Avoid "Funds for Focus".
TL;DR: Idiot working out of an apartment near the Miami gets me to do gig work, then forgets how to pay people. Advertises as "Funds for Focus" on Facebook and Instagram.
I have been a gig economy/beermoney worker since the mid 2010's, and I've done everything from Doordash to ProductTube, but these days, I mainly do work for Prolific. Occasionally, I do studies for Hivemind, Google, or Fieldwork, to supplement what I do on Prolific.
Anyway, about a month ago, I saw an ad on Facebook for "Funds for Focus". They wanted someone to go into a grocery store (Publix), take a short video, and a few photos, and then post them into the Indeemo app. Not a problem, it took less than 30 minutes to do the photos and video. The rest of the activities were online. It was supposed to pay $175, via a Tremendous gift card.
So, I did all the activities, and got an email that I would be paid soon. That was a week ago. Note, the ad was posted a month ago, and the activities for the study were at the beginning of this month.
The week passes. Nothing. So I emailed the person in charge of this, Liz. (Her full government name was in her emails, so I'm being nice.)
She claims she is waiting for a "meeting with Tremendous", BUT she could send me the money via Zelle. I didn't have Zelle, but I humored her, and downloaded it and started an account. She then swears she can't find my Zelle account. I say, okay, I'll wait on the Tremendous card.
A couple of days later, I email her again. This time, she asks if I could do a Venmo. I told her no, I just have a Paypal account, but I downloaded Venmo to again see if I could get paid. Then she gives me the most generic Venmo tag: elizabethd. Turns out, there's literally hundreds of "elizabethd" accounts, and none of them are her. She screenshots her account name on her app, like THAT'S the problem. No, Liz, there's just literally so many accounts with that tag, you're getting lost in the search results.
Finally I get fed up and start Googling "Funds for Focus". Turns out, she only filed for an LLC in November 2023, and the address on the filing is an apartment in Hallandale Beach, Florida. I also went to the Funds for Focus Facebook page, and asked one of the people who responded on the page if they ever got paid.
My phone starts blowing up with SMS texts from Liz, asking why I would do that. I told her I'd looked into her and knew she was a new business, and that I needed to find out why I wasn't being paid. She started in on the whole, "If you would just look!" approach to me not being paid.
I did look. I don't have the money. I still don't. I ended up telling her I wasn't dealing with this anymore. I blocked her on Facebook, email, my phone number, and Instagram. I've already sent an email to the Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce, for all the good that will do me. I have bookmarked the local news station in her area, just in case.
Sorry this went so long. I don't really think she is crooked, just inept. After all, all she got was some video and feedback from me about a local store. She didn't take money from me, and apparently doesn't understand how Venmo, Zelle, or Tremendous work. But I just hope no one else gets taken in by this idiot.
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/beermoney/comments/1as8r6v/avoid_funds_for_focus/
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