advantage of. If you have any questions or comments regarding this change, please contact support@powerdime.com , and allow some extra time for a response as we complete these changes.
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Malcolm Bedell
Director, Member Support
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
sparklesky
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Member: Melissa
Reviews written: 75
Trusted by: 323 members
About Me:
"My heart does not know from logic."
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