OT: ChaCha

[Nik's Mom]

How can I find out what I've earned? I just started as an expeditor 2 days ago. Yesterday, I could click on the "my account" button to see my earnings. Now when I click on the button, nothing happens?

 

[Nik's Mom]

O.k, nevermind. I figured it out. It's kind of discouraging. For 40 searches, I've only earned a little over $1

 

[Flyingmonkey]

Is anybody else getting kicked out repeatedly this afternoon? I keep getting messages saying that "the connection to the server was lost". I have rebooted, and am still getting that message. Any ideas?

Thanks!

April - Flyingmonkey

 

[Daydreamer64]

Yeah, OK, I pick up the kids from school, fix dinner, get the little one down for his nap ( Dad works until 11 PM so the toddler is on a late schedule so he can have Daddy time each night) and.................. I log on start to answer questions and apparently the system has gone down? Aarrgghhhh!

I am having a rotten day and this just adds to it. Anyone else shut out? - it's around 6 PM ET.

 

[Daydreamer64]

Is anybody else getting kicked out repeatedly this afternoon? I keep getting messages saying that "the connection to the server was lost". I have rebooted, and am still getting that message. Any ideas?

Thanks!

April - Flyingmonkey

Ok, I feel better now, sorry Flyingmonkey. I must have been typing at the same time as you were! I feel better because I thought that ChaCha just decided to be mean to me!

I can almost always get over 250 searches between Friday night and Sunday evening, that's when I do most of my work because everyone's home to keep the toddler so I can get busy. I hope this isn't going to be an all weekend problem!

 

[cukal6]

I thought it was just me. I was doing great for about 30 minutes then all of a sudden I kept getting booted out. Really frustrating!

 

[Flyingmonkey]

Whew! I'm glad it's not just me! I was getting a little paranoid, as well as frustrated. Maybe the system is getting slammed. I just got a high volume email from them. I don't know about you guys, but I am still getting cut off on some of the searches after about 3 min. too. It gives a snarky little message that you have taken too long, and they have sent the question to another guide! They said that they had that one fixed, but I guess not. I reckon I'll try again after supper.

Good luck everyone!

April - Flyingmonkey

 

[chell]

Now that I know it happened to you all also today I feel better too.

 

[Mom2micayla]

I was never bumped off today.

I hate the new quick links. They are maddening. I tried to do a basic search that should have taken like 2 seconds, but someone put the wrong quicklinks and it kept giving me definitions. I was just trying to look up good pick up lines, and I kept getting definitions of pick up lines.

 

[Mouseless2Long]

I like the new quicklinks. What I don't like is that they when you click on "local links" in the ChaCha toolbar, you get the old qiuicklinks!! And what I really hate is that expeditors preselect which quicklink you will get. They are almost always the wrong one causing me to lose time getting to the one I want. I've start just using google search because with the aforementioned problems, it's faster.

 

[momof1princess]

i hate that the language and lookup quicklinks page doesn't include google maps! it is 100000x faster to find an address & phone number using google maps than the yellow pages! and google maps gives you exactly what you ask for, not 10,000 entries you have to scroll through!

 

[Tink561]

Are you all able to see recent activity?

It is maddening when someone asks for more information!

 

[momof1princess]

Are you all able to see recent activity?

It is maddening when someone asks for more information!

occasionally i can, but it's hit & miss.

a note to everyone: my search session counter under the earnings tab in the account section has been up-to-date until tonight. none of the searches i did after 7:10 p.m. tonight counted (105 of them!). keep track of your searches, guys & gals. the money is in my account and the searches are in my current history, but i took screenshots of the history pages anyway, just in case. i almost typed chacha on!

 

[maggiew]

Are you all able to see recent activity?

It is maddening when someone asks for more information!

I was able to at the beginning of the change. But I got no recent activities at all today.

Maggie

 

[mkymouse1928]

Whew! I'm glad it's not just me! I was getting a little paranoid, as well as frustrated. Maybe the system is getting slammed. I just got a high volume email from them. I don't know about you guys, but I am still getting cut off on some of the searches after about 3 min. too. It gives a snarky little message that you have taken too long, and they have sent the question to another guide! They said that they had that one fixed, but I guess not. I reckon I'll try again after supper.

Good luck everyone!

