This is a bit of a rant post but I am pretty pissed off, I was owed over $1,000 from Aweber in affiliate commissions which they refuse to pay since I did not cash the checks they sent in the first year. I was overseas not able to receive the checks, they never notified me my checks that were not being cashed were being lost FOREVER with no possible way to reclaim the money.
They ONLY send payments by check which for an online company is an obvious scam to get out of paying affiliate commissions, or at least those affiliate commissions ever being received and claimed. If you want to promote an ESP go with Getresponse.
Below is the chat I had with one of their support staff explaining their ‘policy’.
Chat Content:
Stephen C: [4:51:52 PM] Welcome to our real-time support chat. My name is Stephen, how can I help you today?
Vinay: [4:51:52 PM] Affiliate checks getting lost
Stephen C: [4:51:58 PM] Hello Vinay, what can I do for you?
Vinay: [4:52:02 PM] hello
[4:52:13 PM] my affiliate checks have been going to an old address
[4:52:29 PM] i need all the checks that have not been sent to be consolidated and sent again
[4:52:32 PM] ideally paid to paypal…
[4:52:47 PM] all the checks that have not been cashed*
Stephen C: [4:52:59 PM] We do not pay out via paypal and for tax purposes the check will not be consolidated. We can certainly resend them to you. Is the address updated on file now?
Vinay: [4:53:27 PM] nope I will do it 1 second
Stephen C: [4:54:21 PM] Ok.
Vinay: [4:54:24 PM] ok updated
Stephen C: [4:56:04 PM] Ok I will now put the recut requests into the affiliate department. Once they are ready we will send them out to the address on file.
Vinay: [4:56:23 PM] ok cool so all checks that have not been cashed yea?
[4:56:44 PM] you know my ID>
Stephen C: [4:57:16 PM] Anything within the last calendar year. Yes you provided your ID initially I have XXXXXX.
Vinay: [4:57:29 PM] ok thanks
[4:57:33 PM] what about ones before that?
Stephen C: [4:58:29 PM] We can only recut checks that are less than a year old. After a year they completely expire and are no longer eligible for a recut.
Vinay: [4:58:41 PM] so how do I get that money?
Stephen C: [5:00:14 PM] There is no way to get it beyond that point. The 1 year rule ensures that our taxes are inline each year.
Vinay: [5:00:45 PM] how can your taxes be inline if the check was never cashed?
Stephen C: [5:02:03 PM] Because if we write a check out in 2013 for an affiliate amount that was on file in 2012 it does not line up properly. A check expires after 1 year. Even if the check is never cashed, there will be a check written that doesn’t have any record backing it up.
Vinay: [5:02:33 PM] so you sell a digital product
[5:02:39 PM] but you pay with physical checks
[5:02:40 PM] that expire
[5:02:44 PM] sounds like quite the racket
Stephen C: [5:03:03 PM] I will forward that to the affiliate department as a suggestion to provide virtual pay outs.
Vinay: [5:03:13 PM] and pay the money you owe me…
[5:03:24 PM] for sending you customers and revenue
[5:03:28 PM] which i was never compensated for
Stephen C: [5:03:52 PM] We sent the checks to the address on file. It is important to update your information to be the current address.
Vinay: [5:04:19 PM] i was abroad for 1.5 years and had no way to access the checks
Stephen C: [5:04:48 PM] I am sorry for that. We were never notified of that and sent the checks to where they were supposed to go according to your account.
Vinay: [5:06:23 PM] I was never notified my checks were expiring and I was losing that money forever…
[5:06:28 PM] I assumed you would pay me
Stephen C: [5:08:04 PM] We attempted to. There is no way for us to know your address is no longer good. If the check never gets returned to us by the post office we will never know until we hear from you. Regardless of what happened, at this point I can put in the recut request for your account including any checks within the last year.
[5:13:02 PM] It has been several minutes since I last received a reply so unfortunately I will need to end this session. If you have any further questions or requests please feel free to contact us! Our Support is Available on 8AM-8PM ET Mon-Fri which includes our Phones Support Toll Free Phone: +1 877-AWeber-1 (877-293-2371) International Phone: +1 215-825-2196. We also have Email and Livechat Support 9AM-5PM ET Sat-Sun.
9 responses to “Aweber Affiliate Program is a SCAM Don’t Send them Traffic!”
If that’s their policy then they absolutely have explained it in their terms you may have failed to read them, which happens to all of us.
Hi Ana,
This is unfortunate. Mr Stephen, the support staff, did not address the question “how can your taxes be inline if the check was never cashed?” very well.
I have never done Aweber affiliate marketing before but it is important to know what to expect from such companies. Your experience has thought me one more lesson.
Losing over #1000 plus for not cashing a check doesn’t speak well of a popular brand like Aweber. I guess its time to review its terms of service.
I still agree with you on this response “I was never notified my checks were expiring and I was losing that money forever…”
I left this comment in kingged.com where this post was shared.
This is total pissed off, if they really want to pay you for the job then they notified you for expiring…
lol. You were overseas for a year and a half and didn’t think to update your address? Check on payments/your account for OVER A YEAR? Sounds like you’re not really trying to get paid.
It sucks that they won’t reissue your year old+ lost checks, but I do get their reasoning. At least they’re willing to work with you on any more recent checks.
Unfortunately you’re just going to have to take this as a hard lesson learned.
Yes, same story as above. Been trying to get the check for over 18 months but same response each time – literally ‘the cheque is in the mail’. Amount small and neither here nor there in scheme of things but prinipal at stake. Criminal. I was a loyal customer for many years but will now close my two accounts and go elsewhere!
hi guys
has anyone actually been paid yet?
they mailed my check to the WRONG address in 2013…
i had to wait 6 mths to request for a recut check…
they took 6+ months to recut the check (really?)…
said they mailed me the recut check in dec 2014…
jan 2015 – still no check…
and now they’re saying that i have to wait another 6 months before putting in another request for a recut.
how insane is this!
I had a response from AWEBER the other day – supposedly the CEO Tom Kulzer – suggesting a time frame of 18 months to receive an affiliate fee was not unusual and once again was told to request a recut if I don’t get the 2nd recut cheque. If not a scam, then it is incredibly poor business practice and so either way, they are not an organisation with which to do business. Why not send by PayPal or international bank transfer or Skrill like all my other affiliate relationships? Suspect to say the least. I received my first ClickBank payment by cheque, and it just took 14 days, before I switched to international bank transfer. That confirms for me that AWEBER are not doing things the right way given they day they have issued 2 cheques already, and the first was issued almost 18 months ago.
Finally received my cheque. Still think that paying by cheque in strange given options available
AWeber put a stop payment on my lousy $30+. Never got the money 6 months ago.
I don’t even care about the money, but my bank charged me a stop payment fee – so now I am getting negative payment!
My office is 90 minutes away from AWeber. Yes, I am in the USA. So that is no excuse.
I switched to PayPal to prevent the possibility of stop payment fees.
And I just got a notice about another $30+ affiliate payment. Yet when I checked my PayPal account, I did not get a payment.
So much for AWeber bragging about being a debt-free company. Brilliant. They are debt free because they do not pay their debts!