How it works
You get an offer that reads as real at first, a flat fee for a dedicated video, a promo code, a tracking link. Then a condition appears. Before the campaign can start you have to register in their creator portal or activate your partner account, and that step carries a one-time fee, framed as a refundable onboarding or activation charge of 25 to 75 dollars. The promise is that it comes back with your first payment. It does not. Once you pay, the contact either goes quiet or a second fee appears, a compliance charge, then a priority processing charge, each one explained as the last.
The tell-tale signals
No real brand or agency charges you to be paid. In a genuine deal money only ever flows toward the creator. Watch for the words registration, activation, onboarding, or processing sitting next to fee or deposit. The sender rarely uses a real company domain, and the conversation is often pushed to Telegram or WhatsApp the moment you ask a question, which moves it off the record. If the fee is refundable, ask why they cannot simply deduct it from a payment they are about to send you. They never have a straight answer.
What to do
Stop at the first request for money. Tell them you invoice after the work runs and you never pay to onboard, then watch how they react, real partners agree at once. Keep everything in email so there is an evidence trail. Verify the brand by finding their partnerships contact on the official site yourself rather than trusting the address that wrote to you. Paste the email into a risk assessment before you reply so the fee language and the sender domain are checked together.