Home Computing, Small Talks, Webmasters - Written by Yen on Wednesday, May 21, 2008 0:16 - 25 Comments

Is MySearchFunds (Homepages Friends) a Scam?

My Search Funds LogoI think the title says it all. Is My Search Funds a scam?

If you have never heard of it, My Search Funds is new hot topic on the Internet right now. This site claims to give you money for each search you do through their site. Although you may only get 1 cent for a few searches, but what is there to lose? At least I believe that is what most users of this site thinks.

A search on the domain info reveals Alpexus Ltd as the registrant as well as the administrative and technical contact.

Alpexus Ltd.
Unit 1A Wrexham Enterprise Park
Ash Road
Wrexham Industrial Estate
Wrexham, Wrexham LL13 9JT
GB

At the homepage of Alpexus Ltd, I was greeted with a one-page website stating that the company is a specialist web marketing company helping the 3rd Sector ie. charities, voluntary groups, CVS etc to take advantage of the opportunities the internet brings.

‘Contact us’ on alpexus.com
Address: 17 Canal Wood Industrial Estate, Chirk, Wrexham, LL14 5RL
Telephone: 0800 2888669
Email: info@alpexus.com
Company Registration No: 5151615
VAT No: 811 5241 70

See the difference in address? But maybe both address are valid? So is it a scam? I do not know at this time, but I do intend to find out. Viewing the traffics details for My Search Funds on Alexa reveals that this website amazingly went from a 294,524 to a 18,972 ranking in just 3 months time.

For more information, visit my My Search Funds affiliate link. (Browsing to mysearchfunds.com will not display any information. An affiliate or ‘friend’ link is required to see the FAQs, Terms and Conditions and other pages.)

Look at the comments and judge for yourself.


Update (June 08, 2008):

Searches from my MySearchFunds are now redirected to results from yahoo.com. Previously it was google.co.uk


Update (June 10, 2008):

The MySearchFunds.com account admin page has been moved to a new domain myhpf.co.uk with the title set as ‘homepages friends’. Strange move. Could it be because of the bad reputation linked to the keywords ‘My Search Funds’. From my point of view, ‘homepages friends’ is just seems too generic.

One other thing. The logout button is not available in the new account admin site. So how do we log out? Clear cookies? Definitely not something a reputable company which cares about user security and privacy should overlook. Case of hasty copy-and-paste? Frankly, the amateurish feel had been there since the very beginning.


Update (July 01, 2008):

For the past few days, connection to mysearchfunds.com returns “Network Timeout” error. Is this the beginning of the end?

Update (August 02, 2008):

More readers are leaving a comment on this page confirming that MySearchFunds @ Homepages Friends could potentially be a scam!

No related posts.

- Written on Wednesday, May 21, 2008 0:16 - 25 Comments -


25 Comments

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TONy
May 22, 2008 21:26

Its a SCAM!!! They stole money from my bank account!!!

Yen
May 22, 2008 22:09

TONy, care to elaborate?

Joe
May 23, 2008 9:38

Mysearchfunds is a SCAM…first, they erase most of your searches , and when you reach a certain ammount of £, they start to send click fraud emails!!!???
I have reached +/- £50 , and waited 45 days past the end of that month…and nothing, they don`t pay…big SCAM and big loss of time.

kenny
Jun 4, 2008 2:53

If you don’t use it properly, the software will detect that the searches are not genuine, i have just had my 4th payment of over 3 figures GBP.
So it has worked for me, with no problems at all.
Alpexus also have another site called whitedotbox.com, or you can get to it via homepagesfriends.com
as for taking money out of a bank account, no way! show proof.
i have actually sold this on ebay for the past six months, under stay at home internet searching and be paid for it!! no-one has had any problems.

kenny
Jun 4, 2008 2:58

i have received word today, that you will only get the results from Yahoo when you search now, doesn’t bother me, at least i get something

vikki
Aug 4, 2008 11:38

Well, I have 66 searches from last night and they’re gone today. They erased my searches. I wasn’t even cheating because I was using the search engine for a research. Damn cheaters. Yahoo! even joined this bunch of scammers. Everyone should know about this scam. Tsk tsk tsk.

mel
Aug 12, 2008 6:02

yes its true, its a SCAM! i was supposed to get paid last june and i never got my money. i wrote to them like 4x, but they never replied. i think they only pay a few of their members so that someone will defend them and say that they have been paid to lure more members so that they will earn more, all the while scamming the other half.

Rob Ferrer
Aug 16, 2008 23:24

I can’t comment on everyone else’s experiences, but I’ve been paid my first £30, and have rarely had searches removed (one or two, but they were repetitions).

They seem ok to me, although I think they’ve become a victim of their own success - I think they struggle to keep up with support and other contact requests.

Hemant
Aug 27, 2008 21:37

Hey!
It’s a HUGE scam! Just like “SurfJunky”.
Now they started another site named “http://www.whitedotbox.com” by using the same company address. They havn’t paid me since last six months. Check this new site yourself. Here they said again they are tied up with search Engine “ask.com” just like mysearchfunds.
Hurray!!! They started their rotation again to catch more fish on the net!!!

