Make Money Online Without Spending Any - Plus, Pitfall and Scam

When you are looking for ways to make money online without spending any, you are bound to be drawn to companies offering free or reduced fee introductory memberships. There are some companies where membership is free forever. Other companies offer free membership for a trial period; at the end of the trial, you decide whether you want to continue as a full member. At that stage, you either cancel or stump up the fee.

This sort of deal is pretty standard; you will find concessionary low start offers being made by all kinds of businesses (for instance, credit card companies and utility companies). So, why is it that online companies get so much criticism for offering exactly the same type of deal?

I have just read a couple of forum threads written by people who have decided that free/low cost start-up concessions are scams and the people owning companies making such offers are crooks. There are a variety of "reasons" put forward by the contributors to the thread I was reading. These are the main ones:

1. Did not realize they would have to pay when the trial expired if they failed to cancel.

2. Forgot to cancel the membership.

3. Used a pre-paid debit card with insufficient funds and incurred bank overdraft charges.

4. Didn’t think the service/product was worth the full membership fee.

Do these sound like reasons to condemn the company as a scam run by crooks? Let’s look at each one in turn:

Number 1. Low cost or free trial offers are not scams. If a dealership offers you a free test-drive in a brand new sports car, you don’t assume that you can drive it away and keep it forever without paying anything.

Number 2. There is only one person to blame, and it isn’t the company.

Number 3. Again, only one person to blame.

Number 4. The point of the "almost free" trial is to let people see what they will be getting without forking out a full month’s membership. In any event, the fact that something might not live up to our expectations does not make it a scam.

On the plus side, these free or low cost trials can be great money savers, and they are an excellent way to sample products and services with little or no cost and no ongoing obligation.

The pitfall is that the consumer must remember to cancel within the required time-frame if he does not wish to continue with the company after the trial expires. You need to make sure you note the cancellation date in your diary, otherwise you will be liable to pay the fees demanded.

Scams? There are certainly plenty around, and many are targeted at people seeking a way to make money online without incurring any expense. With common-sense and a little caution, scams should be pretty easy to avoid. Offering a low cost or free trial is a legitimate marketing technique. You should easily be able to spot a scam by reading the terms of the offer: if it does not tell you exactly how to terminate the deal at the expiry of the free trial, be suspicious, be very suspicious.

If you want to find a way to make money online without spending any, make the most of low cost or free trials, but make sure you read all the small print and understand exactly what you need to do to avoid paying for something you decide you don’t want.