[Warning System and Appeal Procedure]

Our Warning System:
 
At Batoto, our staff are empowered with great flexibility in moderation. Staff members can give informal, verbal warnings to users, or where conduct is more serious, staff can issue formal warnings.
 
Formal warnings come in the form of warning points, which are also documented with notes from the issuing moderator. Moderators can assign a user warning points ranging from 0 (used to generate a written record in the system, but not considered disciplinary) to 1 (minor violation) or even more points, depending on the severity of the conduct. Warning points determine both current and future punishments. Punishments are issued automatically to users by the system; punishments are not cumulative by points, but are cumulative by infraction (see example below). This is our warning scale:

• No punishment.
• Moderator preview of content for 24 hours. (This means your posts will not show up until a moderator manually approves it)
• Moderator preview of content for 72 hours.
• Posting ability disabled for 24 hours. (Only affects forums, you will still be able to access PMs)
• Posting ability disabled for 48 hours.
• Posting ability disabled for 72 hours.
• Posting ability disabled for 7 days.
• Posting ability disabled indefinitely.
• Not used
• Full ban (suspension) from the site. (Profile is hidden, you are unable to access forums or PM. Rarely used punishment.)

When the warning point is initially issued, the issuing moderator can, at their option, set the point to expire automatically after a set period of time. If no expiration is given, that warning point will be permanent until a moderator manually removes that point.
 
Example: Preposterous Potato violates the rules on January 1, and a moderator gives him 3 warning points (+3 points) with no expiration; he will be automatically given moderator preview for 72 hours, which will lift somewhere around January 4.
 
If Preposterous Potato commits another rule infraction on January 2, and a moderator gives him 1 point that expires in 15 days (3+1=4 points), he will be given the punishment for 4 points and not be able to post at all for 24 hours. Note that this is in addition to the moderator preview that expires on January 4, so he will not be able to post at all until January 3 and still be on moderator preview for a day after that.
 
On January 16, his one point will expire (4-1=3 points).
 
On February 1, he commits yet another rule infraction, for which a moderator gives him 4 warning points that do not expire (3+4=7 points). He will not be able to post for 7 days.
 
Afterwards, Preposterous Potato is a good Batoto citizen and always helps out other users. However, no moderator has ever revoked his points and he has never asked for an appeal or review of his disciplinary history. Five years later, he makes a silly mistake and incurs one more warning point (7+1=8 points). He is now indefinitely barred from posting on the forums, unless he successfully appeals his warning.
 
Warning appeal:
 
Normally, a staff member's decision will not be reversed. However, we are all only human so if there was some mistake, misunderstanding, unjust treatment, or other unusual circumstance, you can try appealing the warning by explaining the problem to the staff. We will read and seriously consider all complaints if they reach us directly (via PM or email) and if they are constructive in nature. Remember that this is a tiered process, do not skip directly to step three unless you are appealing a site ban.
 
1. Discuss the problem with the moderator that issued the warning and calmly ask for a better explanation as to why you were warned or explain yourself and your reasoning.
2. If your appeal fails and you disagree with the severity of your punishment, you can try to refer your case to one of the global mods.
3. If your appeal fails again and you're still convinced that you're right, you can bring up the problem to an administrator. Administrator decisions are final.


Ban/Suspension appeal Process:

If your account gets banned (temporarily or permanently) from the site, you should send an email to one of the administrators. Be sure to use the address that is associated with your account so we can verify your identify.
 
Administrators:
Grumpy: [email protected]
mhh: [email protected]
seyrine: [email protected]
Trebor: [email protected] 
Note:

• Soft-bans, you can mail any admin listed above.
  • A soft ban is when it tells you that you are banned.
• For hard-bans, you must email Grumpy and no one else.
  • A hard ban is when you can't visit the site at all (doesn't respond) or every page results in no permission.