Click here for the latest update (4/29).
I know all of NetWinner’s members would like some sort of update but there isn’t much to tell and what I do have isn’t good.
First of all, yesterday a NetWinner member named Sue called the number on her Ecount card to find out the status of her payment and was told by Jessica, an Ecount manager, that NetWinner had not sent them any funds since March 13.
Second, on Friday two NW forum posters reported receiving emails from NetWinner requesting copies of their IDs by fax in order to process their raffle prize. This isn’t all that unusual and has been done occasionally in the past. HOWEVER, the company committed a huge privacy violation by sending out the email by publicly addressing (versus BCC’ing) the message to what was described as around fifty member email addresses.
Third, members need to be aware that the site’s Terms of Service have been changed in regards to referral earnings. Formerly, members would receive 100 points for referring a friend, then another 400 after the friend completed 100 game plays. Now, that has been changed to be after their friend wins 100 contest entries. You do still get 10% of your friends’ winnings, but if you didn’t notice, now that the 10-point prize has been removed, you don’t get anything if your friend gets the most likely win, a raffle entry.
What can players, some waiting nearly six months for their payments, do about the situation? Here are some suggestions, proposed by fellow players, an attorney friend of mine, and yours truly:
1. File a complaint with the Attorney General for the state of North Carolina. The instructions on how to do this are here. If you have a printer, you can print the complaint form here. It includes their mailing address and a toll-free number, 1-877-566-7226. I’m not sure if they accept complaints by phone; I confirmed that they definitely don’t accept them online, so mail may be your only method.
2. File a complaint with the BBB for Charlotte, NC. Start your complaint process here and it will redirect you to the Charlotte BBB. Note that the BBB “does not act as a collection agency.” They do, however, “work closely with local, state and federal law enforcement agencies,” should they determine that fraud is involved.
3. File a complaint with the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, Division of Marketing Practices. Their website is here, and you can file a complaint here. I think this would need to be complaints along the lines of, they advertised one thing and that’s not how it worked.
4. Contact the local (Charlotte, NC) media. Wikipedia says that TV station WBTV “is the largest television news department between Washington and Atlanta,” so they may be the best ones to approach. Information on how to contact them (including their assurance of confidentiality) is here, or go straight to the story tip submission form here.
5. Contact Ecount. Last year, members of the Freeride rewards program waiting for Ecount GCs called Ecount directly, and they were able to tell the members whether the delay was due to the rewards program not paying Ecount, versus some other reason like the program sending Ecount an old email address for the member, or the member’s ISP blocking Ecount’s email. You can contact Ecount at 1-800-522-7458.
To read other members’ experiences with NetWinner, including the latest payment (or non-payment) reports, you can visit their forum at NetWinnerCentral.com.
Lastly, as an aside, do you remember the video about the NetWinner Fairy? Take note of the costume and the background (red walls, white paneling). I found these other videos interesting: “Netwinner Dog LOL,” “This is how we stamp our mail! LOL,” “bright eyes crazy dancing,” “eyes,” and www.netwinner.com Dogs!!! sooooo cute!!!.” I think these show behind the scenes at NetWinner far better than the “Spin Report” PR video released a few days ago.
{ 20 comments }
Thanks so much for keeping us updated on the facts reguarding netwinner.
wow very informative update. i really found the video’s very informative. seems like all were taken at the same place. if that was the netwinner offices i can now understand why the prizes are so late . to much time spent dancing with the dogs and to little time performing work to get the prizes out. i also found the suggestions helpful i have already followed a few of these and will look into the othersas well. who knows perhaps there is a attorney that just loves this sort of stuff and would handle it pro-bono.
If that wasn’t enough to get your haunches up, check out this girl:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=98718055
Scroll down until you see what her job is, which company she lists and how much she makes.
The more I see of this site, the more and more, it looks like a variation of the Ponzi Scheme.
thecommittee,
That person no longer works for Netwinner and hasn’t in quite some time and I guarantee that you cant go by what people say on a My Space account about how much a person makes for a living.
