Is Swag Bucks a Scam?

Swag Bucks scams you in the most legitimate way they can. The basic premise is, you sign-up, download the toolbar, search, vote on polls, participate in the community, refer friends and complete “special offers.” All of these actions will earn you Swag Bucks which you can in turn redeem for gift cards and various other types of merchandise.

In many ways its legitimate, it doesn’t scam you out of money, but it does scam you out of time. If you’re not careful, you will definitely be scammed out of your privacy. Many, if not most of the special offers are those you might find in your spam folder within your email. One special offer I clicked led me to an easy, “fun” quiz. After submitting the quiz it took me to an endless cycle of offers that, before I would be given the 10 or so Swag Bucks, I had to complete at least one of them. I decided to forgo the Swag Bucks and get out of that cycle.

There are a few offers that only require you to watch a video and within minutes you are awarded the Swag Bucks. There are also offers from well known businesses like GameFly and Netflix. Before taking advantage of these offers you have to ask, will I make money on the offer, and is this a service or subscription that I would be interested in if I didn’t earn Swag Bucks? If the answer to both those questions are “yes,” then consider the special offer. I decided I would take advantage of the GameFly subscription for 1 month.

The first thing I did was look at how many Swag Bucks I would get for subscribing. I would receive 1,232 Swag Bucks for a 1 month subscription at $8.95. Next, I went to the Swag Store to see what I could get for those 1,200 Swag Bucks. A $5 Amazon.com gift card costs 450 Swag Bucks. The subscription would cost me $8.95, but I would earn $10 in Amazon.com gift cards netting me $1.05 and leaving me with 332 Swag Bucks.

Just for signing up and using the Swag Bucks search engine I was able to earn and win 91 Swag Bucks. That, in combination with the remaining 332 Swag Bucks from the GameFly offer, left me with 423, dangerously close to the 450 required for another gift card. I searched for awhile and didn’t earn anything and I had gone over most of the special offers, so I decided to call it a night.

The next morning, I did some searches and didn’t win anything. I then checked the special offers pages and found some videos to watch and things to “Like” on FaceBook, which earned me the Swag Bucks needed for one more Amazon.com gift card. So, over the course of a few hours, I earned enough Swag Bucks for $15 in gift cards. It doesn’t sound like such a bad deal. However, because I took advantage of the GameFly offer I really only made $6.05 over the course of the few hours, or $2.02 per hour.

The average person will probably not earn $2.02 per hour. It was because I took advantage of the GameFly offer that gave me that high rate. You will, unless you are vigilant in referrals and take advantage of the special offers, earn substantially less. If you think about it, many people are unsatisfied with how much they are paid at work, that their time is worth more than the minimum wage they’re getting. If you’re satisfied in earning  less than $2.02 an hour in your spare time, Swag Bucks could be something fun to do.