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Univox Christmas contest, very fishy


Siegfried

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In October, November and December Univox are paying small bonuses to the top ranking users, as defined by Univox's Engagement Score.

All well and good, it seemed, really dedicated users in the top 100 got $30 bonus. Next 100, $10, next 100, $5.

 

For the whole of October, I was sitting in the 50s, high as 40, low as 60, and figured I was easily in line for $30, but it was not to be. On the 31st about 60-70 new IDs appeared in the points table, hithertoo unseen but all with more than 1000 points above my score and most others. The extremely odd thing was all these IDs had consecutive member numbers, and were previously unseen entries in the table.

 

From all appearances, the Univox team invented some imaginary users to avoid paying out many $30 prizes, I was bumped from 55 to 126 by this manouvre, and as expected it created a big  furor on the Members Community forum there. I did get a $10 bonus, so it was not all fake, but it created a lot of ill will and resentment.

 

There have always been some strange aspects to Univox's Wall of Fame, mainly top scorers with quite unfeasibly high scores, but this latest swindle really tops it all.

There were never any actual 'rules' published, indeed the apparent rules were changed half way through the month to create the lower prizes for lower ranks.

It may have been that the ghost users were a hacker playing with the Univox computer, who knows, but if it was an outside hacker rather than an inside job, what does that say for Univox's data security and all our stored profile data.

I can't wait to see what happens at the end of this month, but a number of people are going to be looking closely at and archiving the table as the end looms.

 

It is unfortunate that even with strong evidence of misfeasance, there is no real Survey Police to report them to.

 

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That’s absolutely appalling! That sounds very sketchy and should be reported. I have a real issue of these awful sketchy nasty survey companies doing this kind of crap. It should be illegal. There should be someone to be accountable to. That’s the biggest problem. They are accountable to nobody and can pretty much do whatever they want. That they are so brazen about it is just galling. They are probably laughing about all the complaints on the member forum. I find this disgusting. Univox is one I will not go near with a 10 foot pole. 

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Hi,

One thing you should understand about Survey Police (SP), they get substantial revenue from panels, SP is transparent about this, so don't expect SP to disturb that relationship, this is also described by the apt phrase "captured by the industry". However, you are not powerless and mute, unless you decide to be, you can voice your suspicions to relevant professional groups, regulatory agencies, state gaming and gambling commissions and so forth, but it takes work. You can start by doing basic research and drilling down on what you find about the company, and you'll find Univox is part of Market Cube and if you kept digging you would find that Market Cube is a member of ESOMAR.  ESOMAR has no authority outside its organization. However, being a member of ESOMAR has many benefits for a marketing research firm. So all you can essentially do is work to erode their reputation in a professional organization.  If enough individuals make complaints about these unethical maneuvers then their reputation is brought into question. Also, making an ESOMAR complaint goes to individuals in the C-Level and bypasses support. You may also make a complaint to BBB but the BBB is a joke.  I've posted in the forum how to make an ESOMAR complaint.  Your mission, should you chose to accept it will be to kick up some sh_t.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Every survey I've tried in the past month, either from email or at their site,  takes me to a blank page saying "Sample Cube" on top. Writing to them hasn't helped. Will report back after I call them.

URL of their forum, please. I can't find it.

 

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