I will still get referrals, so thanks to those of you that used me as a referral! I get the same from either company, so there is no conflict of interest in recommending one over the other (though I would recommend the better one regardless, I wouldn't feel good otherwise), but I do genuinely think the new company is better (and the proof is in the pudding, I have moved all my cards, and my wife's cards, there).
How could we possibly decrease sales for them?
We wouldn't decrease sales, but flood it so much each person gets very few. I've sold 24 lines so far in Nov & Dec... if enough cards were enrolled, that could drop a lot. I wouldn't be surprised if it dropped somewhat (my sales went way down at the old company after referring Mustachians, and the referral commissions didn't make up for it, but did help some). But I have faith the new company can handle a higher volume, for reasons I will explain in the comparison post.
At this point, ARS should just offer to buy into their company and reap the profits from his referrals directly.
Hah. I don't think I could afford them. I mean, calculate the money THEY must be making. Even just few hundred tradeline sales/mo, they charge, say, $800 for a line, pay out, say $200.. yes, they have expenses (say, 5 employees at 100k/employee annually, plus advertising, infrastructure, taxes, etc).. they're grossing, and likely netting, multiple millions annually, I'm sure.
An enterprising individual could try to compete with them, but I wouldn't personally because:
A) I don't need the money.
B) That's a full time job. Ugh.
C) I don't want the work and hassle required to verify the AUs the way you need to to do it right (aka the reason why the previous company and the current one are the only ones I can recommend) for liability reasons.
No thanks.
I'd rather collect ~40k doing about 40 hours of work for the year (a rate of ~$1,000/hour) by adding 15 or so AUs each month (maybe two to three hours of work for the MONTH) than collect ~$1MM doing 40 hours of work every week (for a rate of $480/hour).
In other words, the hourly rate of owning it is half, though you collect a LOT more (1MM versus 40k).
Would I trade all my free time now, being FIRE'd, for a full time, 1MM/yr job?
Heck no! Even if you made 2MM, so the hourly rate was the same, or 4MM, so the hourly rate was double ($2k/hr versus 1k), I'd pass. That whole concept of "enough" I've very much bought into. :)
I'll sell my tradelines, make silly money on that, and still have total freedom of time to travel and enjoy life.