Getting Paid & Terminating Account

1. 76

   Swisstoonsposted 14 months ago

   As I approached the $50 payout a few years ago, HubPages kept changing the rules until my monthly earnings fell to a few cents per month.  I believe I'm currently making about a penny or less a month.  I want to TERMINATE my account.  But first I want to be paid the $48 and change that I am owed.  I can't believe I am the only HubPages user in this situation.  Has a class action lawsuit ever been brought against HubPages for continually "raising the bar" in order to keep the payout threshold out of reach?  I'm not talking about raising the payout threshold.  I'm talking about the path necessary to reach that threshold.
   I do not want to hear from regular HubPages contributors telling me how wonderful the company is and how happy and successful they are.  I'm interested in hearing from those in the same boat as I am; that is, if they are still around.  I'm guessing that there are perhaps thousands who, as they approached the $50 payout threshold, found that there were more and more hoops to jump through.  And, if that is the case, HubPages could be holding on to tens of thousands of dollars earned by others who were repeatedly met with new requirements for previously written articles.
   There needs to be a stipulation that anyone desiring to terminate his/her account, should be able to do so without relinquishing earnings.

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   1. 98

      Mike Grindleposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      Are any of your articles still getting traffic? As far as I can tell, none of them are featured (and are incredibly niche), so it doesn't seem all that surprising that they're not bringing in any cash.
      
      As I see it, your options are to
      1. contact the Hubpage staff and ask for your money
      2. Write a couple of articles in hopes of getting featured to get you over the threshold
      3. Let the $48 go, or just leave your account open and wait.

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   2. 91

      Kenna McHughposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      When we signed up to write for HP, we agreed to their terms and conditions. One is the payout limit. You have some valid suggestions in this thread that will get your earnings up to 50 bucks. Thus, you'll get your payout.

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      1. 76

         Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

         My Squidoo account was automatically switched to HubPages when HP bought Squidoo.  I do not recall the conditions that existed at that time.  But if HubPages is allowed to shift the conditions under which money is earned, theoretically, they could add any number of new conditions as they saw fit, whenever they felt like it, so that no one would ever get paid.   There needs to be an OPT OUT option for anyone who simply wants to get paid for past work.  A reasonable condition for such an opt-out would be that the contributor would be barred for life.  In any company, if an employee decides to quit, the employer does not have an option to pocket that employees earnings.

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         1. 91

            Kenna McHughposted 14 months agoin reply to this

            I hear you. Still, if it's in the terms and conditions, then you're like the rest of us, though, can email the HP team and put in a request.

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   3. STAFF

      Matt Wellsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      You have to reach the $50 payout threshold to get paid. This cannot be circumvented by closing your HubPages account. I suggest updating or creating new articles to increase traffic to earn more money.

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2. 96

   PaulGoodman67posted 14 months ago

   I had an account that was in a similar position, close to payout for a long time, but earning only a matter of cents per month. I intended to email HP and ask if I'd get the money if I closed it down before payout, but didn't get around to it.
   
   The account eventually reached payout last month after 8 years!
   
   You're in a worse position, though, as you have no featured articles.
   
   I would start by emailing them, if there's no official response to this thread, and asking what the situation is. I doubt that a lawsuit over $48 would be your own interest!

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   1. 76

      Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      Well, a class action doesn't involve an individual.  It involves a group suing a company.  Penalties are involved.  The ones who make a ton are the lawyers who take a case on a contingency basis.  They take 1/3 of the total amount awarded.

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3. 97

   eugbugposted 14 months ago

   I thought that when you close your account, you get what's owed to you. Maybe I'm wrong.

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4. 96

   PaulGoodman67posted 14 months ago

   I looked it up to be sure.
   
   From help answers: "If you close your account, your Earnings Program balance is subject to forfeiture. Please review your balance amount and the payment timing guidelines, and do not close your account if you do not want to forfeit your current balance"
   
   So you may have to revive a few old articles, write a new one, or lose the $48!

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   1. 97

      eugbugposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      Why should it be forfeited? It seems like a ploy to keep authors behind an Iron Curtain so they're reluctant escape and they life in hope of eventually reaching payout which may not happen for years.  Meanwhile Hubpages can keep the money in the bank. I can understand Hubpages having a threshold to reduce the expense of paying out too regularly, but if an author wants to leave, that's a different story.

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      1. 96

         DrMark1961posted 14 months agoin reply to this

         I cannot feel sorry for someone who just set up an account to sell on Etsy or plug a bunch of Amazon products that he has never used. Changes were made so that HP would not go the way of Squidoo.
         He suggests a class action suit because HP no longer allowed all of those spammy links? I certainly do not think that HP needs to cater to that person or worry about those payments for someone who closes their account because things have changed. (It is the internet and things do change.)

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         1. 97

            eugbugposted 14 months agoin reply to this

            Fair enough in this specific case, but I don't understand the logic of why HP would keep someone's earnings. Is it a form of compensation for work involved in closing the account?

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            1. 95

               theraggededgeposted 14 months agoin reply to this

               I suppose because someone could rinse and repeat, set up new accounts, in order to bypass the minimum payout. In many countries, $10 is a lot of money.
               
               Keeping it strictly at $50 requires a commitment from the writer. After all, HubPages provides the platform and technology as their part of the deal.

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               1. 96

                  PaulGoodman67posted 14 months agoin reply to this

                  I was thinking the same as Bev about some people opening and closing for relatively trivial amounts.
                  
