We’ve recently developed a disputes system to handle different types of disputes on our site. The first type of content to be integrated with this system is resource reviews.

Primary changes over the previous system:

• Users cannot communicate more than 1 message unless staff request additional information. If a staff member can make a decision off of just the initial complaint (because it’s obvious) immediate action can be taken without a back and forth.
• Reports can no longer be made on reviews, either by third parties or creators. Only creators can dispute reviews. Third parties may still create tickets, for instance to report positive review farming/abuse.
• Only one review can be made per buyer, per resource. If a review is deleted and then re-posted it is essentially an edit and republishing of the previous review. All previous duplicate reviews have been deleted (only the most recent remains).
• Review disputes can be handled by any staff member, they’re not individually assigned to a specific staff member like tickets are.
• We can automate certain actions to take place if we don’t receive compliance, such as rejecting the dispute if we don’t get a response from the creator or deleting the review and closing the dispute if an edit is not made or a response is not received, avoiding wasting everyone’s time or needing to check back when someone is not responsive.
• Users are alerted and emailed when their action is required.
• If a review is changed since the dispute was created, the original and current version are both displayed in the sidebar.
• Users are always able to edit their review, even if the creator has responded to it.
• If a dispute was closed in the creator’s favor and the review is deleted and the review is re-added within 60 days, the dispute will automatically re-open to ensure the violation has not been sneakily re-posted.
• There’s a flagging system if a creator or reviewer identifies false/misleading information in the other party’s response and wants to call that to the staff team’s attention.

The process

With the automation and restrictions, the process has become simple and fast enough to replace reports. The creator provides one message, the reviewer provides one response. If the staff member needs more information they can request it from that specific participant and get exactly one message back until the staff member has enough information to solidify a decision.

If either party sees a message that they believe contains misinformation and would like to flag that for the team’s attention, the “Flag” button on the message can be used for this reason. A staff member will see the flag and be able to request more information from you if necessary, to correct whatever misinformation may have been provided.

Staff only messages are also available if you need to provide personal or sensitive information such as source code or emails. Do not abuse this feature to provide more than only the sensitive information, or we may require that you resubmit your response where the other participant can see it (and flag it if necessary), or reject the dispute in the case of repeat abuse.

Example images