April - Flyingmonkey

I keep getting the snarky little message too, and it usually is because the info seeker wants so much info that I have to do some creative abbreviating. I usually find the info quickly, I'm just in the process of abbreviating and am about ready to send. GRRRR...so frustrating.

Am I the only one who isn't getting any recent activity info? I gave had several "More" texts that I can't answer because it isn't providing me with the prior information

Jessica

 

[mkymouse1928]

oops, Should have read further -- I see that I am not the only one who can't see recent activity.

 

[BCV2003]

Ok, i hadn't been online for a few days so today was my first time using the new system. How does the search work now? When I click the search button it takes me to a basically blank screen with a couple of options on the bottom?!?!?!

Also, once you click "Pay Me Now" how long does it take to show up on your debit card?

Thanks!

 

[momof1princess]

whenever i click pay me now, the money usually shows up in my account within 5 minutes, but ymmv.

 

[YorkieMommyKandis]

yeah, i really don't like this whole expeditor thing. the way i understand it, a lot of the queries we used to get are now being directed to an auto-answer system. that would explain why i've been online 37 minutes and i've answered SIX questions. i've always gotten questions back-to-back, even in the mornings. i have a feeling this isn't going to go well for us (SMS Guides).

I agree with you! I can't tell you how much I HATE the new expeditor position. Apparently, they figured, why pay guides 20 cents to answer a simple joke/weather question when we can just pay 2 cents (or whatever they are getting) for that. So now, every question I get requires that I do research. Please don't get me wrong; I am not complaining because I am too lazy to research the answers, but when I have a question that takes 5 minutes to answer, I need something quick to answer to balance it out. Now I don't have that. I have occasionally been getting some phone number requests, but they are the ones that are difficult because something is spelled wrong, to where the computer can't answer it. What I don't understand is what would make someone want to do the expeditor position for that little pay amount. I see people reporting on the ChaCha boards that they are making something like $3 an hour. Figuring that is before taxes, and they are self employed....how much are they coming out after taxes? It must be terrible! The fact that they are willing to work for that amount makes it possible for ChaCha to get away with this. I apologize for this rant, but I am really ticked about what seems like another pay decrease. I have dodged the 10 cents a query, by making top guide, but I feel like now they are going to get me with this. Is anyone else upset about this?

 

[ajh88]

I agree with you! I can't tell you how much I HATE the new expeditor position. Apparently, they figured, why pay guides 20 cents to answer a simple joke/weather question when we can just pay 2 cents (or whatever they are getting) for that. So now, every question I get requires that I do research. Please don't get me wrong; I am not complaining because I am too lazy to research the answers, but when I have a question that takes 5 minutes to answer, I need something quick to answer to balance it out. Now I don't have that. I have occasionally been getting some phone number requests, but they are the ones that are difficult because something is spelled wrong, to where the computer can't answer it. What I don't understand is what would make someone want to do the expeditor position for that little pay amount. I see people reporting on the ChaCha boards that they are making something like $3 an hour. Figuring that is before taxes, and they are self employed....how much are they coming out after taxes? It must be terrible! The fact that they are willing to work for that amount makes it possible for ChaCha to get away with this. I apologize for this rant, but I am really ticked about what seems like another pay decrease. I have dodged the 10 cents a query, by making top guide, but I feel like now they are going to get me with this. Is anyone else upset about this?

First, I'm not upset - mainly because I've never figured on ChaCha being around forever and I figured I'd use it for what it's worth now (and boy that extra couple of hundred bucks have come in handy!), but I won't count on it as part of my budget. I've also always assumed ChaCha was building a vast database, though I always thought it would be so they could launch their own search engine (a la Google), but have more precise results.

That doesn't mean they have carte blanche to treat me as useless. What I find most interesting about the increase in auto answers is that ChaCha is billed as a "human powered search engine" - I don't necessarily think they created expeditors to get rid of guides or to lower the amount of money they make (even though that is definitely a negative consequence of the role). I do think it was supposed to make searches go faster - so that theoretically even though you are searching for every answer (not easy, gimme questions), it should balance out due to enhanced quick links, etc. I don't think that vision has come to fruition yet, and may never. Perhaps the role of exepeditor will go the way of the do-do once they realize it isn't working out as they envisioned.

And even though I don't get as many "easy" questions (like send me a joke), the new Universe screen (where everything is there together) works much faster and I think I'm actually answering most questions in less time than before. Now if only the traffic would pick back up...