Gratis is not a scam ! …but did it become a lottery?

First thing off, sorry for the long post, but I need to get into some details here. Just pass if you’re tired.

Although I’m a still a 10/13 STV not shipped for the freeipods deal and I miss one completed referral for freephotoipods (one of them being on hold), I’m willing to take a risk with this post and, I hope, help people who’ve been put on hold, don’t know why, and don’t know if the hold will ever be lifted. I’ll take that risk because

1) I think (although I hope I’m mistaken) there might be something seriously wrong with Gratis HOLD policy

2) I completed enough deals for free stuff with OfferCentric to risk getting labeled an “ungrateful @#%$” or getting banned here (or both), or even be put on HOLD myself by Gratis because they don’t like the point I’m raising here (my understanding though is that they don’t come over here too often now, but here again, although I’m not masochistic, I hope I’m wrong). (oh, and please note I’m not affiliated with OfferCentric in any way, although I wish I were so that I could know in advance when they release their upcoming Nintendo DS and PSP deals…)

So, we all know that Gratis deals are no scams and that there are plenty of people who completed their requirements and received neat expensive items for free, but it seems to me that the way Gratis put people on hold (especially for the new freephotoipods deal) might transform their whole business into something that is more akin to a lottery. Let me get this straight first even if this is indeed a lottery, I don’t have a fundamental problem with it, when people get stuff from them, it’s still for free and it’s still very nice. But I feel like they should now say somewhere “Join, complete an offer, get X people to do the same and [bc3f91093df]you might get a chance[/bc3f91093df] to receive a Y for free”.

Now, here’s why I think they should change the way they present their deals, or at least, [bc3f91093df]we[/bc3f91093df] should change our understanding of what these deals are. I know two people who got their account put on hold for the freephotoipods deal and I’m inclined to believe that they’re not guilty of any fraudulent activity (I’m taking a risk here too because I can’t know that for sure. If it turns out they did, well, shame on me, and everyone here takes 1 off my karma). I read on the forum here that the same thing happened to other people as well and that they used the faqs to contact Gratis and received an automated answer, like the two I’m talking about did. But, and this is where the lottery seems to be, in some cases the hold is lifted without an explanation a couple days later, in others it remains there and there’s no sign that it will ever go away. Please note that I’m not asking why the hold is not lifted in these cases. Indeed, it’s stated clearly somewhere in Gratis faqs that [quotec3f91093df]Please note, we hold the right NOT to tell you why you are on hold for
proprietary reasons.[/quotec3f91093df]. (Sorry I can’t put a direct link to it, but any link pointing to a specific faq redirects you to the faqs main menu. It would be nice if they could change that so that we can help people who run into problems).

What I’d like to point to is that this rule enables Gratis to freely decide who’s going to get a free item, and who’s not, and this regardless of any proven fraudulent activity. In this situation, I really don’t see what can prevent Gratis from giving away as little free items as it is necessary for them to send so that the number of items they ship remains worth less than what they get from the companies they advertise for. That way, they can keep making profit and there is still proof around that their deals are not scams.

Now, let me make this clear again, Gratis shouldn’t been bashed for having such a rule, they send expensive items for free to some of the people who complete all the requirements, and thus their “customers” can hardly consider themselves to be in any position to question the rules they devised. What I’m saying is that, if there’s an arbitrary use of the hold policy, we should be aware of it, and more importantly, we should let the people we refer know about it in advance and tell them there’s a chance they’ll be put on hold randomly and indefinitely.

If there still are Gratis people reading the posts here and who run into this one, here’s y message to them (and I’m sorry it seems I have no other way of contacting them) please clear up for us what your procedure to put people on hold is, and let us know if there’s anything that can be done other than filling out a form and receiving an automated answer if we believe we’ve been put on hold wrongly. I believe everyone would benefit from such a clarification, Gratis and their “customers” alike.

i concur

it just seems like us new yorkers/east coasters are taking longer to get the goods (

[quoted3fa49b73b="Oldfashionedhussy"]it just seems like us new yorkers/east coasters are taking longer to get the goods ([/quoted3fa49b73b]


werd

[quotec852e75823="Oldfashionedhussy"]it just seems like us new yorkers/east coasters are taking longer to get the goods ([/quotec852e75823]

which is ironic because Gratis is based out of DC and the goods are shipped from East of the Mississippi for the most part.

please note I'm not complaining about getting the goods. I'm questioning Gratis' hold policy here.

