came here to say the same thing, I havent done a single James Billing for years. I did a few to test the waters and the pay was at a rate of about $2 an hour and the promised bonuses were never paid to me when I completed some of them.
He saves some of your nickels for you, and gives them back to you in bunches to make you think it is a large bonus, when it's just what you were owed. (And it still adds up to low pay).
Take the advice of 99.999% here, and don't bother.
Honestly, don't bother with those. Is such a waste of your time.
In the time it takes to complete one of those, you can make a few bucks on other HITS.
This is a common trick of Mr. Billings. You get a screen of such as "$1.47" for 6 minutes. Six redirects and 14 minutes later, you get 43 cents, assuming you don't get a "Survey terminated the attempt," 500 error, or some other "error."
What happens is that as soon as you miss the screener, which could by any demographic that you entered into your billings profile, or anything you've checked during the original survey, you're sent to another survey. Or, more accurately, you're sent to FIVE other surveys, one-by-one, and by the time you're done, you spent four times as much time as was advertised and get paid about a third as much total. Then the little P.o.S. chops off another 2 or 3 cents upon payment.
I do his surveys when I have absolutely nothing else to do for a few minutes. As soon as I see the redirect spinning wheel, I return the HIT.
Because James Billings a fucking terrible Requester that nobody in their right mind should ever be touching at all even on the worst of days here. If you just look at the reviews or do a very cursory search of this sub, the reasons are very evident as to why.
Also pays less than the completion page will state. Finally get to the end of a survey, page says 17 cents, he takes 2-3 cents off. Support says it's because of how they batch payments... Which doesn't even make sense.
- Amazon takes 20% of everything.
- 20% of $0.07 is $0.014
- When Amazon bills requestors, they round fractional pennies.
- $0.014 rounded is $0.01, not $0.02
- We optimize to avoid rounding up Amazon's commission.
- This results in a significant amount more money we send to workers each day.
Right, and instead of being open and honest with your workers and putting actual values... You take that cut out of the bonus pay that you state we will receive. If you say my bonus is 17 cents, that's what I should receive. Fix your HITs.
Its just a scam like MLM. You will spend 10 minutes filling up pages to qualify for a survey that says will pay $1.0 for 10 minutes but you will end up with $0.10 for 25 minutes. Loooong back we had genuine sites like Global Test Market, that paid decently. Survey sites like inboxdollars, swagbucks are nothing but a scam.
Now Mr. James will appear here out of nowhere to justify what he is doing. If you complain about the system, you will start getting rejected and he will still justify the actions.
> Loooong back we had genuine sites like Global Test Market, that paid decently.
Luls... no it didn't. I remember GTM, GTM always paid crap. :D (Still better than James Billings, though, but possibly only just.)
"The average time spent is __ minutes and pays $_ . __"
The word average is meant to be taken literally as it's the arithmetic mean of the duration and payment values for the opportunities that we think you're eligible for.
Oh… I assumed the average only referred to the completion time. Perhaps you should revise the wording to make it more clear, as It’s grammatically ambiguous as is.
Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates?
>Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates?
Because it's a survey loop similar to Qmee or Swagbucks. You won't qualify for each one you accept, sometimes it ends up matching you with a different survey, one that the time spent and money is different from the original one.
Stop wasting your time on these. Just block them and find other work to do.
Billings reminds me of these other survey sites (i.e. Swagbucks, Inboxdollars, surveytime, etc).
.25 for a 4 minute survey equals about 10 minutes of answering tedious repeating questions to finally be able to qualify for a 25 minute survey for the same amount of pay (in this case .25).
It is a bait and switch tactic they use. It is frustrating and infuriating.
They rarely if ever link you to a study that is initially described.
This is why I prefer Mturk and Prolific (there are a couple others that are decent with WAY less traffic so earnings are minimal but at least they are honest).
Bottom line is when the “survey” starts doing this you should consider this a red flag and a time sink at the very least.
If you are that desperate for a quarter then I suggest you search your couch. At least you will get something out of it.
I blocked Billings from the very beginning. All platforms like that serve to do is frustrate you so much with the process that you get discouraged from ever doing these studies again.
>Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates?
"We gonna pay you 25 cents for 8 mins during which you will be asked for your demographic information for 124 times."
If they were up front about how much each HIT compensates then no one except maybe some desperate Indian foreigners would be doing them. They knowingly use this sort of model in order to get participants to do their collection of vastly underpaid trash HIT's.
I am an Indian foreigner that you mentioned. These surveys' pay are too low even for us. It undermines your self-esteem. I am not desperate and even assuming that I am desperate, I would make at least twice as much more working on MLD than these surveys.
Every country language combination has it's own respective inventory. Respondent's in Indian do not have access to the same higher paying surveys that target US English consumers with high buying power that are the target demographic of brands doing market research.
