ePerks- A Scam or A Gem?

Following our initial review of ePerks, one of the comments was quiet negative:

I’m a Real Estate agent in Northern Virginia and was duped into buying into this ePerks thing. I bought two zip codes and they have taken the money out of my account and now I can’t find a single ad for them, and they refuse to answer any of my e-mails. I’m afraid this is just another flash in the pan, get rich quick scheme to rob Agents of their hard earned money. Every year new ones pop up with great hype about how they are going to flood you with clients and all you get are large bills and no responses.

And then this YouTube (see below) video showing a Realtor hit by a truck- evidently meant to convey a message that a potential customer will get a better deal using a Realtor listed on ePerks. However Realtors are/were one of the first after whom founders and creators of ePerks “went after”. So what do you think about ePerks? Is it a gem? Is it a scam? Please leave your comments below. Here is the video:

UPDATES:
This post is long overdue for some updates. The Brabus Ventures (now DotNext Inc) lawyer Ron Cook sent me a cease and desist threat on February 13, in which he accused me for having “fabricated” all the negative comments on this post, and of course he was very upset over the fact that I challenged few “positive” comments made most likely by the employees of ePerks. I certainly feel vindicated in this regard, when the astortufrifng on behalf of Brabus/DotNext Inc’s newest startup LeapFish.com became so obvious that the worlds leading technology blog TechCrunch had to block their IPs to stop them from astroturfing.

In June of 2008 Brabus Ventures file a civil claim against me and this blog- the case was settled in October. I have to say a huge thank you to Greg Swan, Andy Beard, Lord Matt, Trace Richardson and hundreds of other bloggers for supporting me during this time. Without you support and spreading the word about my troubles I simply would not have been able to afford an attorney to defend myself.

I have to point out that for over one year comments on this blog post were closed, however the dissatisfied clients continued to express their frustration- out of all websites I would like to point out two in particular – the Ripp Off Report and BBB.org

ePerks Reviews on Ripoff Report:

However, if you hesitant to believe things written on Ripoff Reprot the BBB.org website has updated their rating of ePerks to Unsatisfactory.

In recent days many agents trying to demand a refund are given an answer that ePerks is to file for bankruptcy and offering a 20% discount. It is very likely that many of these dissatisfied agents are not aware that Brabus/DotNexInc have just launched a new startup called “LeapFish.com”.

125 replies on “ePerks- A Scam or A Gem?”

  1. Vlad, and the other 2 people that are heavily involved in the negative comments on this blog.

    You have clearly used this companies name to simply bring traffic to your site and to increase your members. I run several blogs and I am now in contact with this company and I will be personally exposing Vlad and this agenda online.

    Vlad, you have decided to make your living by defaming this company and calling them names while playing a victim and claiming that they or others are attacking you. The only individual attacking anything is you. You are attacking people by calling names and your entire blogs is attacking eperks.

    I also want you to know Vlad that it looks like certain people were not entirely aware of this blog of your at this company. I had a long conversation with a VP yesterday and they are now aware of you full on.

    I will be personally working to expose you online and as I understand it you will be served by them shortly as you have damaged a good idea and company.

    I hope you as well as your type of people learn not to play dirty anymore.

  2. By the way. I am involved heavily in blogging and marketing and I want every user to know that Vlad is closing this thread purely for search engine positioning reasons. See there is a dirty agenda here that looks to be funded perhaps by Vlad or competitors. Vlad wants things prime and center on the engines and so he is waiting for the right moment to close of the blog.

    Another tactic known in the industry. Another angle of agenda by mr vladimer. Everyone should know this on this blog. We will soon have a blog about Vlad and if vlad has this site still open I will make a post inviting everyone to discuss their experience, knowledge of this mans tactics and affiliations.

    you can contact me at: jsadighij@yahoo.com

  3. John,

    Your comments are back, but I did took them off because they did not address my question above about incentives.

    However I changed my mind after trying to e-mail you. Turns out it is a fake e-mail.

    Anyway, your comments above show me that you know as much about marketing as you do about real estate. Keeping comments opened on a thread like this means more content for the search engines. I can tell you how many times this article came up on the first page of search engines because of the keywords in the comments. Nice try though.

    Again f you would like to address my question about “ePerks incentives” you are welcomed to do so. If you continue to attack and threaten me- your comments will be deleted for good.

  4. After moving the comments moderation to IntenseDebate, I have decided to once again open the comments on this post. Anyone from DotNex Inc, Brabus Ventures, ePerks and/or any other affiliated company or business should be aware that astroturfing will not be tolerated and you will loose the privileged of commenting on this blog forever.

