Panda Research Review: Is It Really Worth Your Time? (2022)
Survey websites have proven to be a great way for some people to earn extra money in their spare time. Many popular survey sites like Swagbucks and Survey Junkie offer different ways for people to participate in paid surveys for market research purposes.
Panda Research is one such paid survey site. This Panda Research review will walk you through the details of this market research company so that you know if it’s a good option for you.
Contents
What is Panda Research?
Panda Research is an online survey panel, and is a legit survey site. However, that doesn’t mean that Panda Research is one of best survey sites out there. We’ll get to that in a moment.
Panda Research was founded in 2005 and is owned by A&A Marketing Inc. A&A Marketing is located in Buffalo Grove, Illinois.
Better Business Bureau
If you go to the Better Business Bureau (BBB) website, you’ll find that Panda Research isn’t accredited, and neither is A&A Marketing.
When you search for A&A Marketing on the BBB site, you’ll find that they’re rated B+. When this article was first written, it A&A Marketing was rated F, but it appears to have made some progress in resolving complaints. Not enough, though. It still garners 1 star (out of 5 possible stars), with 6 reviews.
Below is a summary of Panda Research complaints from the BBB site:
- Completed survey and reached their $50 payout threshold but never got paid
- Repeated phone calls to the listed phone number with no response
- Complaints about raising the minimum payout for cash incentives
When reading the complaints and reviews on the BBB website, it appears that the company is making reasonable efforts to research the issues. But it does appear to take a long time to respond to customer complaints. This is only one of the red flags, which we’ll get to later on.
How Does Panda Research Work?
Panda Research provides opportunities for people to get paid to complete surveys online. Panda Research members can also participate in special offers and special promotions.
By signing up for email offers, a member of Panda Research can test new products, receive free trial offers, or receive special discounts.
Personal information
Some survey companies usually ask for your credit card information. This supposedly helps the company provide more targeted surveys and offers.
However, Panda Research requires only basic personal information, such as your name, email address, and phone number. The data collected through Panda Research site is then provided to the companies who are doing the surveys.
Here’s a reminder to be mindful. A legitimate company will not ask for your credit card information. If it’s a free survey site, then they have no use for that information.
Watch the fine print
You should always be wary that once you accept the terms and conditions and privacy policy, your information and responses may be shared with third-party research companies. This is called third party reporting, and most survey sites do this.
Getting Started with Panda Research
Let’s get into a little more detail about how to start with Panda Research.
How Does Panda Research Work?
Panda Research works as any survey site does. You sign up on the Panda Research website, you fill out some surveys, take part in paid offers and paid emails, and then finally start earning money.
When you provide your information and register, the site immediately matches you with some of the best available surveys. It even sends potential surveys to your email address. As new survey opportunities arise, you’ll receive a survey invitation via email.
Qualifying for Panda Research surveys
Almost all of the questionnaires have a qualification process that you need to pass in order to fill the survey out. Because these surveys are conducted by market research companies, you probably won’t qualify for all of them.
Signing Up for Panda Research Surveys
The primary benefit about Panda Research is how easy it is to sign up. When you go to their website, the sign-up page is the first thing you’ll see so just follow these steps:
- After you’ve opened the website homepage, enter your information in the boxes;
- Click on the sign-up button;
- You’ll be prompted to a profile survey; complete it and click on ‘Submit’;
- Confirm your email address.
- You’re officially a Panda Researcher. You can now choose from the survey opportunities available or wait to get survey opportunities sent to your email account.
Ways to Earn as a Panda Research Member
The primary way to earn with Panda Research is through surveys. Panda Research has previously claimed that some of their surveys can pay around $40. This is pretty unrealistic, and doesn’t appear to be the case today.
Other surveys allegedly give you a payout somewhere between $1.50 – $3. Even these numbers are high compared to other survey sites. The reason (as they claim) for such payments is that you need to complete an offer after completing your survey. If you don’t complete the offer, you don’t get paid.