Sharky
Aug 29, 2008 3:41

I found them through a sponsered ad on facebook, a bold move if it’s a scam site…

Yen
Aug 29, 2008 4:08

Scam or no scam, all sites will need some kinda advertising to get started.
And I don’t think the ad hosts/providers are responsible for the verification of legality and authenticity of every ad that comes through. Unless it’s some really crazy ads like selling kids etc…
Just my 2 cents.

Ron
Aug 29, 2008 16:12

SO whats the conclusion?

Anthony Pealson
Sep 6, 2008 7:51

They seem to pushed heavily by some people on forums, a quick look at digital point points to a member called ste1975 promoting them heavily.

If you have given your bank details to them, and also a password that is associated with either your bank account or email address I would change them with immediate effect.

Looks like a another MLM marketing scam, this time it looks like it is collect valuable data.

dezzy94
Sep 10, 2008 22:31

that ste1975 on DP has suddenly disappeared in the last week it wouldn’t suprize me weather he has something to do with HPF

Was NOT PAYED FOR AUGUST and alot of people have not SO IT’S A FECKING SCAM!

Riza
Sep 11, 2008 11:42

So this definitively is scam. Right?

TheWereWolfRR
Sep 23, 2008 15:43

It is a SCAM. Just a big liar. I had made 80 search on my first day but when i check my account the other day, IT WAS GONE! What the hack. Its not like I really care about their money, but at least their should show us some sincerity.. And for those, who’d claimed they receive they payment, congratulation. Or maybe you are just one off them, no one else. They said in their web site that it will take sometime before they can make payment to searchers. Okay, its acceptable, i can wait.. But what made me pissed off is that, they delete all my search count! This website? Is a NO.

Diomil
Sep 27, 2008 12:18

WTF??!!! ive been using it for sum days and had sum searches erases, i hope to reach the minimum and den check if they pay. ILL LET U KNOW>

Duncan
Sep 30, 2008 5:16

I have been using Whitebox since the begining of August and they seem very genuine. One of their staff lives in our area. I have only just reached the threshold for payment so am waiting my 45 days. I have no reason yet to believe that my money won’t come through. These funds were raised in the name of a charity using that charity number. We will see.

Crissy
Oct 8, 2008 21:00

My Payments
Date Method Reference Amount
Total - - £0.00
Next Payment Due
Payment due between 15-30 September 2008 for searches before 1 August 2008 £21.79

as u can see it is past the payment time (by their own calculations) and still nothing.. so yes i truly believe it is a SCAM now

as for erased searches..i’ve not watched closely to notice if i have had any but they say duplicate searches will be erased

Pheonix K
Oct 12, 2008 7:52

Except for the first comment (”They stole money”), I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a scam. Some people are getting full credit for their searches, some people aren’t getting any money, but no one is out anything. “Scam” usually means that you pay for some good/service and don’t get what you paid for. Seems like everyone is still getting their search results, which is really the important thing.

They may have a lousy system that doesn’t work as everyone expects, but bad service does not equal a scam.

jona
Oct 28, 2008 20:37

I have never had any trouble with them been paid £433.49 so far from searching referrals, I have a down line of around 600 friends,

It now also looks like they are rolling out the shopping channel very soon,
With the home pages friends referrer a friend program paying out as follows

How Much Can I Earn?
Homepages Friends is a great way for you to earn funds from your own internet searching and shopping! You can earn even more if you tell your friends and they raise funds in the same way.

We share the funds raised 50/50 with you and your friends. What is great is we will pay you some of our 50% from your friends searches and shopping in return for you referring them to us! You can refer as many friends, family or colleagues as you want!

It gets even better! As you can imagine, your friends will want to refer their friends, so can you benefit from that? Yes! We will reward you, for three ‘levels’ of friends. The same will apply to your friends. Everyone wins! Remember, the funds you earn from your friends searches and shopping do not come from yours or your friends 50%, but from our 50% in reward for your referrals.
I would say all looks good for the future of Homepages Friends and this could be web history in the making,

dezzy94
Nov 11, 2008 18:06

About a month ago i say its a scam on this site but after sending an email to MyHPF a few weeks ago they finaly payed up yesterday ……………

chine
Nov 23, 2008 7:03

to those who emailed them, what email address did you use? everytime i try to email them to remind about payment due me (thrice rolled over now, havent been paid since june) my mail bounces back. i was due payment for my june/july searches since end august. the bulletin said expect payment mid sept, was rolled over to october, then now again to mid november…. now november is ending and no news, no payment either, no bulletin either.

just because they paid out for a few doesn’t excuse them not paying out for the many who are still waiting. this does look like an MLM scam running out of the internet.

Crissy
Dec 2, 2008 12:21

chine same here… they did email me back saying they arent a scam but that they were backed up in payments.. that was 3 months ago.. so im deleting their service now.. its basically a useless search engine for me.. google turns up more accurate results as for the email i used info@homepages-friends.com .. not sure if it works still

Peter
Dec 29, 2008 8:35

i have been using the site for a few months and i tried to contact them a few times but they are not replying so i think its a scam.

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