Dating.com's communication policy requires its free users to spend at least eight hours online each week and reply to 60% of incoming chats within ten minutes. On the other side of the conversation, its terms price basic chat at one credit per minute. The same exchange therefore meets an access condition for one person and spends another person's balance.
For Social Discovery Group, which includes Dating.com in its portfolio, sustainable growth requires the paying customer to understand that difference before spending. A quick reply can be valuable. Its frequency alone does not establish that both people want the same thing. The commercial opportunity is an intelligible, verifiable experience that can support a conscious second purchase.
Profile activity does not establish a shared intention
Dating.com publicly explains that external partners help attract users and prepare profiles, photographs or videos, receiving compensation for their services. It distinguishes that work from the free user's participation, which it says must not be paid. The page also presents virtual communication as a possible goal and acknowledges that it cannot guarantee a particular outcome.
That distinction matters to advertising. Someone seeking online companionship may value sustained conversation; someone seeking a partner may read the same continuity as a promise of meeting. If the platform attracts both through imprecise wording, the first payment cannot establish whether it sold the service the buyer expected.
Conversation can serve different goals
Major reasons reported by people who used online dating in the past year. United States, July 2022.
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Question base: 951 past-year users; reasons are not mutually exclusive. Not all group differences are statistically significant. Historical U.S. context, not current SDG customer intent or a Spain estimate.
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| Category | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| Long-term partner | 42% | 48% |
| Casual dating | 43% | 37% |
| Casual sex | 31% | 13% |
| New friends | 20% | 24% |
Pew's July 2022 survey, presented by Statista, illustrates the range of goals. Reasons were not mutually exclusive, and the authors caution that not every difference between groups was statistically significant. This is not a current picture of Spain or SDG. It does show why counting conversations without understanding their purpose leaves the commercial interpretation incomplete.
Improvement starts before the first top-up: explain what each participant seeks, what free-user status involves and what a customer buying communication can expect. Asking afterward whether the service met that expectation offers more information than rewarding minutes or replies alone. It requires neither promising a relationship nor turning people's intimacy into a metric to exploit.
Identity verification has a specific scope
Dating.com's terms describe document and biometric checks through SumSub, with verified status valid for six months. Checking an identity does not itself establish romantic intention, the absence of external assistance or a future meeting. The scope of the check needs to be as visible as its badge.
Suspected deception was already part of the experience
Users who thought they had encountered someone trying to scam them. United States, July 2022.
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Question base: 3,128 people who had ever used online dating. Measures reported suspicions, not confirmed crimes, financial losses or SDG incidents. It is not an estimate for Spain.
Explore the data table
| Category | Thought they had encountered a scam attempt |
|---|---|
| Men | 59% |
| Women | 44% |
Pew found in 2022 that 59% of men and 44% of women who had used online dating thought they had encountered someone trying to scam them. These are historical perceptions of the U.S. sector, not a crime count or an allegation against SDG. The economic implication is that a general safety promise needs comprehensible evidence alongside a badge.
Public allegations require a distinction between controls and outcomes
In an investigation published on July 23, 2026 , the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) reported testimony and documents concerning paying users of SDG platforms who questioned their correspondents' identities and motives. The report put those allegations to the group and included its responses. Publication of the investigation does not itself constitute a court ruling.
In a statement distributed on July 8 , SDG had announced suspended payments to an affiliate partner and an external investigation into evidence of misrepresentation. It said every profile must represent the person operating the account and credited its controls with removing more than 30,000 suspected accounts in 2025. The group also told ICIJ it does not employ chat operators or models, directly or indirectly. These are the group's statements; they provide no denominator for calculating an incidence rate.
The commercial response cannot stop at announcing detection tools. Publishing what each check covers, how a complaint is resolved and which corrections follow a failure would let the buyer assess the protection offered. Removed accounts can rise because detection improves or because the problem grows. Without a comparable base, the figure cannot distinguish those explanations.
The balance and the exit are part of the product
The refund policy , dated December 2025 and consulted for this analysis, distinguishes credit refunds from monetary refunds. It sets conditions and review procedures, and says purchased non-subscription credits expire after 90 days; subscription credits expire at the end of the monthly period. The commercial terms also provide for automatic renewal of the monthly pack until cancellation.
A credit is useful to a customer only if they understand its cash equivalent in their purchase, which action spends it and when it expires. Showing that equivalent and a notice before spending narrows the gap between the advertised price and the perceived bill. A readable history and a discoverable exit help distinguish a deliberate top-up from an unexpected charge.
Clarity can reduce immediate consumption: a spending limit or a more precise explanation may stop a top-up. The growth criterion should include that trade-off, comparing collected revenue with refunds, disputes and the cost of handling them, then observing which customers choose to return. The public evidence consulted does not allow that balance to be calculated for SDG.
The defensible advantage would be less about producing the maximum number of messages than enabling customers to explain what they bought, recognise whom they are engaging with and choose whether to return. For a business charging per interaction, that understanding is an economic condition of growth, not an addition at the end of the funnel.
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Marian Vasile
Marian Vasile is a MarTech and growth professional. His work spans product marketing, SEO, paid advertising and deep online tracking, including behavioral analytics and attribution.