And according to their terms and conditions, Panda Research pays out on the 1st and 15th of every month.
Other ways to earn with Panda Research are relatively unique.
You can do any of the following:
- Enter the referral program by referring your family and friends
- Complete non-survey paid offers
- Read a lot of paid emails
- Enter giveaways after completing some survey offers
- Receive account promotions and discounts after completing surveys.
Does Panda Research Really Pay?
Panda Research is a legit site, and does pay. But there are a lot of things in the fine print. Here are a couple of examples.
Fine print examples
- You need a PayPal account. One of the major drawbacks of Panda Research is that you need to have a PayPal account to recieve a payout. Paypal is the only payment option available.
- Use the correct email address. Make sure that the email you used to register on the site is your correct PayPal address, to avoid any problems.
- If you can’t complete a survey or were interrupted during the survey, you don’t get paid.
- High payout threshold. You’ll see all your account balance in your Panda Research wallet but in order to cash-out and transfer that money to your PayPal account, you need at least a $50 account balance.
- Paid offers. When you withdraw your $50, $25 of that amount needs to be from paid offers.
- Increments of $50. You can only request money in $50 lots, which means that even if you have $99, you’ll only be able to redeem $50.
- Payment periods. Panda Research pays on the 1st and 15th of every month. Additionally, there is a 30-day wait period after you’ve requested payment.
Panda Research Review: Pros and Cons
Pros
- Easy registration: When you go to the Panda Research website, you’ll find their sign-up and registration form right in front of you. Soon as you enter your information and confirm your email address, you are ready to fill out surveys.
- Free to join: Panda Research is completely free and can be joined by anyone. There are no specific age limits, however, surveys may be age-restricted.
- Plenty of surveys: The site always has a plethora of surveys and paid offers to choose from. Specific surveys are even sent to you by email or by SMS to your mobile device.
Cons
- One way to redeem: There’s only one way to redeem your earnings and that’s through PayPal. There is no point in becoming a member if you don’t have a verified PayPal account.
- Geographically limited:
- If you’re in any country except the United States, you can forget about joining this site. Any IP address that’s not based in the United States is automatically rejected so you can’t even establish an account from overseas.
- Strict payment conditions: High payout threshold, $50 lot payments, 30-day wait period. These are just some of the variety of reasons people have legitimate complaints.
- Hard to qualify for surveys: Although there are a lot of surveys available, they appear to be focused and very targeted. Many people find it difficult to qualify for them, so a lot of hard work goes unrewarded.
Who is Panda Research for?
Panda Research is basically for anyone looking to make some extra money and is willing to be patient. However, those people need to reside in the United States, have a legitimate PayPal account, and be willing to put in a lot of time to make it work.
In fact, it may not even be for people looking to make extra money because most people have complained about not being paid.
Is Panda Research Legit?
After carefully researching for this Panda Research Review, it’s clear that while Panda Research is legit, they definitely have opportunities to improve their customer support.
However, the company is very smart with its actions. You can find reviews for it on Trustpilot and Sitejabber and most of them talk about how they haven’t been paid.
Most people complain about the fact that they’ve completed their surveys and reached the $50 limit and still haven’t been paid. That’s where Panda Research’s tons of payment conditions come in.
They have listed all of their terms and conditions and if someone actually reads them before joining, they would never join the site. There are so many loopholes by which they can legally refuse to pay people.
Wrapping Up Our Panda Research Review
It’s already pretty tricky to earn money online, especially through surveys. There are companies like Panda Research who take advantage of people because they know that almost everyone accepts the terms and conditions without actually reading them.
You can earn money with Panda Research by completing surveys. However, you need to read their terms and conditions and set the right expectations. You won’t get rich but you might earn some extra cash.
Our Panda Research review found them to a good back up for other sites. However, Panda Research definitely shouldn’t be your main focus. There are way too many survey sites out there to choose from. You shouldn’t have to deal with the ones that make you jump through extra hoops like Panda Research does.