Two new companies are offering rewards, but who are they? We'll start with WRS Consultants, Inc., a company with addresses pointing to Canada and the U.S. This company may operate out of the U.S., and Canada. Or, just one of these addresses belongs to WRS Consultants, Inc. To start, let's look at the gift page, and whois report for consumerpanelrewards.com, a WRS Consultants gift site.
gift site:
url: www.consumerpanelrewards.com
whois:
The whois report shows Brian Sloan as the administrative and technical contact, and that this site is registered to WRS Consultants, Inc. From the report, we know WRS Consultants, Inc. and Brian Sloan are in Canada. But I wanted to check out the company web site...
The information for a WRS Consultants, Inc. company web site was found on kellysearch.com It shows "wrsconsultants.com" as the web site for WRS Consultants, Inc., but the site directs you to a godaddy error page. The kellysearch.com results also show this company's "second" location, Philadelphia, PA.
Since I could not see the company web site, I went to Wayback Machine. The web site names William R. "Sam" Sneed III as President and Founder of WRS Consultants, Inc. on the about me, and bio page for Sam Sneed.
So we have Brian Sloan out of Canada, and Sam Sneed in Philadelphia, PA who are under WRS Consultants, Inc. Either these two people are connected, with one maintaining the operations out of Canada while the other in the U.S., or they just have the same company name. Many independent businesses have the same or similar names, so that in itself is not the problem. But if a business has their corporation registered as a tradename, and another company infringes on that, a legal battle would ensue. I don't know the laws of Canada, some may differ by province; but could the other company sue with both being in different countries? Seems like they could, because no matter where you are in the world, you are still taking someone else's name. It would be interesting to see the turn out of that, if both were independent businesses.
I sent Brian Sloan, and Sam Sneed an e-mail in hopes they would respond.
My e-mail:
"from: diyfreebies@gmail.com diyfreebies@gmail.com
to: sam@wrsconsultants.com,
sloman@myprivacy.ca
date: Wed, Nov 21, 2012 at 4:25 PM
subject: Question about WRS Consultants and consumerpanelrewards.com...
mailed-by: gmail.com
Hi,
Does this site belong to you? Web site: consumerpanelrewards.com -- If so, what are your current promotions? Also, I found your corporation under a Canadian location, and I wanted to know if the Canadian address is one from a previous company, or if your company has locations in Philadelphia, PA as well as Canada? Below are the addresses I have that are listed under your corporation, WRS Consultants, Inc.
WRS Consultants, Inc.
113 Amik Court
Box 117
Kimberly. Ontario N0C 1G0
Canada
WRS Consultants, Inc.
Suite 300
630 West Upsal Street
Philadelphia, PA 19119-3626
I looked up wrsconsultants.com on Wayback Machine, a domain archive service, and it pulled up your old site from 2005. I am sending this e-mail to both e-mail addresses; one under the Canadian location, and one under the Pennsylvania location. Reply at your convenience.
Thanks,
wozniack"
I don't expect a response out of Brian Sloan, as I haven't had much luck with Canadian companies and e-mails. Especially e-mails that come from whois reports. Sometimes DIY companies put junk e-mails in their whois reports instead of a real contact. My impression is they don't like giving it out; spam may have contributed to that, which is understandable. Sam Sneed, however, I am more optimistic about. I learnt on linkedin.com that he's a campus keynote speaker for middle schools, high schools, and colleges. Through his web site, campuskeynotespeaker.com, I obtained his e-mail address, and contacted him about WRS Consultants, Inc. I contacted him previously at the e-mail address on wrsconsultants.com, sam@wrsconsultants.com. He never replied, so he may have dissolved WRS Consultants, Inc. to move on to other things, and that e-mail goes unanswered. I cannot say sam@wrsconsultants.com doesn't work, however, because I never got a mailer-daemon message. If Sam Sneed discontinued WRS Consultants, Inc., the Canadian dealers came along sometime thereafter and took their name, with Sam Sneed no longer under WRS Consultants, Inc. It is also possible that both businesses under WRS Consultants, Inc. may function simultaneously without the other knowing. Its a common occurrence in the business world.