I'm 10/13 STV but I'm still being very patient with that. And I will remain patient as long as Gratis doesn't decide to put a hold on my account. I just read about someone who was STV and got a hold on his account yesterday... Which makes me think more and more there's something wrong going on and that more and more people are concerned. How many we didn't hear about now?

ditto. i think when and if i get my ipod, i'm not going to try for any other gratis offers. it'd be worth the work if not for the wait and the uncertainty, but given those two things, it's not worth it.

[quoteb46b7b4066="Oldfashionedhussy"]it just seems like us new yorkers/east coasters are taking longer to get the goods ([/quoteb46b7b4066]

Well, that does seem like it might have more to do with how Fedex does things, but we'll never know because Gratis will never take 10 seconds to tell us.

10th is completely right on this hold policy though. That, combined with their policy of canned emails is the groundwork for OfferCentric to become number one. All OfferCentric has to do is keep customer service their top priority and they almost can't fail. They could be backed up for months at a time and take weeks to credit an offer but I at least, would be relatively okay with it as long as there are open lines of communication. If I could just know why the delays are taking so long and why so many STVs are being placed on hold, I would feel much more comfortable about Gratis. As of now, I feel kinda guilty about asking friends to sign up for Gratis's offers because I'd hate for them to get stuck on hold for no reason only to have Gratis blow them off when they try to get out of it. And of course, no one will ever sign up if I give them the "lottery" disclaimer ahead of time by myself.

or, I just thought about this, they put people on hold for an undecided period of time because they would be backorders. That would be more optimistic for we could hope to see holds lifted when there are more items in stock.

I don't know, I'm just looking for a bright side here.

l0th.. i think u read my post...
lolol

i was stv 10/22
and was put on hold.. just yesterday... 11/10... so yeah... sux =(

[quoteb4f9713dde="l0th"]or, I just thought about this, they put people on hold for an undecided period of time because they would be backorders. That would be more optimistic for we could hope to see holds lifted when there are more items in stock.

I don't know, I'm just looking for a bright side here.[/quoteb4f9713dde]

Sadly, that would be a bright side. Its totally shady and totally shatters their reputation however. They should at least have a "pending hold" stage before "hold" where people get a chance to explain themselves and ask questions, at least for the less obviously fraudulent cases where everything seems to line up according to their own terms.

I think people already get a chance to explain their situation. What's unfortunate is that it looks like nobody's reading their explanation. And if I'm right, it doesn't really matter to Gratis who's justified and who's not.

well said l0th.

i've been saying something similar myself ever since i noticed the increasing number of people on hold for photoipods as of late, myself included. i know, for fact, i've done nothing wrong or against the tos. i've completed 2 other gratis offers successfully, 4 offercentrics, prizecube, sound dock etc.

the on-hold mission which has seem to appear as of late, actually has some beginings to look like a method to increase profit margin.

its not a lottery, the select few that get picked to receive the photoipod "prove" its still not a scam. after that, its all cake for gratis.

in any case.
my only course of action from this point on is to use the many other companies running these types of promotions. there are two other courses of action which could reflect directly poorly on gratis, but ill keep those to myself for now.

cheers.

My boss is away in DC at the moment. I should've asked him to do me a little favor twisted

[quote4e4d1711f4]My boss is away in DC at the moment. I should've asked him to do me a little favor[/quote4e4d1711f4]

shock what are you talking about?

i think this is how this works. let say gratis get $20 per referral

so you sign up and your friends sign up. complete 11 offers. guess what gratis only has $220.

now if your freinds get 1 more person to sign up under each of them. guess what gratis still falls short by about a $100.

now those people get 10 more people to sign up. gratis makes about $100 but these might be counted as sunk costs.

if you get enough referrals and your freinds get enough referrals you will not be put on hold. i.e gratis makes enough money.

also the whole backordered thing is bullshit. they simply wait 2 months to get their money from advertisers. they claim $4 million of stuff has been shipped. i doubt anyone is going to give them a $4 million credit line. so basically they wait for their money to come.

I am sticking to offer centric for now. customer service replies within 2 days. and an actual guy replies. not some bs automated gratis system. and guess what no spam. i get spam from gratis (advertising freeipods) every day.

one thing OC needs to work on is getting instant credit offers.