  5. I signed up with Eperk about a year an a half ago. Never got any leads from them. After a while, I called and complained. All the sudden I had leads here and there, but they were all garbage Either the phone number doesn't work, a fax number doesn't work, or no one answers the phone. And then they started to double charged me for their monthly service, and they charged me an small extra amount.

    I cancelled the service back in August and asked them about the money back gaurantee program that they offered when I first signed up. Within a week,they sent me a stupid stamped certificate, saying that I qualify for the refund, but I won't get it for another 5 months. The time has finally arrived and I still have not receive any checks. I have been calling the company for about 3 days, finally I got a hold of someone. They told me since the economy is so bad, they do not have enough money to pay back all the agents, and they are in the process of filling for bankruptcy as well. Therefore I have two choices, one is take 20% of the total refund, or 12 months installments, but they still don't guarantee I will get my money back once they go bankrupt. Later they sent me a settlement and general release form to sign. The agreement also included a lot of terms. If I sign the release form, I will agree that I will not directly or indirectly diclose the fact of and terms of the agreement to anyone except my attorney or accountant for tax purposes. Release any claims with Eperks, and agree not to make any comments in any capacity relating to the company.

    Is there anything we can do about this company? Who and where can I report this issue to? Is there a class action going on?

  6. I am a contractor in the DC area and also got ripped off by ePerks. They charged me $399 to supposedly have a huge amount of traffic come to my web-site. after two month, not even ONE visit to my site came from ePerks. After being refused a refund, I called American Express to dispute the charge and was happy to learn two weeks later that the dispute was resolved in my favor. Unfortunately, this was simply a maneuver on ePerks side to undertake the legal battle with me instead of American Express, as they sent me a Notice of Delinquency a few weeks later that stated "Last Notice" (the only notice I got) and threatened to report this to the credit bureaus. I have since done some research on the net and found out how sleazy this company is and that I am not the only one being ripped off. How can this be allowed to go on? What do we need to do to stop these eJerks!!

  7. I cancelled my account after the 8 month guarantee period and asked for my guaranteed refund since I had no leads during that time. They sent me a letter confirming that, indeed, I qualified for a refund. BUT they took another month payment and charged to my credit card AFTER I HAD CANCELLED. When I complained, they said they would include that charge on my Refund Certificate. When the refund certificate came it promised a refund 8 MONTHS away and the extra charge was not included. Many phone calls resulted in no customer service at all!. I finally called my credit card company to dispute the extra charge taken after cancellation. Several months later I get a collections notice for the exact amount of the disputed charge. When I called to get it resolved I was told that I NO LONGER QUALIFIED to get a refund because I was delinquent!!! Delinquent on a charge that wasn't theirs! I followed the rules by maintaining an account in good standing with timely payments for 8 months per the requirements for a refund guarantee if there was no ROI during that time. Beware. They will find any excuse not to refund your money per their guarantee.

    1. Part 1) I have had the almost the exact experience with Eperks. I am thoroughly disgusted with them. I argued the ninth month charge as well but I let them take it assuming I would be reimbursed. Well the only thing they got right was the amount on the bogus Refund certificate they sent me. Wait an additional 8 months who ever heard of such a ridiculous claim. I filled out their forms to verify that I had no closings with their customers closings hell I never go a lead with three zips! I finally contacted the Attorney general in My state and they managed to get an email reply at the beginning of this month (Fef 2009). They skated around the issue and said they never said we would give him his money back right away.

  8. part 20 I tried calling today and there is no answer. the phone rings and rings and then finally hangs up. NOT A GOOD SIGN. I AM PRETTY SURE THEY SCREWED ME! I will be contacting the Attorney General in California very soon. Brabus Ventures is closed the phone is disconnected but DOTNExt (do you believe the name dotnext should be dotnext rip off or dotnext succer) and something called SAVESTUB are operating out of the same address and one has the same phone when you search the local yellow pages. This COMPANY IS A SCAM A RIP OFF!. And if they want me to shut up all they have to do is return the money they owe me over THREE THOUSAND DOLLARS. the bastards! All pf us that are involved should do the most we can to get our money back (doubtfull) and prevent others falling for the e-perks scam.

  9. Eperks is a rip off!!! I have told them to delete my profile as I do not give "cash back" and that I don't know how I even got on their website. She told me it was free and I told her "I don't care, take me off". She never did. Called back a second time was told I would be taken off and never was. Called back 3 times and now no one answers the phone so now I am filing a complaint with the BBB. We'll see what happens. You best believe there is someone working for eperks sitting down at a chair writing these BS positive comments. Eperks is a joke!

  10. I really need to find out the answer for the following questions. If anyone have any information, please let me know, and I Thank You in advance.

    1. Anyone hear anything about a class action against eperks?

    2. Office address or customer service number?

    3. How do you join eperks?

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