What happens when you get into a dispute with a merchant who you feel has done wrong to you? How does an ordinary solitary affiliate resolve problems and disputes over money issues?
If you are new, it might not even seem plausible to be in a dispute, but it does happen. I have been in several because I have been at it for quite a long time now. If you continue in the business long enough, it will someday happen to you as well.
First thing I do is to write an email to the merchant. That usually resolves a lot of things, but if the difficulty is more serious, maybe a call is the next method.
After making calls, if the matter is still unresolved, you can try talking about it anonymously on forums. Some of these forums are quite popular, but they do not require you to display your full identity.
What is the advantage of this? Let's say a merchant you made some money with decides not to pay you, and stops communicating with you. When this happens, you can go out on popular forums and talk about the situation. Depending on the forum, you may be able to mention the company name without using yours. You may also elect to use your name and other identifying data.
Most business guys check the forums all the time to see what people are saying about them. If a situation causes some embarrassment to the company in question, they will be more inclined to settle your dispute. Be careful using this technique as it can also make some people very angry.
You have to gauge the situation and how difficult it has been to resolve, and I do not recommend the forum method unless you are hands down right in the matter. If you have violated the TOS of a merchant site, usually they will win.
There is currently no agency you can use to force merchants to pay affiliate commissions if they are withholding them from you for some real, or imagined violation of their TOS. They will just take action in most cases, with little or no recourse for you.
There are some great merchants out there who never cheat or chisel the affiliates. However there are some and even if the bad thing happened 10 years ago, it always leaves a bad taste in an affiliate's mouth concerning that merchant.
It is usually the case where someone in a company is just a bit too quick to push the delete button when riled up. This does happen and it is unpleasant, especially if you are making money with a merchant who has suddenly decided to zap you.
I have only had 4 real bad disputes in my 12 years online, and I won 2 and lost 2. Not bad to be at 500 in the game eh? Well, fortunately for me the 2 that I did win were worth more money than the 2 I did not win. In one case years ago, it involved a major network.
Even good reliable and honest companies occasionally hire people who work within their offices who are clever and game the system. A few examples are out there of people who took affiliate commissions by having access to the systems used to pay affiliates.
A dishonest person with some skill can wreak havoc in an otherwise honest affiliate program or network. Exposing the fraud is the best answer, and going to the top is usually the safest method. However, if the guy at the top is crooked, you have a serious problem.
What I have seen in some cases is affiliate dispute story pages on the web. These are volitile as search engines will find them and list them at the top of the heap if the story is controversial, or even just interesting.
Don't ever do this unless you have all the proofs necessary to discredit the company involved. Even then, don't make it wildly public without seeking a couple of opinions within the industry. Ask yourself if your pride is worth fighting with a criminal in a public forum. Otherwise, go right on and do it if you have been cheated by some company who just doesn't want to pay their bill to affiliates.
If it is a small amount I will usually write to ask for it to be sent, and then quit the program and take down all ads for the company. In most cases I just move on, but in the past, there were 4 bad deals. In one of my 4 disputes, I delt with the top guy in a prosperous company which is well known all over the world.
I wish I had a recording of the conversation I had with him back then. I could hurt that bad boy if I had the proof of what he was doing. His employee was working with another employee at another company to steal affiliate CPA commissions, and they decided to use me (and I am sure others as well).
I proved this matter by having a friend fulfill the CPA requirement from his home computer, and my CPA never showed up on the affiliate stats. A young woman was involved in the scam, and she was very very manipulative. I won this dispute, kinda sorta, as after I proved his employee was bad, he paid me the one CPA commission, and then kicked me out of the program.
Wasn't that nice? I found the thief and the top dog hit me with a two by four right on the noggen. Does that make sense? Not to me, but oh well. Live and learn not to do business with some big famous networks.
The last method of dispute resolution is to contact people you know in the industry to find out if the company you are disputing with is known by your friends. Sometimes it just takes a single phone call from a friend who knows someone at that company and it all gets fixed.
0 comments to the post