This is in no way to start a argument or anything i just want to set the record straight.
Quite frankly, Shelly we don’t care who is or isn’t employed with Netwinner. We leave that concern to the prosecutors when and if Netwinner faces trial. All we care about at the moment is that they pay their members and that they’re taken off the net where they can no longer scam innocent people.
John D is correct in that its nothing more than a variation of a pyramid or ponzi scheme where new money is used to pay old debts. In this case the new money has either dried up or any income derived from advertisers has been misappropriated all along.
Wish we could stay and chat longer but we’ve got some complaints to file!
Thanks so much for the informative articles on Netwinner. It sure explains a lot. I don’t think it’s safe for any Netwinner members to post in the NW forum (accounts might be deleted, which could result in not being paid… not that they are paying now, but it’s nice to still have the chance to be paid), and Mike and the other Netwinner lackeys turn my stomach with their lies and stall tactics. At this point I see no reason to argue with them about anything. I already filed with the BBB and will follow through with the other suggestions today.
Thanks again!
Thanks for keeping everyone informed and for digging up the links. It was quite eye-opening and a great reminder that things are not always as they appear, especially on the internet. Even the staff of Ghost Hunters are more professional than those clowns.
the players of netwinner should call and ask ecount if they are affiated with netwinner because i was told and so were others that ecount is no longer affilated with netwinner so the players should call ecount and ask if they are affilated with netwinner and see what they are told….the others that called has an ecount card already but were told they would not be able to get reloaded because they are no longer affilated with netwinner…. dont believe me call ecount and ask if they are affilated… maybe me and a few others were told wrong by different people at ecount… my friend posted this info at netwinner but got the post deleted by the mods there…
Ah, hog wash. Who here is still getting referrals I can use some more if you do not need any yourself.
While I applaud you for keeping current information available, I think it’s time people realize they are wasting their time. Netwinner either does not have, or chooses not to pay, monies owed. If you continue to watch the forum there, what is most noticeable is the lack of posts by people who actually work for netwinner. Once very verbal in their defense, mjp has chosen to lurk in the shadows and make absolutely no effort to address the problems of fulfillment. I think this shows very clearly the company has no intention of resolving these issues. Shame on you all for behaving so cowardly.
I was also asked for 2 pieces of i.d. a while back — I was stupid enough to fax my drivers licence and then compliance asked me to clairify the numbers that i had blocked out!! The name and adress was very clear, but I see no reason for NW having my DL# — all this because I was hoping for the 225$ I earned. If tht is not the biggest invasion of privacy…I posted the e-mail thread and was very quickly banned ad my ISP adress “disbled”. , so I can no longer even access the board. I m sure that this information will help the BBB!
Despicable behavior. All the lies and deceit, but what can you expect when you look at the owners, their office behavior. I would be embarrassed to have my name associated with netwinner. And now mike, who proclaimed himself to be administrator of their forum has simply stopped communicating with players altogether. Perhaps he has already been terminated? If not, he has clearly dug in and sided with the company in their decision to stop paying their players. I hope everyone here has, as I have, filed complaints at all the above addresses. Hopefully, though we will never receive money they owe us, we can put a stop to them cheating anyone else.
Here is some contact info for Netwinner!
Hopefully this is help to some people.
The AdverGame Network
Steve Goldberg, Director of Communications
704-904-8849; steve.goldberg@netwinner.com or
Matt Coapman, V.P. of Business Development
980-253-3301; matt.coapman@netwinner.com
http://finance.myfoxnewmexico.com/www.shannonhurley.com?GUID=4712328&Page=MediaViewer&ChannelID=3191
Just to throw another possible avenue for exposure of these con-people,, Tom Martino, a well-noted radio talk show host who really despises companies crawling up on peoples’ back and “taking some”. You can fill out a complaint form via his website: http://www.troubleshooter.com
good luck all,,,, I bet Ken Lay is applauding these people from the grave for watching his how-to video
Well, I was strongly reprimanded this morning for asking a rather benign question, benign that is, if things were aboveboard. I see it raised some hackles. When asked how many referals someone had, and whether the page they display would be changed due to false advertising, I was accused of making personal attacks and not being considerate of their feelings.
