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How To Identify and Avoid Paid Survey Scams |
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With so many paid survey scams and spams those days, and so many websites promoting those scam and spams, often it is difficult to determine which is real and which is the ugly, especially for survey newcomers. However, there are ways you can identify them and avoid them:
- Please remember: Never pay anyone to do paid surveys and get paid. Legitimate paid survey sites are always FREE to join and cost absolutely Nothing to take surveys and get paid. If anyone ask you to pay or provide credit card information, walk away!
- The most common scam sites work like this: They claim they are paid survey sites and ask you to sign up and provide your personal information. They then turn around sell your information. Often those sites are overly simplified, no company information etc, all they ask is your name email address, and you won't know what's going on until you register. If you see a site like this, walk away.
- If you come cross a site that you are not sure if it is legitimate or not, please be sure to check their privacy policy. If you are not happy with their policy or they don't have a privacy policy, stay away. A legitimate company's privacy policy should states something like "We do NOT reveal or sell your personal information to any third parties..." in the "How do we use information collected" section.
- Please be aware the difference between paid surveys sites and get paid sign up offer sites. The later sometimes say they are survey sites, in fact they are not. They are the sites you get paid for signing up free or trial offers, and they sometimes ask you to provide Credit card information to sign up non-free trials or offers.
- Stay away from the websites promoting known scam or spam "survey" sites (such as Panda Research) - usually those sites claim they have a list of 300+, 400+, or even 500+ paid survey sites - They are just promoting anything they can find for commission, and they can NOT be trusted.
- Trust your instinct - Sometimes you just have a gut feeling about a scam site just by it's looks and feel. In this case, you are probably right, trust yourself and walk away.
- You can always do your research for a certain survey site. Fox example, type "A survey site" in Google, you might find "A survey site is a scam!" listed among the top search results!
- Finally, remember NEVER NEVER NEVER provide sensitive personal information to anyone, never give out your driver's licence number, credit card, bank account information to anyone. I have never has any survey sites require me to provide these information to get paid.
*: this article also published on eHow.com website
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 24 December 2009 )
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Paid Survey Guide 