Very disappointed, bad money-making scheme (ciao.co.uk)

Member Name: Stephoohla

Product:	ciao.co.uk
Date:	15/08/09 (101 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Free site

Disadvantages: Hardly lets you take any surveys, difficult to navigate around

To introduce myself, I am a poor teenager, despite having a full time job, and am always on the look out for extra ways to make money.

I remembered that a while ago a friend told me that they made a bit of money doing surveys online, so I went into Google, typed in 'surveys for money' and click go. The first site that came up was Ciao.co.uk. I'd heard of it before, but wasn't 100% what it did, so clicked on it and signed up for an account. This was easy enough, you just type in some contact details, create a username, password, etc, all the usual stuff for making an account on a website. I then had to confirm my email address by clicking on a link they sent me, and voila, I was in.

Without an hesitancy, I immediately clicked on to do a survey, only to be told I should enter some profile information so it is easier for the site to find surveys for me. About half an hour later of filling in never-ending questions, I was done, so again, tried to do a survey.

I was asked a few random questions on the first page, such as do I have children living in my home (no), am I the main grocery buyer (no) and something else (no), clicked enter, and it told me I did not qualify for the questionnaire.

No panic, I just put it down to an anomaly and figured it was because it was the first time I'd tried. So I tried to do another survey, and it asked me one question about the occupations of those living in my house. I clicked a few options, clicked the next button, and again, it said I did not qualify for the survey.

After three more tries, I hate to say I was losing patience. I'm 19, nearly 20, years old, I work full time, I'm fully British, I buy different products all the time, so why oh why does no one want to know my opinion? I would have thought that I cover at least the teen-young 20s market.

About two months has gone by since I joined the site, and I reckon I've applied for about 50 different surveys, but everytime I do not qualify. It's been a waste of my time, completely.

The site was free to make an account on, so at least I haven't lost anything. However, the site was quite confusing to use. I heard that Ciao is similar to Dooyoo, in that you can write reviews for money, but after exploring the site I couldn't find anywhere where you could write a review.

Apparently Ciao used to top Dooyoo by far, but I have to say that in my fairly short experience of using both sites, Dooyoo is miles better. It's easier to use and actually allows you to take part in things!

I get emails from Ciao all the time telling me they've found a survey for me to take part in, but when I answer the questions, it tells me I don't qualify. Why send me the email then? I've entered sooo much personal information about myself on my profile that they asked me to fill in, so why from that couldn't they tell what I can and can't qualify for?

Maybe if I was older, owned my own business, had kids, etc, Ciao WOULD want to know my opinions, but I guess there's no way of finding out right now!

Summary: I wasn't impressed by the site as it constantly told me I didn't qualify for surveys