@pjotter 249269 wrote:
I thought Bet365 was a reputable program, but after what I have learned today I would suggest people to look for other programs if they can avoid Bet365.
In my opinion they do not offer anything special, and from what I have learned they will only go that extra mile when it comes to withholding your rightfully owed commissions.
Some big affiliates will probably disagree, but I hope everyone can see this from a small affiliate’s point of view – and that this is not ok.
Well, he is my story:
I am owed a mere commission amount of just $120 as of December 2012 and I have finally honored their affiliate-unfriendly minimum quota of five players, also in December 2012. So having honored this quota, I was thinking this month, January 2013, I was finally going to get paid for my efforts to promote them.
Apart from the minimum quota, they also have a cumbersome requirement for payment where you have to generate invoices, print these, sign them and fax/email these to get paid. So I sent the invoice 08 January 2013. Nothing happens until 10 days later, today, where XXXX, my sudden affiliate manager from Bet365, contacts me via email. I don’t recall having ever received a personal email or a call from them, even though I have probably been affiliated with them for more than 5 years (It a good thing for them that they don’t have a minimum affiliate manager activity quota). After telling me that he is now my dedicated affiliate manager, this message follows:
“As part of the programmes terms and conditions, we do require that an affiliate is actively promoting us in order to be able to withdraw their funds.
I can’t seem to find where bet365 are being promoted on your site Casino Bonus News.
Could you please provide me with a link to where you are promoting us?”
I can’t believe what I am reading, but I do check the terms to find this:
“6. Continued Promotion
You shall incorporate and prominently and continually display the most up-to-date links provided by us on all pages of your website in a manner and location agreed by us and you shall not alter the form, location or operation of the links without our prior written consent. You are eligible for Referral Commissions based upon your continued promotion of Sports at bet365, Casino at bet365, Poker at bet365, Games at bet365 or Bingo at bet365. We reserve the right to reduce Referral Commission percentages if you reduce your efforts to recruit new Customers. Your reduced or suspended promotion of our sites will be deemed to represent your termination of this Agreement.”I guess this is the clause he refers to as new reason for refusing payment, but I haven’t received a reply yet to my question: are you serious?!
I have links on Casino Bonus News to Bet365 as I have on other of my web sites. Last month I generated 42 click-throughs, 2 new players and 1 depositing player. Fair enough, so this month I only generated 4 click-troughs according to their stats, but my wife is just about to give birth to my second daughter, so I have been quite busy preparing for this and furthermore I haven’t found any interesting promotions from Bet365 this month.
I don’t know if they don’t like small affiliates – perhaps just me – or if they are having serious financial problems. But their enforcement of this clause is pushing their terms to the limit of decent behaviour to avoid paying me. This is simply not a kind of behavior I would expect from a reputable program and sponsor of several affiliate communities, and this is what causing me to warn all affiliates, particularly small affiliates.
They probably also have a silly rule somewhere saying that if an affiliate complain he will have to run naked through the streets and send pictures of it before he can get paid, but if this huge company really want to bully their small affiliates, I hope the affiliate communities can help the small affiliates to fight back.
Pjotter,
It would be best if I called you next week to discuss your concerns, please let me know when you are free and I will ensure I am available to speak over the phone. I am not really keen on discussing individual affiliate accounts on public threads. I have your contact details here from your affiliate account.
It is important to clarify that we sent this payment prior to this post, please could you kindly check. Also, and not really an issue as your opinion on this may differ, which is fair enough, but I do feel it slightly unfair to name your new affiliate manager on a public thread based on a single, non-inflammatory email, asking for clarity on promotion, which ultimately was to ensure we can process the payment and satisfy the finance department. The reason I say this is this request could have come from anyone in my team so the situation is really between yourself and the business as opposed to individuals, I hope that sounds fair.
Speak to you next week and hopefully can satisfy your concerns then.
Have a nice weekend.
James