Originally Posted by stevo

When CCBill added the new "void transaction" feature several months ago, i noticed it was not working correctly in my NATS admin. I noticed a problem with 1 sale, I contacted NATS and they fixed the code immediately.

You on the other hand have 270 missing sales, and it took you 3+ months to find this out? You shouldn't be putting all the blame on NATS and the postback error - you should of caught this much earlier! If you run an affiliate program it is your duty to check the numbers. NATS would of helped you immidiately.

50/50 at fault

Originally Posted by kBizzle

well well well-

You'd think a company that is so cocky and full of themselves would take the time to improve their system rather than bash their competition.

I find it laughable that John and Charlie love to point out the flaws with MPA2 while in the same breath - they have worse issues to fix now

Perception is reality in this business people and if people think NATS is fucked up
then NATS is fucked up.

I already know that they can't be straight up and honest- since Charlie had told everyone I'd be representing them as their PR guy- then they had a bad time at the Players Ball and found it in their best interest to hold me accountable for their miserable time-

I still don't know why NATS being anti social at a party has anything to do with my excellent PR services-

:pimp

hmmmmm But hey it's their biz they can run it anyway they want
I guess, unless they are costing webmasters money
Then YOU run THEIR business!

Originally Posted by kBizzle

well well well-

You'd think a company that is so cocky and full of themselves would take the time to improve their system rather than bash their competition.

I find it laughable that John and Charlie love to point out the flaws with MPA2 while in the same breath - they have worse issues to fix now

Perception is reality in this business people and if people think NATS is fucked up
then NATS is fucked up.

I already know that they can't be straight up and honest- since Charlie had told everyone I'd be representing them as their PR guy- then they had a bad time at the Players Ball and found it in their best interest to hold me accountable for their miserable time-

I still don't know why NATS being anti social at a party has anything to do with my excellent PR services-

:pimp

hmmmmm But hey it's their biz they can run it anyway they want
I guess, unless they are costing webmasters money
Then YOU run THEIR business!

Originally Posted by Hornydog4cooter

Hey Ibanker is this your companys symbol IMAG.PK ?

Originally Posted by datatank

You need to wax KK has WAy better legs ;)

Originally Posted by Brad Mitchell

Looking forward to seeing everyone in Phoenix... Drinks are on me :)

Before I give my two cents, here's where I'm coming from:

1) I own a billing company that is integrated with both MPA2/MPA3 and NATS.

2) I own a hosting company and support about a dozen managed client programs that use either program, several clients that have been with each respective company through their upgrades and a few more still who have switched from one vendor to another.

3) I owned an affiliate program which was sold late last year, SinBucks, which was originally MPA2 then MPA3 then post-sale I provided technical support the new owner while he migrated to NATS.

Someone want to tell me I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about? HA, I can't fucking wait.

Now, here's my :2 cents:

All versions of every every back end package can have problems with "post-back". That's the process where the 3rd party billing company posts back to the accounting package so that a sale ultimately gets tracked and reported.

This isn't a shave, this is a technical problem. When it doesn't work, it just plain doesn't fucking work so nothing gets reported. This is something that won't start working again until gets fixed. Why does this usually happen? For one reason or another, it's usually a result of biller and merchant servers not being able to communicate properly either because of an authentication issue or a DB issue. I won't speak to the specifics of the Electracash issue that was identified, but I've seen problems with post back on both platforms with every 3rd party billing program.

Whose resposibility is what? Well, obviously when you buy software you expect it to work - and when it breaks due to no malfeasance of your own, it's reasonable to expect your software vendor to warranty it. If someone like a billing company who is somewhat of a 3rd party to the software vendor and the actual merchant decides to not be part of the solution, really everyone gets screwed except them I guess.

My point?

At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility for the integrity of an affiliate program lies with the person signing the checks. Like was suggested earlier, you reconcile your 3rd party billing reports to your payout reports. An honest business person either fixes the problem or moves to another software solution. Obviously, J&A moved so it's clear their intention is to do right by their affiliates.

NATS got stuck with a billing company that evidently wouldn't fix the problem, they did what they could in the situation unfortunately it wasn't enough to make their client happy.

:321GFY

Is there some magic bullet solution out there? Fuck no. The integrity of a program is only as good as it's operators.

What are my honest thoughts on both pieces of software? You won't hear them unless we're drunk and naked at the next tradeshow. Any one of you that thinks either program is "perfect" is an idiot. I've lived in them from EVERY angle and there are nightmares and dramas with some vendors. The reality? The affiliate public can't handle the truth. Even with a great product sometimes communications are so bad that vendors and merchants will never see eye to eye. This thread is a perfect example, I think.

Get me started, get me drinking - let me tell you how many tens of thousands of dollars in support costs and lost productivity has come off my kitchen table for MojoHost doing "whatever" it takes to triage problems with accounting packages and their customers who are our hosting customer. What bugs me the most is the lack of humility and accountability when they royally fuck up.

I fully appreciate that as a host I'm responsible for my client's entire livelihood. Sometimes I wonder if I'm the only one that feels this sense of accountabilty and thankfulness for my client's business.

Mind you, I say they and them as if to indict everybody when in fact I might not really be doing that..

Is it both of them, one more than the other? I'll have to leave that up to speculation. I think I can plainly state that I'm the only guy out there that has the triple experience of being the hosting company, the affiliate program and a 3rd party billing company.

Finally, the reality check.