[quote667f4c00f0]I am sticking to offer centric for now. customer service replies within 2 days. and an actual guy replies. not some bs automated gratis system. and guess what no spam. i get spam from gratis (advertising freeipods) every day. [/quote667f4c00f0]

I certainly agree with you on that, but let's try to keep this thread mostly about Gratis' HOLD policy. Who knows, it there are still Gratis people roaming around here, they might decide to let us know something about it, unless they're too pissed off by our advertising for others. I think the assumptions we make about Gratis here are negative enough...

[quoteb1eb6ffa84="l0th"][quoteb1eb6ffa84]My boss is away in DC at the moment. I should've asked him to do me a little favor[/quoteb1eb6ffa84]

shock what are you talking about?[/quoteb1eb6ffa84]

hehe nothing. i just wish there was something i could do ?

I bet their hold policy catches A LOT of bad apples. If it didn't, they wouldn't use it. Plain and simple.

However, I can't help but think that there are a lot of false positives. Especially if they catch something like click rates and stuff like that. If you tell your friend "Hey! Just go to the site and click no through all the questions, complete the Infone offer and you are golden!" it may look similar to what you did and be put on hold. This could also be considered a "walk through" "coaching" or many other of Gratis' unwritten rules.

On the other hand, back when Harry was frequently visiting you would see people swear up and down that they were valid. Harry would come back and tell them no way, they used the same password for each account and then you would never hear from them again because they were owned.

Moral of the story. Yes they are catching frauders. Sure there are false positives. No question a lot of people that say they are cool, aren't. The weakest link of this business model is the human element. People are willing to lie, steal, and cheat to get a free $300 device.

l0th. I know you feel a commitment to take care of the people under you, and I really respect that, but if YOU aren't on hold get the greens you need and check out. This isn't about getting the gift either. If THEIR accounts are on hold, you don't have any responsibility to get them fixed. Let them handle it. YOU have done nothing wrong, and as you may believe they haven't either, you never can tell. It could have been something on flatscreens or PVR that they did something they shouldn't have and got banned from ALL Gratis' sites.

Couldn't agree more with 10th

in the same boat of hold like others

I'm in the same "hold" boat, and have not done anything wrong. cry

This is worth putting in an additional post

1. Common Reasons for Being Placed on Hold

(a) Multiple accounts.

(b) Fraudulent referrals.

[b67888cf074](c) Negative feedback from one of our affiliates or offers being completed and immediately canceled.[/b67888cf074]

(d) More than one account at a user's shipping address.

[b67888cf074](e) Posting information on a website, forum, or auction that has to do with "canceling the offers" included, but not limited to, cancellation phone numbers, cancellation time frames, and any encouragement or direction to cancel the offers after signing up with them.[/b67888cf074]

(f) Any other reason or a combination of reasons at the sole discretion of Gratis Internet.



I can tell you that those 2 bold are going to be the TOP reasons for hold. You know people are doing an offer and then cancelling right away.

From my experience with Gratis, I think they put everyone on hold that they possibly can. That is how they make more money. Some people fight it, and get their iPods, some just say eh it was a scam and leave and Gratis comes out on top. Personally, I and my brother were both put on hold at least 4 or 5 times and we had to contact Gratis back and forth 4 or 5 times each to get us off hold. I guess Gratis does it so some people don't fight and they get more money! lol

gratis hasn't even replied to me yet =/

[quotebe0ac37332="Oldfashionedhussy"]it just seems like us new yorkers/east coasters are taking longer to get the goods ([/quotebe0ac37332]

clap This deserves +karma! )

Great post, 10th.

And for the most part, i think you are right on the money with the HOLD happy actions that Gratis does.

I can see why they do it... some people do try to cheat the system to get whatever they can for free. But, their reasons for flagging an account were way too broad.

My FreeDesktopPC acct got put on hold when I had NO referrals... the reason? The person I signed up under, had another user that signed up under him where his email address started with [b7c388080ba]chill....[/b7c388080ba]. My email addy starts with chill as well, but it goes to [b7c388080ba]chillywilly...[/b7c388080ba], whereas the other address was [b7c388080ba]chilloutman...[/b7c388080ba] or something like that.

