PTS News and Commentary - May 27th, 2006
Posted by rabbit on May 27th, 2006
PHOENIXSURF
This excerpt from an update sent out a few days back explains whats going on with this dead dog:
"As a result of the recent events affecting the program, Phoenixsurf has a cash shortage. Our situation is being reviewed by our lawyer. We are working to come up with a strategy to get our members the return of their initial principal purchase less profits taken."
My Comments:
The quick failure of the program can be laid squarely on the backs of the arrogant admins of the program. They came up with a hare-brained idea to abandon e-gold in favour of a debit card only solution for upgrades and payments. Despite reservations by a lot of members, they chose to go ahead any way. This is not the way to treat your customers — especially for a Paid To Surf program that requires new membership upgrades in order to stay afloat. I removed the link from my list completely, and will be adding them to my Dead and Dumped Programs list as soon as I update my spreadsheet to determine my gains.
WIREDSURF
This program is still having problems. They are way behind in payments, and are still blaming Rackspace for their technical problems. I am not sure why a big provider like Rackspace cannot keep their site up. I am also not sure why others using Rackspace (such as Alientrust) are not having the same problems. I am expecting their "we are out of cash due to recent problems" email any day now. I hope I am wrong though, and everyone end up getting paid. The way I see things at this point, even if I get paid, it is doubtful that I will upgrade here again. I now have these guys listed in my "Problems Programs" list.
These guys are humming along very nicely. I am very impressed by the running of the program thus far. Their communication is very good, the admins are very responsive, and most importantly, they pay on time every time. They had some technical issues this week, but did not use it as an excuse not to pay people on time (how refreshing). My only concern with this program to date, is their plans to start their own payment processor (Compactpay) in a few days. I am not a big fan of programs having their own payment processors. All the programs that have tried it in the past have failed. In fact, based on my experiences, programs start to fail as soon as they start running their own payment processor. Still, I will give Compactsurfing the benefit of the doubt for now, and will be watching them closely for any signs of trouble. Right now the vast majority of my Paid To Surf funds (a few thousand) is with Compactsurf. I do not like putting all my eggs into one basket, but right now there is no other Paid to Surf program that can be compared to Compactsurf in my opinion.
This one is still going, and from what I have heard, still paying. They recently switched away from e-gold, and are now using e-bullion and safepay. I just re-activated my ebullion account a few days ago, and updated my profile on the 14DailyPlus site. Thus, I am anticipating a payment some time next week. If I do get paid, I will upgrade again. Still, I am a bit wary of the program, which is why it is still rated a C+ on my PTS list.
ALIENTRUST & BLACKGOLDSURF
I received payment from these programs a few weeks ago, but decided not to bother with them. Alien Trust is still doing ok from what I have heard, but I am not keen on sending my personal information to the folks running the program. I am also not happy that they are now forcing their members to abandon e-gold in favour of a debit card solution for payments and upgrades. I will also add these later to my Dead and Dumped Programs list once I update my spreadsheet to determine my gains/losses.
keywords: phoenixsurf | wiredsurf | compact | 14dailyplus | alien | blackgold | e-gold | e-bullion | safepay