Until there's confirmation on WRS Consultants' ownership, I cannot confirm who works for WRS Consultants, Inc. Since the domain, consumerpanelrewards.com, has a Canadian address, and an individual named Brian Sloan as the contact, WRS Consultants, Inc. at the Canadian location are who manages the gift site, not Sam Sneed. Until we learn more, Sam Sneed's place in WRS Consultants, Inc. and the gift program is unknown. I will continue to look into this. The addresses for the Canadian, and U.S. locations are below.
Address for Canadian location:
113 Amik Court
Box 117
Kimberly, Ontario N0C 160
Canada
Addresses for U.S. location:
630 West Upsal Street, STE #300
Philadelphia, PA 19119-3626
29 Bala Ave, STE #106
Bala Cynwyd, PA 19004-46 (taken from Secretary of State business filing)
Now for another company and DIY site, consumeronlinerewards.com. We'll start with the whois report, and take the site page by page...
whois:
::post edit::
gift site:
url: www.consumeronlinerewards.com
Registration page:
Survey page:
Offer page:
Thank you page:
status page:
For once, a DIY site that runs smoothly with easy access to everything. Even the owner responded. Since this DIY company has a California address, I was eager to see if there was any connection to Consumer Gain. I sent the owner, Kevin Davis, the same letter I sent to Consumer Gain, and several others (see last month's entry for letter: "DIY Halloween with I-Deal crediting issues..."), and closed it with the following:
"If your company is in no way linked to Member Source Media, I'm sorry to have bothered. If there is no connection, could you tell me a little about your company, and the gift program you offer through Consumer Online Rewards? The reason for me asking these questions is so that I can update my readers; I am the author of a freebie blog, DIYfreebies.com. For nearly a year, we've tried to solve the mystery surrounding Consumer Gain. We're trying to find out what happened to them.
Any response is appreciated. I thank you for your time.
Regards,
wozniack"
Kevin Davis' reply:
"from: Kevin Davis bornbuckeye@gmail.com
to: diyfreebies@gmail.com
date: Thu, Nov 29, 2012 at 3:12 PM
subject: Re: Akismet: Spam - Born Buckeye Contact: Questions about your company and gift program, Consumer Online Rewards...
mailed-by: gmail.com
signed-by: gmail.com
Hello,
Consumer Online Rewards is not affiliated with Member Source Media in any way whatsoever. I have no idea what Consumer Gain or giftpile.com are either.
Thanks,
Kevin Davis"
My reply:
from: diyfreebies@gmail.com diyfreebies@gmail.com
to: Kevin Davis
date: Fri, Nov 30, 2012 at 1:18 PM
subject: Re: Akismet: Spam - Born Buckeye Contact: Questions about your company and gift program, Consumer Online Rewards...
mailed-by: gmail.com
Hi Kevin,
Thank you for responding. Could you tell me a little more about Consumer Online Rewards? Is your gift program called Consumer Online Rewards, or is it something else? I was thinking about doing a write up on my blog about Consumer Online Rewards. My readers like write ups because they get to know the person about the gift site (consumeronlinerewards.com), and it let's them know who is running it. Doing so may also bring you business, as my site gets a lot of traffic. To get an idea of what my write ups consist of, you can see one here: "DIYfreebies third annual anniversary blog..." It's the fourth paragraph down on the CEO of LeaderMarkets, LLC. :)
Your site, consumeronlinerewards.com, is one of the most well organized sites that I have seen in a while. Everything is where it should be, and I LOVE how the "Member Control Panel" is right there in front of you so you don't have to look for it. Some sites have hidden offer pages, and/or lack an offer or contact page. Are billing statements required to confirm your participation, or will e-mail confirmations suffice? I was thinking of doing your site myself.
Thanks again,
wozniack"
This confirms consumeronlinerewards.com does not belong to Consumer Gain. I had to ask. I have not given up on the CRS investigation either. We need to know which sites belong to who, and what happened to these companies' gift programs. Anytime a new DIY company comes along I get excited. If only Kevin Davis had more sites with larger payouts. *sigh* Well, maybe he does. I'll ask him if he has anymore promotions. Below are the terms I have written for Consumer Online Rewards.
