[AAAA]

just never seen it mentioned as a possibility before, but a couple people were "bonus abusing" my Empire affiliate accounts and making negative MGR month after month. Nothing huge, just negative $5.00 here and there.

Empire asked me if I wanted to close those accounts. So it is just possible that some of the account closings were at affiliate request. No guarantee, but a distinct possibility.

I doubt that any affiliates would want to admit to asking for account closings, but it could have been people who got tired of losing money month after month on accounts.

The only one that I asked to close was some scumbag who made a large chargeback and would have cost me over $200 bucks, but Empire wouldn't have let him continue anyway.

If there is a common thread of a couple affiliates I would guess it is more likely to be the case than if it were a widespread cut across large and small, but was anyone who was cut signed up directly with the site? and not on an affiliate tracker?

BTW, just for the record, I really feel that Empire made a very stupid move when they closed accounts with no warning. They had no reason to close accounts when they could have just written their promotions better, and I told Empire what I thought of their move too! They gave away a bunch of customers who were just going by the rules that Empire dictated.