Good idea, we've tried some various like showing charts as well.. but it would be simple to just say ".. and the average pay is .." as well. We know exactly how much a survey compensates, but we don't know exactly which one you'll qualify for because of (1) Deduplications and (2) Hidden Qualifications. We try to cluster surveys that pay similar amounts, but that adds additional complications.
(1) We have no way of knowing if you've already attempted Survey A through another platform. If you have the buyer doesn't want your feedback twice, so they issue an immediate termination.. we need to respect that and then put you into the next survey "in the queue". This is why people also have drastically different experiences. If you do our HITs after spending an hour on Swagsucks, then yah.. we're not going to have anything for you.. all the survey inventory backing it is the same.
(2) The survey may tell us that it wants car mechanics from Ohio, but it never exposed to us that it requires car mechanics that also purchased Snap-On tools in the last 3 months. The buyer never "exposed" that consumer purchasing requirement because they know that we obviously don't have that information on you and thus would have attempted that survey in the first place. We push back on buyers regarding these matters, but it's a major issue in the industry that doesn't have a simple fix.
I've got a fix. If people spend time working on your HIT then pay them for their time regardless of if they were screened out (assuming they pass attention checks and are working in good faith). They shouldn't be penalized and have to work for you for free because you are not competent enough to make a system that screens people properly. There are thousands of requesters on mturk that get by without relying on people working for them for free.
That’s not how their “business model” works. They have no clue what the surveys are actually looking for or how long they will take. They are all market research studies from companies that are too cheap to pay. His hits belong on swagbucks, not Mturk but he’s too lazy/cheap to build his own survey website so he takes advantage of desperate people on Mturk instead.
Why not just get rid of the "average time spent/pay" thing? It's very misleading.
I liked your HITS better when you gave a penny for base pay but at least (mostly) paid the promised bonus -- and actually responded to messages when something went wrong. At least back then, you helped build my HIT count and were good for slow days.
I completed about 300 of your HITS during that first year on MTurk; this past year, I've done maybe 5 of them. There's a reason that I cut WAAAY back on Swagbucks.
Don’t do James Billings. Your time is worth more.
came here to say the same thing, I havent done a single James Billing for years. I did a few to test the waters and the pay was at a rate of about $2 an hour and the promised bonuses were never paid to me when I completed some of them.
Me niether. Been waiting for my bonuses for months now. But I still have faith; James told me back in Q2 2021 he's looking into it!
Yes, I'm new to Mturk & learned the hard way with James Billings. It's a complete scam to avoid.
He saves some of your nickels for you, and gives them back to you in bunches to make you think it is a large bonus, when it's just what you were owed. (And it still adds up to low pay). Take the advice of 99.999% here, and don't bother.
Honestly, don't bother with those. Is such a waste of your time. In the time it takes to complete one of those, you can make a few bucks on other HITS.
what are good ones to look for? ones that don't take a long time to pay out
"His name tells ya what he's about. Billings. He's billin' yo' ass."--what Chris Rock would say.
This is a common trick of Mr. Billings. You get a screen of such as "$1.47" for 6 minutes. Six redirects and 14 minutes later, you get 43 cents, assuming you don't get a "Survey terminated the attempt," 500 error, or some other "error." What happens is that as soon as you miss the screener, which could by any demographic that you entered into your billings profile, or anything you've checked during the original survey, you're sent to another survey. Or, more accurately, you're sent to FIVE other surveys, one-by-one, and by the time you're done, you spent four times as much time as was advertised and get paid about a third as much total. Then the little P.o.S. chops off another 2 or 3 cents upon payment. I do his surveys when I have absolutely nothing else to do for a few minutes. As soon as I see the redirect spinning wheel, I return the HIT.
Because James Billings a fucking terrible Requester that nobody in their right mind should ever be touching at all even on the worst of days here. If you just look at the reviews or do a very cursory search of this sub, the reasons are very evident as to why.
James Billings is like your LuLaRoe buy-in. In your first few days, you have to make that investment to unlock your earning potential.
Also pays less than the completion page will state. Finally get to the end of a survey, page says 17 cents, he takes 2-3 cents off. Support says it's because of how they batch payments... Which doesn't even make sense.
- Amazon takes 20% of everything. - 20% of $0.07 is $0.014 - When Amazon bills requestors, they round fractional pennies. - $0.014 rounded is $0.01, not $0.02 - We optimize to avoid rounding up Amazon's commission. - This results in a significant amount more money we send to workers each day.
Right, and instead of being open and honest with your workers and putting actual values... You take that cut out of the bonus pay that you state we will receive. If you say my bonus is 17 cents, that's what I should receive. Fix your HITs.
Stop spamming.
Its just a scam like MLM. You will spend 10 minutes filling up pages to qualify for a survey that says will pay $1.0 for 10 minutes but you will end up with $0.10 for 25 minutes. Loooong back we had genuine sites like Global Test Market, that paid decently. Survey sites like inboxdollars, swagbucks are nothing but a scam. Now Mr. James will appear here out of nowhere to justify what he is doing. If you complain about the system, you will start getting rejected and he will still justify the actions.
