I feel your pain; I was perturbed when I received a pop up telling me that they are famous for not coughing up money so I removed my earnings and deleted all my stories soon after. I did get my money but I've heard too many stories like yours.

What irked me was their payment to read ratio after I had discovered Medium. I've written a few stories on the subject if you want to check them out. They were like the smitten lover at first then ditched me.