Swagbucks

What: Swagbucks proposes to pay consumers to complete surveys and play games, but don’t expect to make minimum wage

Expected pay: 1 cent to $2 per survey — about $1 an hour

Husl$core: $$

Commissions & Fees: NA

Requirements: Be over the age of 13; have computer or cell phone and loads of free time; other qualifications vary by the survey

Where: Nationwide

Review:

You’re not going to make a living taking surveys online at Swagbucks — or any other survey site, for that matter. Even fans of the site talk about making tens of dollars. A month. If you’re lucky. 

After wasting 5 minutes filling out general profile questions, for instance, I was offered the opportunity to earn 5 points — worth five cents — for filling out another survey. Swagbucks helpfully cautioned me to fill out the survey carefully and accurately or I might miss out on this and similarly lucrative opportunities in the future.

We estimate that this job pays roughly $1 an hour. If you’re efficient. If you accumulate enough points, you can turn the points into gift cards at a rate of 1 penny per point.

As far as I can tell, the best way to make money on Swagbucks is to convince your friends to sign up, which could get you a referral fee of $3. Other activities that might earn a decent number of points involve buying something — bad idea — which will “earn” a rebate. You will invariably pay more for the product than you get back in points. So get lured into buying things you weren’t buying anyway. Even if you do buy here, make sure you price-compare to make sure that your rebate isn’t just giving you back the amount that you’re overpaying for the product.

Survey sites, Swagbucks included, also require that you give up a huge amount of personal information. Of course, you give out a huge amount of personal information to data miners on Facebook too — and they don’t even offer to pay pennies for the privilege. 

When is Swagbucks worth your time? When you’re stuck in an airport or in line at the DMV and don’t have anything better to do. Some people also do Swagbucks and other survey sites when they’re watching t.v.

Recommendations:

There are dozens of survey sites that pay similarly low rates. If you want to earn more, you may be better off signing up to do focus groups. You won’t be called for a focus group every day, but they pay well when you are. Some places to sign up for focus groups:  FocusGroup.com, FindFocusGroup.com or Consumer Opinion Services. 

What their users say

(from SurveyPolice):

I initially signed up for this website because there seemed to be so many people raving about it. However, once I was a member, I saw it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. I’d literally sit and let an entire playlist run, only to realize I hadn’t earned a single point.

Only earned a little over 200 points [$2] since the beginning of the year. I just deleted my account after seeing numerous emails in my inbox from Swagbucks for their “panelist offers.” I’ll stick to survey sites that I can actually cash out with.

If you dont mind the slow build up of points then its a fun place, If you want to provide your opinion & be paid quickly, then its probably not the best place for those needs. Overall you will have fun with all their options to earn points but you wont earn much or earn it quickly.

Yes I have received money from this site, but the time taken to get anything is not remotely worth the effort.