                  Plus having a threshold is standard practice for all these earning sites and I'd be surprised if any of them allow earners to withdraw amounts below the threshold because earners are leaving.
                  
                  If you turn it around, what's in it for the site to help out someone financially who's chosen to leave? Like Bev says, it's a two-way contract.
                  
                  If the threshold was bigger, there'd be an argument for HP acting unfairly, but $50 is not a huge amount of money for most people who live in North America, Western Europe, etc. And I say that as someone who lives on a limited budget.
                  
                  While it's certainly true that writing and earning on here is way more difficult nowadays, it's not necessarily that hard to earn a few dollars/month and reach threshold within a year or so. You still have to do some editing, but it is largely passive income, once you've published.

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               2. 81

                  Justice Ndlovuposted 14 months agoin reply to this

                  I agree with you. This also helps to get rid of the spammers and people just trying to promote their product for the short term.
                  
                  I have only been on the platform for 4 weeks with a total $0.25 but I understand that things will improve as I publish more articles over the long term.

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                  1. 96

                     DrMark1961posted 14 months agoin reply to this

                     Hi Justice I just read your article on billionaires and debt. It was well written and answered a lot of questions.
                     
                     There are a lot of things you can do to make the article more SEO friendly (which will increase your page views and increase your income from this site) like going into Google suggest and finding out what kind of questions people are asking, and then changing your capsule titles to the questions and putitng them into H3 format. (You can do that in the text capsule that HP provides to us.)
                     
                     Here are some more tips: https://backlinko.com/google-ranking-factors
                     We cannot change all of them, like things that have to do with optimizing the site, but we can change each of our articles to follow suggestions like adding sources, adding searchable titles to text capsules, images, etc.
                     
                     One thing I did notice was that most of your articles are about financial matters but it does not state anything about your expertise in the profile or the bio that is on each article. Are you familiar with EAT? Google will not rate your articles on financial articles unless you have expertise in that area, so you might want to make some changes there.
                     
                     Best of luck here.

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                     1. 81

                        Justice Ndlovuposted 14 months agoin reply to this

                        Hey Dr. Mark. Thank you so much for all the information and advice that you provided. I'm still a beginner at SEO.
                        
                        I will get started on fixing my articles and bio. And once again thank you for providing value!

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         2. 76

            Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

            I'm not asking for your pity, Wise Guy.  I'm asking only for my share of the money my few postings earned for HubPages.  As to your point that the internet changes, maybe, in the interest of fairness, HubPages could do what Zazze, Amazon Merch and others do; namely, pay everyone what they earn, monthly, through PayPal.  No checking-cutting; no envelope-stuffing; no postage.  But, of course, why do that when you can pocket every cent by adding more and more stipulations in order to hide published pages?

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            1. 96

               DrMark1961posted 14 months agoin reply to this

               Did you read the TOS before publishing here?
               
               By the way, HP does pay everyone monthly through Paypal. All they have to do is earn over $50, even if it is cumulative.

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               1. 76

                  Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

                  I get paid by Zazzle with a check, at my request.  But for those who choose to be paid via PayPal, the threshold is $25.  AmazonMerch deposits directly into a user's bank account...and there is no payout threshold.  Contributors are paid monthly, no matter how small the amount.

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                  1. 96

                     DrMark1961posted 14 months agoin reply to this

                     Congratulations. If you are doing so well why are you so worried about less than $50?

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      2. 76

         Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

         Exactly.  I don't think a judge would go along with the notion that a company gets to keep an employee's earnings when the employee leaves for whatever reason.

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         1. 96

            PaulGoodman67posted 14 months agoin reply to this

            But are you an employee of HP?

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5. 62

   TessSchlesingerposted 14 months ago

   Hubpages policy says that if you close your account before payout, you lose it. So, in your case, I would write something, anything, that was guaranteed to get a readership - remember that hubpage members can read it as well. As far as I know, Hubbers can also click on the the ad.
   
   Then close it.

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6. 83

   bhattucposted 14 months ago

   In various sites the views have been going down with time and it is really very difficult to reach up to the first payment threshold.

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   1. 76

      Swisstoonsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

      ...especially when HubPages can change conditions anytime they feel like it.  It's a pretty nifty racket, isn't it?   I don't know how many writers contribute to the site, but when HubPages can change, on a whim, the conditions necessary to earn, theoretically they could be sitting on hundreds of thousands (or even several million) of dollars in the accounts of people who are stuck at $20...or $30...or $48 like I am!  It adds up.

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      1. 93

         Sherry Hewinsposted 14 months agoin reply to this

         I'm a little confused about these changed conditions you keep talking about. What conditions were changed in your opinion? I have not noticed any new requirements for getting paid.

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7. 97

   eugbugposted 14 months ago

   Don't Adsense payout if you close your account?
   
   Edit: They have a cancellation threshold of $10.
   https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/9914?hl=en
   
   Hubpages could give forfeited earnings to their favourite charity.

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8. 94

   MariaMontgomeryposted 14 months ago

   Consider writing some actual articles that are interesting to read, instead of just listing products for sale.

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9. 91

   Jodahposted 14 months ago

   Just write one or two more articles, that are actually interesting or helpful and not  just advertising products and you should reach the $50 threshold in no time (as you are so close.) I know if it was me I would do whatever it takes to reach it as soon as possible, rather than waste time complaining. HP only pays via PayPal, so there is no “checking-cutting; no envelope-stuffing; no postage” anyway.

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