Despite whatever shortcomings such vendors might have, I will say that it's obvious they are all well-intentioned. The goals are simple for each program, to have the best affiliate management software out there. When you're growing a business it's not easy to please everyone and despite best efforts it's statistically impossible to anyways.

Who pulled it off, who has the better product? Buy and use both, find out for yourself. I'd love to get drunk with Garry, Oystein, John and Nathan but I don't think that'll ever happen. I certainly won't double talk any of them, I'm more than happy to tell them exactly what I think about their products but you had best believe such opinions won't end up in a public forum, published, online. LOL

Just don't be a fucking moron and start pointing fingers at one company or the other and be ignorant thinking that whoever you think is better isn't without sin. You're simply unaware of what such sins might be.

Cheers,

Brad

Originally Posted by Arioch

You sheep do remember who the guy that runs NATS is, right?

http://www.gfyboard.com/showthread.p...ight=porngraph

:1orglaugh

Originally Posted by Arioch

You sheep do remember who the guy that runs NATS is, right?

http://www.gfyboard.com/showthread.p...ight=porngraph

:1orglaugh

Originally Posted by undermyspell

I think that if you look at the timeline the issue reported was 3 weeks after the program started with NATS... I'm not speaking for the company because i've tried to stay out of this but you might want to reread iBanker and Nathan's posts about the timelines about the problem being reported.

Originally Posted by thewebgarage

the thing that bothers me about this entire thing is that nats packages come with only a limited number of support tickets per month. I dont see how that helps if sites are having problems with information passing thru wouldnt it be best to offer as much support as is needed until issue is solved? I'm not a customer so maybe I'm misunderstanding what thier packages include.

Originally Posted by SmokeyTheBear

Speaking from an affiliate standpoint, not a sponsor atandpoint.


I find it awfully strange that as an affiliate of several NATS sponsors, i never recieved one word from any sponsor about this problem.

When my NON-NATS sponsor have an issue with billing they usually notify me right away that some signups were not credited , and that it may take a few days to look over the data but that all credits would be awarded.

Does NATS advise sponsor programs when a billing issue arises to notify its affiliates ?

Regardless of whether its 5 minutes or 5 days downtime . I want every signup i send to be credited.

Did NATS re-credit the missing signups ? or did you leave it up to the sponsor programs to notify the affiliates themselves ?

Originally Posted by Nathan

Smokey,

this error was found before anyone else used Electracash and like I said we told everyone to not use them until it is resolved.

If a problem with sales or rebills or credits or chargeback info occures that we can not fix right away our clients know about it. Eventually the missing data will always end up at the reseller again. It might take longer sometimes, but they will always get there, we make sure of that, not our client.

I would expect any of our clients to contact their affiliates if they know that for a longer period of time there will be no data available at all, and I am sure they all do.

The reason you were never told about this from any of your sponsors most likely is because they do not use electracash for checks.

Originally Posted by BradShaw

Porngraph is one of the biggest capers pulled on the sheep in this biz in a long time. Anyone with a brain knows what went on with porngraph and can see through the smoke.

Originally Posted by fris

i like the fact john has access to every signup, every credit card and every program passwords. etc at his master switch. so he is god.

:)

Originally Posted by fris

i like the fact john has access to every signup, every credit card and every program passwords. etc at his master switch. so he is god.

:)

Originally Posted by Relish XXX

So he could effectivily mail out all your members?

Originally Posted by fris

every credit card

Originally Posted by Fletch XXX

rut roh

cheers

:glugglug

Originally Posted by Nathan

Get your facts straight before you make yourself look like a fool.

Originally Posted by iBanker

This was another reason we left. This kind of attitude. I know someone made a somewhat negative comment, but grow some thicker skin. Geesh. Can you believe they treat some of their clients like that? They did with us.

Yes, you can lock NATS out. We all know that now. We opted for it at the end of the road as well once it was told to us (4 months after we signed up of course). I don't know to what extent they had our information either. I do know that every "update" seemed like it just caused more problems than it fixed.

I was just going to read the thread and let it die, but your demeaning comments towards people asking questions are just wrong. You got a small black eye here, let it go. You act like these people kicked your fucking dog or something. Why you come across as so rude I will never understand, you seemed like a pretty nice guy in person, so maybe it is how you come accross in text. Quit making excuses and move on. Damn, we started the thread and WE have been leaving it alone, you on the other hand keep bumping it to the top.

Your shit has problems, everyones stuff prolly does. Fix it, get new clients, and move on.

Originally Posted by Braincash Fred

You know that you are my mentor :winkwink:

Originally Posted by Nathan

I am not making any excuses, I am explaining myself. If someone posts extremely wrong stuff like fris, you want me to just sit here and let it happen? Why should I... he was totally twisting the facts around without knowing what is going on.

Originally Posted by fris

i like the fact john has access to every signup, every credit card and every program passwords. etc at his master switch. so he is god.

:)

Originally Posted by iBanker

That is right though, just call him a fool. You kill me.

I'll reitterate something for you, learn from it. Nobody fucked your girlfriend, so why act like they did. I'm done. Lunch time.

Originally Posted by Nathan

Someone implying we or john steals data from our clients is just plain wrong and I have every right to comment on it.

BTW, if things I write sound rude to you sometimes... please do not forget, English is not my first language... I'm just german...

Originally Posted by iBanker

I'm pretty damn sure the word 'fool' is the same in English as it is in German.

Shit, even in ebonics it is close.