You may have seen the offers online or even heard them on the radio. Fill out this short survey and get a free laptop. If you’ve ever clicked on one you know that survey is a rather misleading term.

Once you tell the company how green you really are or what karate belt you deserve you will be directed to the actual business part of this transaction. If you look closely, there will be a paragraph of fine print at the top or bottom of the page telling you how many bronze, silver, gold, and sometimes platinum offers you have to complete before you get your prize. So what actually are all these color coded offers?

Well the truth is, this site isn’t interested in your survey information. Their goal is to get you to accept a certain number of trial offers. They get a commission on every customer they send to these sites, so that’s where their money comes from and why they can well afford to give that laptop to whoever manages to complete the offer.

The fine print is small for a reason. If you don’t catch it, you will only see the headline of the first page they direct you to, saying you only need to fill out two bronze offers to get your prize. That doesn’t seem so bad. So maybe you fill out those offers, only to find that there are quite a few left before you get to the end. If you get frustrated and give up they just made money off you and didn’t have to give a thing in return.

After looking at that multitude of offers you might wonder if it’s possible to get the laptop at all. It is, provided the site you chose isn’t actually a scam, but your reward won’t by any means be free. Trial offers cost money, shipping and handling costs money, and pretty much every offer you complete will be asking for your credit card information

If you do decide to do this, keep good records of all the offers you complete. These trial memberships will turn automatically into full memberships if you don’t cancel in the pre-determined time, and charge you every month. Read the cancellation policies so you know if it’s a phone call, a click on the website, or shipping back their product before the time is up.

It is possible to get your laptop for less than store price, but not for free. There will be a fair amount of work involved, and it’s up to you to decide if that work is worth the discount.

Would you like to know exactly how much that free laptop is going to cost you? Visit this page for an estimate of the computer’s value vs how much you will pay on average.