Over that little incident, 3 accounts got put on hold. Thanks to Harry for seeing the obvious, he took us off hold and the guy I signed up over got his PC.

Regardless, it's to the advantage of these companies to get more offers completed for accounts they never have to send an iPod or TV or PC to.

Thanks to 10th for addressing this issue and +karma for him.

[quote64eb88146a]c) Negative feedback from one of our affiliates or offers being completed and immediately canceled.
[/quote64eb88146a]

You know I don't understand how they can justify this. Say I signed up for the Computer Tutorial CDs ... received the CDs .... reviewed them .... and realized they sucked so I canceled my "subscription". Now I have other referrals that signed up for the Blockbuster thing and love it, its our choice if we like the service or not ... thats what a trial periods is all about ... we try it ... if we like it, we keep it ... if not, we don't.

guys don't forget one of his main issues is also getting in contact with them. i have yet to be able to reach gratis through their website (faq/help leads me in circles to no contact form). and the rare time i do get in touch (or anyone) its met days later with a canned response.

this morning i submitted a question to offercentric from their easy to find web form, and ive already received a personal response to my question.

and im still waiting to find out why im on hold with freephotoipods.com.

[quote7569b367f1="idris"]From my experience with Gratis, I think they put everyone on hold that they possibly can. That is how they make more money. Some people fight it, and get their iPods, some just say eh it was a scam and leave and Gratis comes out on top. Personally, I and my brother were both put on hold at least 4 or 5 times and we had to contact Gratis back and forth 4 or 5 times each to get us off hold. I guess Gratis does it so some people don't fight and they get more money! lol[/quote7569b367f1]

i was on hold because one of my refferals signed up 2 times. i found another guy, and guess what, im 10/13 shipper as of yesterday

you guys realize that whenever anyone is put on hold, there area always like at least 3 referrals or more are on hold? Never just one person.. that is strange. I hope I don't get on hold for my PC account, I know everyone is legit and I followed all the rules. But I still have a feeling that I might...

has anyone gone processing/stv for photo ipods?

I think I got onhold because me, liquid, and themetsarebad(the guy me and liquid signed up under) live in NY... Gratis should take a closer look

haha I live in NY too

<- in ny and on hold!

maybe after gratis' politcal message (get out and vote), they decided to play with all the blue states )

[quote80a53cfea7]maybe after gratis' politcal message (get out and vote), they decided to play with all the blue states [/quote80a53cfea7]

If only it could be at least that, but, no, I think it's really just random.

So after two days of waiting, I get the famous automated response back (this is for photo ipod).
My friend who just started fip who has just a handful of yellows was placed on hold.

We take abuse of our website very seriously, and will place accounts suspicious of fraudulent activity on hold.

The reasons for this may include multiple accounts, improper offer completions, more than one account to the same address/household, abusing an advertiser, etc. Additionally, we do not allow users to create accounts for, sign-up for, or "walk through" referrals.

Due to high levels of fraud, we are forced to take actions against users who attempt to take advantage of our free offer. We take all types of fraud very seriously, and since we give our products away for free, we cannot afford to be lenient on dishonest methods users try to obtain their free items.

[quote80d9c94978="CAP96A"]So after two days of waiting, I get the famous automated response back (this is for photo ipod).
My friend who just started fip who has just a handful of yellows was placed on hold.

We take abuse of our website very seriously, and will place accounts suspicious of fraudulent activity on hold.

The reasons for this may include multiple accounts, improper offer completions, more than one account to the same address/household, abusing an advertiser, etc. Additionally, we do not allow users to create accounts for, sign-up for, or "walk through" referrals.

Due to high levels of fraud, we are forced to take actions against users who attempt to take advantage of our free offer. We take all types of fraud very seriously, and since we give our products away for free, we cannot afford to be lenient on dishonest methods users try to obtain their free items.[/quote80d9c94978]

I got that same response too
[quote80d9c94978]
10th is completely right on this hold policy though. That, combined with their policy of canned emails...[/quote80d9c94978]

I agree... They should spend some time in giving a good a reply that really answers what the customer(us)'s question is, instead of copying + pasting some template... this is a good example

-customer Hi, I'd like to know why I got on hold. I havent tried to cheat. All my refs are unique.
-gratis hi, we ve reviewed your account more closely. Some of your refs raised red flags. But they ve proven to be legit... bla bla


That will be a better response instead of a canned response

some good news here it looks like the hold on my referral was lifted.

