I joined Netwinner.com, a free to play, online game site, in September. Their slogan was and still is, "You Play&We Pay!", meaning if you play their games and win points, you could accumulate them and then cashout for tangible giftcards (WalMart, Barnes & Noble, etc). The minimum cashout level was 25,000 points for a $25 prize; the levels were 25,000; 50,000, 75,000 and 100,000.
During the next year, they continually tinkered with the games (MoneyWheel and Banko) and their TOS, added over 75 partner sites and ran thousands, if not millions, of streaming ads via their "AdStream" software, did away with the giftcards and replaced them with a prepaid Mastercard debit card. They also added other optional raffle prizes, like a trip to Las Vegas, iPhones, MacAir, etc.in exchange for points.
I played nearly every day for almost two years; from the time I joined through October I cashed out points four times and received four giftcards/cash for an instant "promo" prize, and a reloadable E-count Mastercard. During this time, Netwinner got progressively later with prize fulfillment; my last prize took 5 months to get and rumors began circulating on their forum that they had stopped mailing prizes. This was constantly denied by the forum administrator/paid Netwinner staff), who continued to assert that Netwinner paid their winners and all prizes would definitely be received. Multiple scenarios explaining the late prize fulfillment were subsequently posted; e.G., we are late because we are switching from giftcards to E-count; we are late because we are moving offices; we are late because we are short-staffed, etc.
From January through March 31, I cashed out four more times for E-count reloads to my card for $200 total. These cashouts were acknowledged via e-mail from Netwinner and in "My Account" tab on their site; they were shown (as was typical after cashing out) as "Processing."
On May 12, Netwinner President and COO, S. Allen Dean, advised members that due to problems with "fraud", they had effective that day rescinded all pending prize redemptions for debit cards and/or reloads, and replaced them (doubled) with points. At the same time, they eliminated the only remaining cashout prize with tangible value, the $100 E-count card/reload, so the only thing you could do with your new-found points was enter them in raffle drawings! My $200 in debit card reloads became 400,000 points.
Since they had not processed prizes for approximately six months, they defrauded thousands of players for hundreds of thousands of dollars and then have the nerve to state in their forum that they are now solvent. These white-collar criminals need to be held accountable, especially since they managed over the last year to add approximately 75 partner sites and run millions of streaming ads on their website while they scammed the very same players who help them become a popular site.
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