I have news for whomever felt slighted about my posts. The last thing I care about right now are the emotions of those involved with perpetuating Netwinner’s widescale fraud. Go ahead and scamper around deleting members, posts and threads, it doesn’t matter. The evidence is in the internet’s archives….a blatant, expansive, mind-boggling trail of manipulation and deception for anyone to find, and for anyone to capture if they’re so inclined.
Many of you have had ample opportunity to cease actively promoting the site yet you’ve aggressively defended it while making vain attempts to silence those who speak out. The time is now to do the right thing. If you choose to do otherwise then don’t say you haven’t been warned.
If it looks like fraud, acts like fraud, smells like fraud, well then the odds are that it is fraud. I am feeling really utter happiness that this scam is being exposed for the true dispicable sham of a site that it is. I have great compassion for the folks that are owed so much money and will likely never ever see it.
For those of you who are owed money and you have gone longer than 30 days, WAKE UP! HELLO??????????? Are you listening?????????? It has been proven time and time and time again that if a site is going to pay, they will pay and you won’t have a problem. Those sites that don’t take care of your redemption inside of 30 days are ALL likely never ever going to pay you. Don’t even get hooked up with a site who tells you up front they’ll pay in 90 days. THAT is a bad business model and you should RUN! At the first non-payment, get out! That is my best advice! Do not spend your good time giving a site that doesn’t pay the time of day.
If it seems to good to be true, remember it probably is. Some sites may give you a payment or two if they have some great recruiters in the mix. They’ll pay as long as the member count is growing and the payments are rolling in. At some point, when the income stream is flowing in, they’ll almost always stop paying if it is a scam site and you’ll experience your first delayed payout.
LISTEN TO YOUR GUT! If you aren’t being paid, move on. If you are needing the funds you “might” earn, move on and spend your time on a site that is more reputable.
Last, don’t sit around and wait for Becky to give you permission to dump a site or even suggest it. Dump them yourselves. She has far more good sites she can refer you to and I am sure she’d love for you to visit and use them. I know I would. Becky and I both have loads of sites of all sorts listed between our two sites. There is a huge variety to choose from and either of us would be delighted for you to be in either of our downlines. This is the great part of our partnership. We may duplicate some sites but there are plenty that one of us just has no interest in and the other one does.
I am totally amazed at some of the info I am reading. So just how deep does all of this mess go? Who are these people? What have they done in the past? Do they have a past of scamming? Are they reputable? What kind of experience do they have in this business?
I fear these folks are going to fall hard and that a lot of folks who are innocent in it all will be hurt.
Ginger
The best way to expose these cons is to contact the companies who are paying them, and drive them to http://www.netwinnercentral.com, and to this page…i for one will stop buying from companies who are promoted by NW until they pull their ads…get NW where they got us, right in the pocketpook!
i thought those videos were very enlightening, i wonder if that was our fulfillment person stamping the mail or was she the one throwing the big blue ball for the dogs? lol
i just started reading the posts here yesterday but i haven’t seen anyone mention that ‘lots of changes’ thread and how when people started asking mike direct questions that he didn’t want to answer the mods all of a sudden started ‘reorganizing’ the forum and moving threads around and somehow that ‘lots of changes’ thread got lost, what a shame
one thing that struck me as really odd, one of the dogs in the nw office was named diesel and i remembered that we had a forum member named mydiesel that said diesel was her dog (according to her profile she is 51 yrs old and lives in canada), i thought diesel was a very unusual name for a dog and i just thought that was quite a coincidence….or something…
Please note that NetWinnerCentral was changed today to require people to register for an account before they can see any of the content of the forum. One can only assume this is because they want to have control over who can see what’s posted there.
It only takes a few seconds to register for an account on their forum. If you haven’t done so, please take the time.
http://www.NetWinnerCentral.com
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