Ohana Media - Stay away from them http://www.ohana-media.com I have been a publisher with them for three months and they owe me around $930 and now when I asked them payment which was due for over a month...here comes the reply.. "Please take off our adcode from your site with immediate effect. We have received notification about click fraud on your site on our ad units. Investigation of the same is under way - and we are waiting for some clarifications from our click forensic vendors in a day or two. No payments can be cleared till the click fraud issue is resolved." Shameek Clearly shows the motives of the company... I genuine company should have sent the payment within 30 days as the payment terms are net 30.. They later said its 30 days after the receipt of the invoice..But its more than 45 days now...and I got this reply after I mailed them 5 times.. Clearly a fraud company.. Stay away... Contacting friends at Hyd to take the legal angle to the issue..Will book them for sure.. Check the screenshot below...clearly says March and april earnings finalised Abhilash.
Finally after a lot of emails and phone talk, I got my payment for March and April. However they said that there has been a click fraud in the month of May 2010 for a day or so and the amount for that would have to be adjusted to which I agreed. However, all this mess would have been avoidable if they did sent the payment on time. So I guess as I received my payment its not a fraud company but still one has to deal with care and would have to communicate a lot to get payments. Will wait and watch before recommending this to everybody else, lets see how they improve hereon
They panic. Companies that state "click-fraud" after being able to pay out months before without any problem and now this change? They simply couldn't afford the payout at the time or simply didn't. As this story goes, they simply couldn't afford it at the time.
Hey guys, We followed procedure, and informed the publisher as soon as we received a notification from our click fraud detection service provider. Payments were kept on hold till we investigated the matter further, and after a manual audit ( manual audits are necessary because click fraud detection service providers also do raise a false alarm at times ) - when we were convinced it was a one-off case, we paid out to the publisher. If you notice, in the original email snip by the publisher on this thread, we clearly mentioned to the publisher we will be able to resolve it in a day or two. From the time-stamp, looks like the publisher posted this within 30 minutes of receiving the "there's a click fraud flag on your site - wait for a couple of days" notification from us ! Clearly a knee-jerk reaction.
And this thread clearly show how some people are expert in claiming programs as scam in matter of few minutes lol.
@harrisunderwork : absolutely correct! In INDIA legal claims are not possible for online marketing or online scamming as of my experience! so, its waste of time for INDIANS who proceed with Legal Claims...! legal claims are only avalilable for ripping off Credit cards and bank accounts, buying something in a fraud way! so to be frank, i would say these legal claims does not make them afraid of you guys...they just suck Publisher's Time and money!!!
Being an American who lived in India for almost six years, my only advice to you Indians is to tap into a non-Indian-based escrow service so that contracts can be enforced. It is amazing how consistently I saw people bend their morals with justifications and excuses in order to avoid making payments that were due to others. An escrow system which would enforce contracts, and thus create trust, if implemented, would make India a much more competitive marketplace. So many in India refrain from partaking in transactions on all levels as to not get entangled in such nonsense. Coming back to America it felt like such a relief that if I don't want a shirt I bought that I can return it to the store for a full-refund without question; that I can walk into a department store without a security guard asking me to put my bag in his storage compartment; that I can trust that the meter on the taxi is accurate; that the taxi driver won't lie to me that his meter isn't working and try to highball the price... well, the list goes on and on. My wife is an Indian, and I have love for her, her family, and India, but, India needs some help in the trust/fraud department, and thus an knee-jerk response from ecolatur is no surprise. I am always knee-jerking there. In India you assume that the average stranger is nontrustable. That is the only way to survive, or so it seems. Sorry about this rant. I really, deeply, wish the best for all of you, and hope that this whole modernization/globalization wave that is hitting India will help create a more respectful public space. India, in my eyes, is like a fantastic foundation with a poorly built house on it. The start was right, but somewhere something went wrong. But, it is never too late for change!
Andrea, that is how things work there in India. There is such an atmosphere of distrust that people instantly assume the dishonest intent of others even for the slightest glitch. In India if I order a chocolate croissant and there is little chocolate in it, I think they are cheating me. In America, I think that that is the style of the bakery (and might just not return). This shows you how our reactions are formulated by our preconceptions.
@OrganicHotelMarketing : you the man! bytheway, whats your name? and it was a good and appreciative reply...
@blogkora Thanks for appreciating my reply. As a straight talking American I usually get attacked by Indians when I speak openly about India. For some reason many Indians have vulnerable senses of themselves and thus fight hard to maintain a positive self-concept. My Indian wife, who is absolutely lovely, is also the most insecure person I've ever met- at times. It is part of the cultural conditioning, for many at least. Indians simply can't take criticism as a whole, which just hurts their ability to accept things as they are, regroup, and take fresh steps forward. I know there are many exceptions to these generalizations, but still I stand by them as strong elements in the Indian psyche. My name is Ken, by the way. @Hearthrobz Yes, this is the type of response I usually get when I talk about India. People think that the India that I saw was not "their" India. It makes you feel safe this way. I lived in South India (Mysore) and Pune mainly. Although I did spend many months in Goa and H.P. In addition, I traveled by motorcycle, train, bus, car (I had a nice old Mercedes while living there), and foot from the southern reaches of Tamil Nadu and Kerala up through Central India (including Mumbai, Gujarat, Delhi...) and into the mountains on both sides: West (HP/Kashmir/Ladakh) and East (Darjeeling/Sikkim/Kalimpong). I know that the best chaats are at Saraswati Chaats in Mumbai. I know that Sanjeev Kapoor makes some of the tastiest Indian haute cuisine, I know the best lasagna in India is at the Leela Palace in Bangalore, and I know all about the flow of money, the local investment schemes, the high interest black market loans, the pawning of jeweleries, the dowries, the farmer suicides, what is in the tap water, the corruption and how it effects everything from the thickness of the roads to the funding for services, the attitude of most government officials, etc, etc, etc. I've been driven around plenty in a white government car with the red light on top with my government official friend. And, I've smoked beedies with fisherman and farmers, watching life pass by slowly, while eating idlys for 5o paise. I know India pretty damn well. (Never been to the NE though- the whole Assam-Manipur-Nagaland area). While living in India I used to post on the forum indiamike.com. Check it out. Read about what foreigners are experiencing in India. It makes for funny and fascinating reading. My old username, by the way, was livin-in-india.
Hey all, I don't want to continue with this conversation (I say before it gets messy). I made a point for non-Indians to get a sense of the cultural influences on the situation, and enough said. I am out. Please!
To OrganicHotelMarketing, This thread isnt in the cultural section but in the affiliate section and the topic is about "http://www.ohana-media.com". So no need to impart your knowledge about cultural influences on the situation to create a sense. I too dont wish to make a mess, so stick with the topic titles. cya.
I run a small company in Hong Kong and I have been doing business with Ohana media for the last 10 months. They have always been very prompt in mailing, paying back etc. So much so that I have even recommended them to couple of other companies. This incident comes as a surprise to me because I haven't experienced anything like this with them earlier. Unlike other digital media companies whom I have had bitter experiences with, Ohana came across as a very professional organization.
Was searching for Ohana media's US address and found this post.I thought I should register and offer my vote!