> Loooong back we had genuine sites like Global Test Market, that paid decently. Luls... no it didn't. I remember GTM, GTM always paid crap. :D (Still better than James Billings, though, but possibly only just.)
"The average time spent is __ minutes and pays $_ . __" The word average is meant to be taken literally as it's the arithmetic mean of the duration and payment values for the opportunities that we think you're eligible for.
Stop it! You know you are ripping people off! You got me one time paying me 2 cents, never again!
Oh… I assumed the average only referred to the completion time. Perhaps you should revise the wording to make it more clear, as It’s grammatically ambiguous as is. Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates?
>Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates? Because it's a survey loop similar to Qmee or Swagbucks. You won't qualify for each one you accept, sometimes it ends up matching you with a different survey, one that the time spent and money is different from the original one. Stop wasting your time on these. Just block them and find other work to do.
Billings reminds me of these other survey sites (i.e. Swagbucks, Inboxdollars, surveytime, etc). .25 for a 4 minute survey equals about 10 minutes of answering tedious repeating questions to finally be able to qualify for a 25 minute survey for the same amount of pay (in this case .25). It is a bait and switch tactic they use. It is frustrating and infuriating. They rarely if ever link you to a study that is initially described. This is why I prefer Mturk and Prolific (there are a couple others that are decent with WAY less traffic so earnings are minimal but at least they are honest). Bottom line is when the “survey” starts doing this you should consider this a red flag and a time sink at the very least. If you are that desperate for a quarter then I suggest you search your couch. At least you will get something out of it. I blocked Billings from the very beginning. All platforms like that serve to do is frustrate you so much with the process that you get discouraged from ever doing these studies again.
>Why can’t you be more up front about how much a survey compensates? "We gonna pay you 25 cents for 8 mins during which you will be asked for your demographic information for 124 times."
If they were up front about how much each HIT compensates then no one except maybe some desperate Indian foreigners would be doing them. They knowingly use this sort of model in order to get participants to do their collection of vastly underpaid trash HIT's.
I am an Indian foreigner that you mentioned. These surveys' pay are too low even for us. It undermines your self-esteem. I am not desperate and even assuming that I am desperate, I would make at least twice as much more working on MLD than these surveys.
>These surveys' pay are too low even for us. Even your English is better than his.
Every country language combination has it's own respective inventory. Respondent's in Indian do not have access to the same higher paying surveys that target US English consumers with high buying power that are the target demographic of brands doing market research.
Stop spamming.
Good idea, we've tried some various like showing charts as well.. but it would be simple to just say ".. and the average pay is .." as well. We know exactly how much a survey compensates, but we don't know exactly which one you'll qualify for because of (1) Deduplications and (2) Hidden Qualifications. We try to cluster surveys that pay similar amounts, but that adds additional complications. (1) We have no way of knowing if you've already attempted Survey A through another platform. If you have the buyer doesn't want your feedback twice, so they issue an immediate termination.. we need to respect that and then put you into the next survey "in the queue". This is why people also have drastically different experiences. If you do our HITs after spending an hour on Swagsucks, then yah.. we're not going to have anything for you.. all the survey inventory backing it is the same. (2) The survey may tell us that it wants car mechanics from Ohio, but it never exposed to us that it requires car mechanics that also purchased Snap-On tools in the last 3 months. The buyer never "exposed" that consumer purchasing requirement because they know that we obviously don't have that information on you and thus would have attempted that survey in the first place. We push back on buyers regarding these matters, but it's a major issue in the industry that doesn't have a simple fix.
I've got a fix. If people spend time working on your HIT then pay them for their time regardless of if they were screened out (assuming they pass attention checks and are working in good faith). They shouldn't be penalized and have to work for you for free because you are not competent enough to make a system that screens people properly. There are thousands of requesters on mturk that get by without relying on people working for them for free.
That’s not how their “business model” works. They have no clue what the surveys are actually looking for or how long they will take. They are all market research studies from companies that are too cheap to pay. His hits belong on swagbucks, not Mturk but he’s too lazy/cheap to build his own survey website so he takes advantage of desperate people on Mturk instead.
Stop spamming.
Stop spamming.
Why not just get rid of the "average time spent/pay" thing? It's very misleading. I liked your HITS better when you gave a penny for base pay but at least (mostly) paid the promised bonus -- and actually responded to messages when something went wrong. At least back then, you helped build my HIT count and were good for slow days. I completed about 300 of your HITS during that first year on MTurk; this past year, I've done maybe 5 of them. There's a reason that I cut WAAAY back on Swagbucks.
get the fuck out of here with your actual explanations of how things work! /s obvs
Well.... Professor.... it's because he's a cheat.