Consumer Online Rewards- Members must remain an active member for at least 30 days, and observe a 30 day waiting period for completion of all sponsor offers. No Member will be given additional credit for completing more than the required number of offers per category on the gift site. If you complete a specific offer more than once, you'll only receive credit for one offer. A link to the Redemption Request Form will appear in your account within 10 days after all eligibility requirements are satisfied. To earn your reward, submit the Redemption Request Form to ConsumerOnlineRewards within 120 days of registration. Any Redemption Request Form that is postmarked after 120 days does not meet the conditions for eligibility, and ConsumerOnlineRewards are not obligated to award the gift. Fulfillment based on a submission after 120 days is at the sole discretion of ConsumerOnlineRewards. Once all eligibility requirements are met, ConsumerOnlineRewards will ship your gift to your mailing address. Allow 6 to 8 weeks for delivery.
Consumer Online Rewards address:
PO Box 99862
San Diego, California 92169
United States
We don't know if Consumer Online Rewards are a legitimate gift program, but the gift site, consumeronlinerewards.com, is up for testing. I went on and did a write up on their terms in addition to the company write up. Kevin Davis seems like a rather nice guy. Nice to see someone's dream come alive regardless of any difficulties along the way. Check his site out: www.bornbuckeye.com :)
Next is an e-mail from one of my readers. We spoke back in October about his I-Deal progress, but it did not come easy. To learn about this member's experience, please see our exchange below.
Member's e-mail:
"from: member
to: diyfreebies@gmail.com
date: Tue, Oct 23, 2012 at 1:09 PM
subject: I-Deals
signed-by: xxxx.xx
Woz,
Hey there. After much trial and error (finding out how their system works), I finally completed the 10 offers for my $1000 gift card. You may definitely want to let your followers understand that you can only apply for 1-2 offers every 2 days or so. I learned the hard way. Not to mention, all the offers i applied for did not even go through. I probably ended up completing about 15 different offers and invested about $75. I guess that's not too bad but it's more than i wanted to. My probably was that I was so far along in the process (before I figured it all out) that I didn't want to go back.
I printed off my reward certificate, mailed it in with a completed W-9, and received my gift card the other day. They said it would take 6-8 weeks, but it came in two week. Hard to believe huh? And it was as one of your followers had said...a $1000 Wells Fargo Debit Card. As long as it works I really don't care.
Anyway, thanks for the information along the way.
What kind of new offers do you have that you know about? I'm hoping for something that doesn't require referrals. I am looking for a Mac Book.
Have a great one.
member"
My reply:
"from: diyfreebies@gmail.com
to: member
date: Wed, Oct 31, 2012 at 1:44 PM
subject: Re: I-Deals
mailed-by: gmail.com
member,
Is it alright by you if I shared your e-mail with my readers? By sharing it, those who are new to this, as well as those who haven't had issues, will understand our difficulties with offer crediting. I am just glad that you got through it, and received your reward in two weeks! That's great. I hope you've been enjoying your profit. :)
Haven't gone link hunting yet, but will within the next month so that there are links for our holiday link list! If I find anything before my next post (early December), I'll send an e-mail your way. And I'll keep an eye out for any Macbook deals.
Have a good afternoon,
wozniack"
Member's reply:
"from: member
to: diyfreebies@gmail.com
date: Wed, Oct 31, 2012 at 1:50 PM
subject: RE: I-Deals
signed-by: xxxx.xx
Absolutely man. Thanks again for the link and I’ll be looking forward to hearing (or reading on your blog) from you on possible other deals.
Have a great week.
member"
This member's problem was much like my own on my last I-Deal site. I burned through 15-16 offers, and invested about $75.00, maybe a bit more. However, I could not complain as the payout was $1,000.00, and I qualified for the $250.00 bonus. Not everyone has crediting issues, but those that do learn the hard way for doing their offers in one sitting, or for doing at least 5 or more.
Since October's post I've earned quite a bit in cash and gift cards. Clorox sent me a $90.00 check; I earned $100.00 in Tango Cards from Toluna, which I redeemed for Target and amazon codes; Memolink sent me another $100.00 all-in-one retailer card; MyPoints sent me $75.00 to Cracker Barrel, $125.00 to Wal-Mart, and $10.00 to Jack in the Box; SurveyScout Research sent me $30.00 in amazon, and loaded $20.00 to my Payoneer Mastercard. MyPoints shipped my $50.00 to Bath & Body Works today, so I will use that to finish my Christmas shopping. I spent very little cash on Christmas this year because of these survey panels, points sites, Shopkick and CheckPoints. And shopping for deals saved me even more money.
