Now, ‘pay per click’ investors seek govt, Sebi intervention

NOIDA: Even as an FIR has been registered against

Webwork Trade Private Ltd

, a company based on the multi-level marketing concept coupled with social media advertising, investors in such schemes — being offered by other companies as well — are seeking the intervention of government agencies including the

Securities and Exchange Board of India

(SEBI).

Many Webwork investors or “publishers” — as the company insisted they be called as buyers of “publishing” plans — are hopeful of their money being returned by the company. They are refraining from approaching the police as they fear they might end up getting on the wrong side of the company directors and lose all their money.

Legal and financial experts said there was no specific law in the country to govern trade involving such ‘pay per

click

’ schemes, making it unregulated in the country. They said investors were falling in the trap of these companies because of the charm of quick money.

On Monday, many of the “publishers” who had gathered outside Webwork’s office in Noida’s Sector 2 admitted that if the company was sealed or the police got involved, they were not going to get their money back from the company.

Many of them admitted they were lured by the concept of “quick money” floated by the associates of the company, who would deal with them about the programs. But the investors, or “publishers”, admitted that while many such companies had been mushrooming in NCR, the Webwork issue came under the spotlight only after the Social Trade scam came to light.

“Where was the government when the company was issued a PAN Card? Why did the banks allow the transactions,” asked Dinesh Gaur, a resident of Sector 49 who said he had created a chain of 50-60 people by asking them to buy the Webwork plans.

Jitesh, a resident of Mumbai, who said he invested over Rs 17 lakh in different plans, said the government and agencies like SEBI should intervene and formulate laws to govern such companies rather than nailing them later, when no money can be recovered from the company. “Where was the government when the company was set up and registered by the ROC (Registrar of Companies),” asked Praveen Patil of Karnal.

In his complaint to the Noida police, Amit Kishore Jain, the only “publisher” who has lodged a police complaint about the company so far, has compared the company’s strategy with Speak Asia, an online survey marketing company which sold web subscriptions for Rs 11,000 each.

Anshul Sharma, a “publisher” who bought packages from Webwork, said: “There are many companies operating on similar model of paying per click.. However, all of them are running unregulated. A layman does not know about the business models of these companies. Is it not the responsibility of the government to ensure that these companies are regulated?” Adscash.com and GoNextsolutions in Ghaziabad and Uttamdeal.com and Webwork.com, etc are among the many companies operating in NCR region.

Some of these companies have already admitted to have started stopped using “pay per click” model after the news about social trade scam broke.

“We had started giving Rs. five to our customers for promoting our product through clicks. However, when we heard about the scam, we decided to stop using the model,” said Nasir Khan, an associate in Uttamdeal.com. On February 8, TOI had reported that Gonext too had stopped paying for clicks and refunded money of their customers.

Legal and financial experts admit that there is no specific law in the country to govern social trade, making it unregulated in the country and investors are falling in trap of these companies due to the charm of quick money.

Sumit Agarwal, former Assistant Legal Advisor at the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) told TOI that there seems to be an increasing trend of ‘operated reviews’, ‘using click-farms to inflate customers’ likes. He however, admitted that there is no specific one law to deal with these internet based models and each model needed “thorough examination”.