Still, we have no idea why. There are people saying that Gratis put a hold on people who didn't filled their mailing address when they joined at freephotoipods.com. Actually, it looks like they couldn't fill their mailing address in, because there was no form for that. At least this is my case, I didn't have to fill in my mailing address, and I'm now wondering if I'm going to get a hold too because of this. I don't know, these are just things I've read and I'm absolutely not sure about it.

Did people who joined recently get to fill their mailing address somewhere when they joined at freephotoipods.com? I didn't, but I remember having to do that at freeipods.com

Anyway, if there are others who got their hold lifted, let us know, and maybe more importantly, if you know, let us know why it was lifted.

Yeah well at least you got all 10. I am still sitting on 3 yellows that did CC offers and will take 2 - 3 years to go green.

your 3 doing cc offers might regret that it takes so long too. Have you tried to talk them into signing-up for something that gives credit faster?

Yeah, word is none of them have CCs to use for any other offers. I will get this iPod when the 900GB 1oz halographic movie iPod is out.

[quotea56519d2b6="l0th"]some good news here it looks like the hold on my referral was lifted.[/quotea56519d2b6]

how did youre referral get in touch with them.
again, i NEVER find a form or link through the help/faq. it goes in circles.

i sent an email to customerservice@fpipods and cc'd @freeipods.com and have yet to receive a response (days ago). i've also posted in the account issues forum.

i've really done nothing wrong. i even went as so far to provide a list of all my 12 greens, the offer they did, their home city/state and anythign to match their ip address to support that. they are all incredibly unique.

no response. nothing. i'd really like some sort of feedback.

cheers.

And harry989 havent been around the forums for more than 10 days(at least I havent seen a post from him)

Since Oct 29th Harry hasn't posted. That's 15 days as of 11/12

[quoteb35fbd0d2d]how did youre referral get in touch with them.
again, i NEVER find a form or link through the help/faq. it goes in circles. [/quoteb35fbd0d2d]

there is a form in the faqs I believe. That's all my referral did and then 3 (4?) days later the hold was lifted. I used a form as well to tell them I was confident my referral was a "unique individual". At the same time the hold was lifted for him I received an answer (My Account/Customer service inquiries)

[quoteb35fbd0d2d]On 11/11/2004 33656 PM customer service wrote
Your account has been updated.[/quoteb35fbd0d2d]

And I had 10 greens.

Now, I mentioned a referral of one of my own referrals was also put on hold. This one hasn't been lifted yet, but he followed the exact same procedure. We'll see what happens with him.

[quote6812224d44="l0th"]there is a form in the faqs I believe.[/quote6812224d44]

i cant stress enough. i cant get to it. no matter what i click on in the faqs i get sent back to the original faq page. in firefox and ie.

as such, i can't contact them.
god forbid they have an 'open customer inquiry' on the customer inquiries page off 'my account'.

offercentric not only has easy to find forms, gets back to you in a personal way within the day, and posts on GL now.
its making life much easier and pleasurable. i do hope gratis catches back up to speed!

cheers.

i just got another personal reply from offercentric about one of my accounts.
(within 2 hours)

in it they confirmed and mentioned that the bonus offers will soon include cash equivalents (as their main gifts do).

cheers!

I don't want to go jinxing myself (knock on wood) but almost every time I've sent a question to Gratis through their website's FAQ (some say there isn't a form in there, but you just gotta look harder) I've gotten a response back. Yes, to get a response it did take about a week, almost a week exactly, and each time the responder answered each of my questions, so it wasn't like an automatic reply they just sent me. My girlfriend also sent them a question about what address she typed in when she initially logged on, and in a week she got a response of the exact info.

So, it does take a little bit, but they're there and they're listening.

If I would have known all the troubles they're having sending these things out I might have went to an off centric website, but I already have 5 greens (I'm waiting for one more for a "safety" referral before I click the approve button)

So even if it takes a week to get a response, and I get put on hold numerous times, and I have to fight to get an ipod, I'll fight for it. I'm not going to sit back and just watch it fly by. People say we whine when we're getting something for free, but it's not free. They're making money off of our work.

I'll fight for my ipod