Toluna and ReCaptcha

Toluna is one of the better survey sites with lots of surveys to take each day and a half-way decent pay out rate. It's also been one with a lot of ongoing problems such as not paying for completed surveys. Nonetheless, it's a hard site to avoid if you are serious about online survey taking.
Recently, Toluna seems to have added an annoying feature designed to foil automated survey takers that often plague survey companies. Toluna now in many of its surveys precedes the survey itself by having the survey taker manually fill in a "ReCaptcha" identification. This is a box with randomized words, letters and numbers that you have to type into another box in order to be allowed to take the survey.
While I understand Toluna's need for a stepped up security system, the ReCaptcha process is a pain in the you-know-where. Often the randomized letters aren't clearly visible and you have to either guess at what they are or ask for a new set of randomized letters, etc. Either way it takes more time than away from taking surveys (maybe that's Toluna's intent; to slow people down). In addition, Toluna often requires that you fill in a randomized letter and number sequence at the end of a survey - I'm not sure what this is supposed to accomplish but it once again slows things down.
There's not much you can do about this troublesome business except grin and bear it -- and hope other survey sites don't do the same thing (although several have been doing it for some time).
Just another stumbling block on the way to an enjoyable survey experience.

Downgrading Mindfield

I've written a couple of times about the Mindfield Online Internet survey panel (you can see my previous postings at http://surveysheriff.blogspot.com/search?q=Mindfield). I have given it a B grade in the past. But, I'm now downgrading it to a C-, at best.
The primary reason for the downgrade is the recent notice the company posted: Now

• Effective Immediately, Facebook merged members can cash out at anytime and any amount. That's right, merged members have no threshold limit when selecting an Amazon Gift Card* as your cashout option!
• Effective May 1, 2012, the cashout threshold for the Standard Check option will be raised to $10.00 instead of $5.00. We regret this but due to the increased costs and the number of complaints we have received regarding the reliability of the postal service, it has forced us to implement this change.

Now, it was never easy to earn at Mindfield. In fact one of the main reasons I haven't been a strong fan of the site is because it took so long to take surveys (they don't offer many), and so much longer to reach the threshold for cashing in on what you have earned. The site has now made it even harder - except as you see for those linking the site with Facebook.

So, if you acquiesce to their request to link to them via Facebook (I don't) you'll be able to cash in your meager earnings immediately and for any amount. But, if you want your earnings via check mailed to you, you'll have to wait until you accumulate $10 - and working on Mindfield that could mean a very long time.

Is this fair? You better believe it is not. What's more Mindfield has never accommodated quicker and easier payment methods such as PayPal. 

Clearly, this is a blatant attempt to restrict members from cashing out easily and/or to get into members Facebook pages. Not a very friendly way of doing business.

Another reason not to utilize Mindfield as a primary survey site. Stick to legitimate, user friendly sites such as Opinion Outpost, SurveyHead, and Focusline to mention a few.

SpringBoard America

Online Survey Review: SpringBoard America

A review of e-Poll as an online survey site earns it a “C”

By The Survey Sheriff

This is an ongoing review of popular online survey sites.  The sites offer cash, prizes, sweepstakes and other rewards for people interested in spending a few minutes or hours online taking surveys. As with all these reviews, a letter grade is given for each online survey site. The grade is based on my own experience, but also on the following criteria:

1. The rewards/prizes offered

2. The frequency of surveys available to be taken

3. How quickly payment is made for completed surveys

4. Responsiveness to customer complaints

5. Fewest glitches or other incidents that make taking a survey unpleasant.

SpringBoard America - Grade: C

SpringBoard America is a relatively new online survey site. Its parent company is called Vision Critical, based in North America but with offices around the world. Most of the SpringBoard America operation is fairly typical of online survey sites. You take a survey and you get cash called Survey Dollars. Springboard surveys seem to tend more to societal and political surveys than most online survey sites.

The Good

The surveys at this site are fairly easy to take – not too long and not too short. I’ve found them fairly interesting at times (particularly the ones on topical subjects).

The Bad

There isn’t a whole lot that is bad about SpringBoard America except for the fact that polls are few and far between. The minimum number of Survey Dollars you need to cash out is very high, $50, so it will take you quite a while to collect enough to cash in. Once you do collect the minimum it is fairly easy to cash out – you can use a PayPal account, request a $50 check be sent to you, or donate it to a US charity.

The Ugly

Nothing bad about SpringBoard America. It’s not the best site only because there are so few surveys offered and because it takes a long time to earn enough to get to the cash out minimum.

If you’d like to read my “Tips For Being A Successful Online Survey Taker - By Not Following The Rules” go to http://www.infobarrel.com/Tips_For_Being_A_Successful_Online_Survey_Taker__By_Not_Following_The_Rules#ixzz1mOLbG43K

Survey Speed Bumps

Online survey sites desperately want you to spend a lot of time thinking about and answering their questions. Of course, it's not to your advantage to spend a lot of time doing so - speed is king as I always say.
However, the companies are getting more innovative in trying to weed out the survey takers who are in the survey freeway fast lane. One of the newer methods for tripping up speedsters is to place questions within surveys designed to catch the speeders.
For example, some recent tricks include giving a question that, if you don't read it carefully, advises you not to give any answer at all, just click the "next" button or forward arrow. Another tactic is to give instructions that are long and contain a hidden message. For instance, I've come across questions such as the following: "No matter what selections you see below, choose and check the boxes that say red and green." What follows are several boxes with a variety of colors. You would normally think the question is asking what your favorite color is. If you answer in that way you'll be screened out.
So, you need to be more careful than ever. But, I still advise breaking the speed limit - it's the only way you are going to achieve a suitable number of points to gain cash and rewards. If the survey companies were really interested in having their survey taking members spend more time on a survey they might choose to increase the prize levels - but don't expect that to happen any time soon.