Was told by Affiliate Window merchant store to delete affiliate tracking cookie

[Azam.net]

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A friend of mine wanted to buy a flat-screen TV. I always like to test merchants because there are more crooked merchants in this business than Mafia sunbathing in the villas of Naples. So I sat next to him as he clicked through the link from one of our sites to an AW merchant, Sound and Vision. When he added the TV to his shopping cart and tried to make payment, all of a sudden it mentioned a 2.5% charge, supposedly for using a credit card. He was shocked to see this as there was no mention of it elsewhere on the site.

So he rang the company. You know what they told him? Because he had clicked on an affiliate link (he said "all these links" are "spyware"(?)), they added the 2.5% surcharge. He told my friend to delete the tracking cookie, go back to their site and there would be no 2.5% surcharge.

So he tried to make a purchase with another AW merchant, digitaldirect. They have a similar shopping cart and identical prices, so they may be part of the same company. Guess what happens? Exactly the same - because it is an affiliate link a surcharge of 2.5% is added and the only way to get rid of it is to delete the affiliate cookie.

I am furious. If this happened in the offline arena and a merchant did not pay a staff member his wages, everybody would call him a fraudster. But because it happens with the anonymity of the internet where I can't see this merchant face to face and ask him why he told a customer to delete my affiliate tracking cookie, people feel they can get away with it.

This is the only time I've sat next to somebody and seen them try to make an order on these two sites. God knows how much commission we and other affiliates have lost because the merchants tell customers to delete the cookie.

I believe Affiliate Window to be an honourable and responsible network and hope this is an issue unique to this network of electrical retailers. I would welcome a public response and, instead of empty words, compensation from the merchants involved. This is a very serious issue.

[adamski]

Hi Azam

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. As you can imagine, we are a little shocked by your findings and intend to fully investigate the issue.

I will keep you posted on our findings.

Kind regards

Adam Ross
Key Accounts Manager
Affiliate Window Ltd.
aross@affiliatewindow.com

[loquax]

I couldn't believe this when I read it so gave it a go... sure enough on a PC without a cookie Digital Direct don't charge a surcharge... but add a cookie et voila...



Amazing!

Jason

[marky]

Nadeem, am really sorry to hear your experiences with these guys .. I guess a small positive you have exposed two companies that act like this.

I am unsure how close to entrapment this sails but is it possible to try again and get them to email you re deleting cookies / 'spyware' etc ... at least some vague sort of evidence .. no disrespect to AWIN but when I have had 'tracking' problems before (not an AWIN merchant I might add) it has taken darned ages to get the network to do anything or a longf time for them to 'investigate' ... at least this way there is more than just one persons word against the other ....

I am sure there was a thread of dodgy merchants ... (if I am dreaming can this be the start of one ?)

[Matthew Wood]

Thats astonishing.

Whats worse is that a 'debit card' purchase I believe attracts a set fee (under £1) certainly not 2.5% of the basket price, whilst the base rate commission is ony 2% for the affiliate.

The operator also knows why there is a surcharge, so it appears they know exactly whats going on. The most shocking thing I have seen for quite a while.

[adamski]

Dear Affiliates

After investigation we have now locked this merchant out of both their accounts, Digital Direct and Sound & Vision, and will be shutting them down in the next 2 days. We would do this immediately but we wanted to give the affiliates some time to take down their links.

An email to all the programmes' affiliates will be sent out tomorrow morning.

Affiliate Window has a no tolerance policy against merchants like this and we are absolutely appalled at what has been discovered. We would like to offer our sincere apologies to any affiliates affected.

Once again, thank you for bringing this to our attention.

If anyone would like to discuss this further, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards

Adam Ross
Key Accounts Manager
Affiliate Window Ltd.
aross@affiliatewindow.com

[getvisible]

I don't think something like this would (should) have got through the AW pre-launch testing ... so I can only imagine it was sneaked through after launch?

Do networks routinely check for this sort of thing?

Also how do their conversion rates compare with other in the market?

[Aquanuke]

Ive been out of the affiliate game for a while but that was shocking what Nadeem discovered. But top marks to Adam for hitting it on the head.

Big question though, how many other merchants are doing this?

Sounds like it could be someone written an app to create this and selling it to merchants to crawl back commissions ?

[chs]

Thanks for letting us all know about this Azam.

Big question though, how many other merchants are doing this?

This would be where the proposed Affiliate Association would be very useful. Members could routinely check merchants for this sort of thing and report back.

If merchants knew we were keeping a regular close eye on this kind of activity perhaps they would think twice about conning us.

[Mogga]

That is pretty shocking...

I assume some sales went through online for the stats...

Digital Direct

Conversion rate: 0.78%

Average Validation Time: 5 days

Approval Percentage: 79.31%

Earnings per hundred clicks: £8.13

[Azam.net]

Thanks for the stats Mogga. And agree with you CHS.

Thumbs up to Adam and Affiliate Window for their prompt and efficient handling of this matter.

We don't sell a huge number of electrical products through these two merchants, but other affiliates do and I hope some form of compensation can be considered.

Thank you once again Affiliate Window. I'm always had the utmost respect for this network and the handling of this issue proves once again that you are a company worth doing business with.

[Keith]

i'm gobsmacked, surely this practice is tantamount to fraud

thanks for pointing it out Nadeem and thumbs up to Awin for jumping on it and stamping it out

[Shane]

I'm just amazed.. to tell someone to delete a "spyware" aff link cookie to save a surchage is so dodgy it's worthy of a smack in the mouth to the guy that thought it was acceptable to try this con .. pure and simple, If I had been PPC'ing that I'd be livid.

Adding a surchage just because you are selling via an affiliate link is a no-no but to tell someone to delete a cookie to avoid the surcharge is just theft of commission and therefore fraud ... there is no other way to explain it.. no excuses it's a deliberate theft of commission.

merchants like that deserve to be banned from every network for life, it's not as if there aren't plenty of reputable merchants to swap links to instantly.

every day my cynicism grows stronger.. that was todays.. "look were we are at now" indicator.. very sad

well stamped on AWIN.. hope other networks are as swift if other sites practice the same fraud

[marky]

I'd like to echo Aquanuke,Keith et al on this .. excellent response by Adam at Awin for not only investigating but resolving this so quickly.

Is there a case for any legal resolution with this merchant(s) ? Surely a No win No Fee lawyer out there must be interested .......
How long has this been going on for and in theory these guys must owe a bucket load of commissions ?

Affiliate link / merchant audit time ...

[essdeekay]

As mentioned earlier - affiliate trade union anyone??

Imagine the shenanigans that some companies might be getting up to.

Well done to AW for acting promptly.

Simon