Now I'm stacking up Tango Cards from Toluna, and cashing out on a $300.00 Target eGiftCard. I will put the $300.00 Target eGiftCard on my Target app, so the cashier can scan my barcode at checkout. If you have a Smartphone, go to your Market in your applications, and download the free Target app. Your Target eGiftCards will never be lost. When you register an account you create a password, so your Target eGiftCards are safe in your account, and you can access them anytime by logging in.
Open these good deals...
*holiday link list*
Product Test Panel--
http://digitalbrandrewards.com/1000vouchers/index.php?lid=1000vouchers_16505_697_&add_offerid=1617986&addomain=rsmrttracking.com&addomain_id=124&uniclk=true - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 merchant gc of your choice + misc. gifts
http://mybigbrandrewards.com/secretdinezas/index.php?lid=secretdinezas_16096_697_&add_offerid=8323925&addomain=adrtrklnk.com&addomain_id=122&uniclk=true - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 restaurant gc of your choice + misc. gifts
http://digitalbrandrewards.com/mystshp/index.php?lid=mystshp_16505_697_&add_offerid=92379926&addomain=adrvrd.com&addomain_id=125&uniclk=true - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 mystery shopper reward + misc. gifts
http://www.rewardszoneusa.com/Flow.aspx - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Wal-Mart gc + misc. gifts
http://mybigbrandrewards.com/ipzas/index.php?lid=ipzas_5616_OLD&add_offerid=4833813&addomain=rsmrtlink.com&addomain_id=123&uniclk=true - 13 offers, 3 refs/iPad w/improved camera and retina display in your choice of color + misc. gifts
http://tiffany.freegiftcardtoday.com/p1.php?reqid=18829101&affid=47&oid=54&s1=315955&s2=65025bdbf5c6d6bfed2c2e420facfdd8&email=# - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Tiffany & Co. gc + misc. gifts
http://www.claimhotdeals.com/155.php?sid=155&aid=1265&subid=315955&subid2=188ff6756ab629a9f3cb7e38c0da2459 – 10 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Disney Cruise gc + misc. gifts
http://target.freegiftcardtoday.com/p1.php?reqid=18829101&affid=47&oid=17&s1=315955&s2=6897db863bfb59a2e53b0bca9b0d5747&email=# – 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Target gc + misc. gifts
http://www.claimhotdeals.com/157.php?sid=157&aid=1265&subid=315955&subid2=bdab89666f642590bd93d504326f69a7 - 10 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Coach gc + misc. gifts
http://bestbuy.freegiftcardtoday.com/p1.php?reqid=18829101&affid=44&oid=13&s1=207419&s2=17381_254324798&exit_p=0 - 13 offers, 3 refs/$1,000.00 Best Buy gc + misc. gifts
Amped Media--
http://online-promos.net/?oid=4mwhxws2&clk=67d4a7029f46047c13775790459b8423&s=1717# - offers unknown/$1,000.00 Chipotle gift card
http://rewardingpromos.com/?oid=chce85x2&clk=8d7105e6e2ad543554ded656448d1963&s=1717 - offers unknown/$1,000.00 Wal-Mart gift card
http://premium-promos.net/?oid=uygdkibd&clk=c0d79e8dbaf03dc3060c0fed4b047f18&s=1717 - offers unknown/$1,000.00 Panera Bread gift card
I-Deal--
http://e-consumergift.com/?session_id=83520d623ff111e293866446a83e1266 - 10 offers, 2 refs/$1,000.00 JcPenney gc
I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday edition of the DIYfreebies blog. T'was fun writing it this month, and I look forward to many more holiday blogs. I'm excited about Consumer Online Rewards. A $25.00 reward is a small payout, but COR may put out more promotions within the year. As for WRS Consultants, Inc., their site, www.consumerpanelrewards.com, offers no rewards. Not excited about that, but I have to investigate them since they are a new company. So I'm creating a case file for WRS Consultants, Inc. to add to the ones for CRS and Member Source Media (Consumer Gain). I will be working all three cases for the next two months. If anyone finds anything concerning these investigations, shoot me an e-mail: diyfreebies@gmail.com
Happy Holidays, and have a Happy 2013 everyone!
wozniack
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