I have a potential solution to the problem about some subscribers providing false credit cards. And please don’t shoot me, it is just a suggestion.
C2 can leave the current registration free, but should charge a small monthly fee to anyone who want to subscribe to systems. This fee can be very small. Say $1, or $5 a month or whatever. People can browse and review systems all they want, but if they want to subscribe to systems, they have to pay this small monthly fee to validate their credit card number. Only after their credit card is validated, would they be allowed to subscribe with the same credit card. That way when someone subscribe to a system, the vendor can know the credit card is valid. By billing them monthly, C2 can verify each month that the credit card is still valid and if it isn’t, then unsubscribe the user immediately from any systems.
This also would provide Matthew a way to compare billing address of credit cards to prevent people from signing up with different ID’s and keep on free riding trial periods of systems.
I suspect the serious and honest subscribers would not have an issue with getting charge $1 a month to be able to subscribe to systems.
But as I said… This is just a suggestion.
Regards
- Fanus
Pete,
>I’m not sure why you are pushing so hard when you as a vendor have the
>option to pick either.
I’m not charitable person, so my reasons are pretty selfish. I have a view on C2 as on diversification possibility for myself. So mainly I’m speaking from potential subscriber point of view, not as system vendor. As system vendor I’d like to be honest with my subscribers as much as I can or C2 allows. Somehow the two different points of views inter crossed with current suggestions. 
>I think that you will open up a large can of worms
Agree, but my next step is to request C2 owner(s) to give a possibility to calculate profitability of a system by C2 RF in the system configuration. I don’t care a lot about other system. I stop considering any system that doesn’t offer “pay for profitable performance period” in C2 few months ago. And main reason is I don’t fully understand systems in a market where I’d like to diversify. Survival of a system in a long period of time is best stats in the case. I only want to make conditions of the survival more realistic when real money will be involved in the game of system vendor/subscriber
>As others have pointed out, there are real problems with systems
Agree, but my suggestion is from long-term timefraime. Of course, most current issues should be resolved before any try of new business model if there will be any implementation, but I can wait
Eu
Fanus , I agree - a nominal ($1) fee for any “free” trial would solve the problem (validate the user) and really, anyone who is at all serious about a system would not mind paying a buck to signup. It doesn’t even have to be $1 per trial, it could just be a one-time $1 registration fee.
I know that some companies have the ability to place a credit hold on your card without ever actually making the charge (eventually the hold disappears). Doing that for a minimal amt (again $1) would also seem to be another way to validate that the credit card is valid without actually forcing the subscriber to pay anything. I don’t know if the credit card processor that C2 uses supports that option.
Up to now fraud has not been a major issue. It has been (and continues to be, thankfully) very rare. I suppose that as C2 grows and attracts more and more users, this issue will grow in importance. I will soon add credit card “pre-auths” to subscriber sign-ups, which is what Pete alludes to. As always, no method is perfect, but this should solve most of the problem. I’ll keep you posted.
