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l337m4n

19-03-2005 16:22:29

Check out 3 and 4
[b53e369b60c]All credit goes too VaMPKiSS1 from GOG [/size53e369b60c][/b53e369b60c]
I've seen a lot of the same kind of questions asked by people who are new at this. At first, it seems a little bit complicated, a little bit strange, and a little bit unfair, when you hear about the ins and outs of how Gratis works and all the different things you must do to keep from getting the dreaded news that you're "on hold".

The truth is, there are some very simple rules that you can follow that can keep you from getting put on hold in the first place. To start off, I'm not writing this from a position of being high and mighty. I'm writing this as a person who is about to complete their fourth Gratis site and receive the item from all of them. So this is purely from my experience, but it's all the stuff I wish someone had told me before I started.

How to never be put on hold with a Gratis Network site.

1. Read Gratis' Terms and Conditions in their entirety, slowly, until you understand them.

This sounds like something stupid, time consuming, and unnecessary, but it is not. Every bit of advice that I'm giving you now is coming directly from my having read and studied the Terms and Conditions of each of Gratis' sites. Now, they are mostly the same, with the exception of the number of referrals they mention, but it's important that even after seeing this guide, you give them a read. It will help you better understand what you're getting involved in, what your responsibilities are, and will be good practice for reading the Terms of Service sections of offer websites. But that's getting ahead of ourselves.

2. Use only a home computer to sign up for a Gratis site.

This sounds unfairly stacked against those people who don't have a computer at home, and those people who are at college. Now, I can't speak for people who have done this through school networks at college. I've never tried to do an offer from a dorm room. I know that there are some people that have done that without any trouble, but I can only speak from my own experience. I know for a fact that part of how Gratis determines which users are 'unique' is through an IP address. When you use a public computer, or a computer on a network such as on a college LAN or a LAN at workplace, you run the risk of using an IP address that may or may not be used by another computer at another time. In fact, to Gratis, any of the computers on a network might appear to have the same IP address.

So the best thing to do to be safe, is to only use a home, personal computer, to sign up for a Gratis site. And leads us to our next point-

3. Only use one computer to sign up, complete your offer, and check your status.

And by that, I mean, the same, personal, home computer. Don't check your status from your friend's house, or your relative's house, or in any way involve any other computer with YOUR account. You might run the risk of seeming suspicious to Gratis. If they notice activity on more than one account from the same IP address, they might put you on hold as not being a unique user. Or, they might think that you are "walking through" referrals, which is against their Terms and Conditions. The best way to avoid this is to never check your account from any other computer than the one you used to sign up.

4. Never let your friends use your computer to sign up, complete an offer, or check their status.

What goes for you, goes for them, and the same reasons apply. There's a whole bunch of complications that can arise from doing this, and it's easier to just not do it in the first place, than to try to convince Gratis later that you weren't trying to fraud them.

5. Tell everyone that you live with that you have signed up with this site.

Nothing's worse than following all the rules just to find out that your younger brother signed up with FreeiPods.com too, or wanted to show it to his friends, or any number of things that I've seen happen to people when they get unexpectedly put on hold. Tell everyone that lives in your house that you've done this site, and not to sign up for it in any way. This is true regardless of whether or not they use a different computer. Another part of how Gratis determines unique users is by street address; sometimes even people with different but similar street addresses have been under suspicion by Gratis, so don't take the chance. Make sure everyone that lives in your house knows about your quest for free items!

6. Never cancel an offer as soon as you get credit.

Not only is this against the Terms and Conditions, but it defeats the purpose of the entire system of getting free items. This is how it works when you sign up for a trial offer through Gratis, the advertising company pays Gratis an affiliate fee for directing a new and unique lead to their product. (This is why there is all this emphasis on one-per-household rules.) The item that Gratis will send you isn't really 'free'; it's paid for by the combination of the affiliate fee that they get paid from your offer completion and the fees that they get from the offers that your referrals complete. In the end, they still make a profit, and you get your item for 'free'.

The problem is, they will not get paid a fee if the sponsor feels that the lead was fraudulent or not unique. This will happen if you cancel your offer right after getting credit. Then Gratis will not get paid, and you will be put on hold for being a fraudulent referral. The best thing to do is to examine all the offers and pick a service that you actually have interest in trying. For example, for one of the sites I did with Gratis, I tried out Blockbuster's online service. I was interested in trying it and I kept it after the free trial because I enjoyed the service.

Even if you find out you don't really like a service that you're trying, give it a try for as long as you possibly can. That way you can say you gave it an earnest try, and both the sponsor and Gratis can see that you were truly interested in the service and not just doing it for credit for the site.

7. Do not let your friends use your credit card to complete their offers.

I know there are people who have done this without having a problem. But this guide is about how to DEFINITELY not get put on hold, and since the only way to do that is to avoid everything that could look questionable to Gratis or its sponsors, this is right out. If you want to refer friends and they do not want to use a credit card, talk to your bank about getting a gift card for them, such as a Visa gift card. Webcertificates, which are mentioned on other places around this site, have started to become problems and some people have had trouble getting credit using them. The best thing to do is have your referrals use their own credit card, to avoid problems. If they're reluctant because they doubt that this is for real and not a scam, they have a lot of mainstream press coverage archived at http//www.gratisnetwork.com/PressRoom.html for you to show potential referrals.

8. Always read the Terms and Conditions for a sponsor's site before you sign up for a trial.

This isn't completely necessary from Gratis' perspective, but it's one of the best ways to decide which offer you would like to try and is a great way to understand just what exactly the trial itself involves. Sometimes there are things in the fine print that it may not tell you anywhere else on the site. You want to make sure you fulfill your obligations in the trial according to the Terms and Conditions of the sponsor's site, and that will further increase your chances of getting and keeping credit with Gratis.

9. Make sure your referrals know about these steps and follow them, too.

It's an unfortunate thing, but there is a possibility that you could get your account put on hold because one of your referrals didn't follow the rules. It's usually easy to get taken off of hold in a case like that, but the referral who didn't follow the directions will not count toward your free item and you will have to find someone else. The best thing to do is to make sure that the people who sign up under you understand the rules of the site and what is and is not acceptable for them to do.