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Welcome to the Resolved Issues folder. This folder is intended primarily for trader complaints in the Scam Alerts Folder that have been resolved. Under special circumstances, some unsupported or abandoned claims may also be moved here.
I plan to lay out the rules as clearly as possible. I am doing this because I do not intend to spend my time debating which threads do and do not belong here. What I am implementing is much more fair than the current system of leaving resolved issues inside the Scam Alerts Folder. I will admit that the handling of abandoned complaints is not 100% fair. I do say that it is much more fair than it was. If some company wants to pay the costs for the FPA to hire several more full time staff members to try to track down the original poster (OP) in older threads, I'll consider expanding the rules. If a thread doesn't currently qualify, I'm not going to change the rules to make the person who can send me the most complaints happy. If too much time is wasted, I will have to cancel the whole plan, move all the threads from Resolved Issues back into Scam Alerts, and delete this folder. If that happens, I'll be sure to let everyone know which company representatives triggered the decision.
Only the OP's complaint applies to whether an issue is resolved or not. If the OP's issue is fixed, then the thread is resolved no matter what other complaints there are in the thread. If the OP's issue is not fixed, then the thread is not resolved no matter how many other complaints in the same thread have been fixed. The FPA actively encourages members with complaints to open their own individual threads.
"Resolved" is defined as the situation has been explained or dealt with to the satisfaction of the OP or else all money owed has been send to AND received by the OP.
Any attempt to convince the OP to report an issue as resolved in exchange for a partial payment of money owed or before payment is received is considered by the FPA to be blackmail of the company's client. If a company representative is worried that the OP will not follow through on reporting a resolved issue, then please involve the FPA in the final part of the negotiations.
If I become aware of a company using blackmail to force a trader to report an issue as resolved before it qualifies as resolved, that thread will not be eligible to be moved to the Resolved Issues folder. If I am warned in advance, I may temporarily mark it as resolved and temporarily move it in order to try to get the client paid. In the end, it will come back to Scam Alerts and warnings about the company blackmailing the client will be added.
For a thread to be moved into the Resolved Issues folder, one of three things must happen...
1. The OP must declare the situation to be resolved. If there are any serious questions regarding the resolution, the OP needs to return and answer those.
For companies with any prior reports of pressuring clients into accepting partial settlements or posting that an issue is resolved before really resolving it, any FPA member may ask if all payments were really sent and received.
Rule 1 will apply retroactively to threads were I have already added "Resolved" to the subject line. I will consider other old threads where the OP has indicated that the issue is resolved on a case-by-case basis. Use Contact Us to ask me to look at any thread like this. Please remember that asking nicely is much more likely to get the results you want. Aggressive demands for instant action will always given the lowest priority.
A vaguely worded "It's fixed" from the OP will generally trigger questions. If the OP doesn't return to answer those questions in one week will make the issue be considered permanently resolved.
2. The OP makes one or more posts before abandoning the thread AND a company rep posts in the thread. The company rep post needs to be an explanation that the complaint is without merit, a public assurance that the issue has been fully resolved to the satisfaction of the OP, or a question asking the OP to provide the information needed to identify the person and the problem. The post by the company representative must be made within 15 days of the last post in the thread by the OP. If there are any questions posted about the claimed resolution of the thread, the company representative must provide adequate answers within 1 week of those being posted. If the OP returns within 1 week of being invited back to the thread, then the issue is not abandoned. If the OP fails to return, the the thread will be marked as abandoned.
This is where I warned that the system is not 100% fair. Yes, there are a few people who have created accounts at the FPA solely to smear a company. I am convinced that there are many more people who had real complaints and gave up instead of pursuing the issue to resolution or to a Traders Court guilty verdict. I do not have the time or the staff time to hunt down everyone who complained about a company 3 or 4 years ago. If there is a new complaint, it is abandoned, and if your company will get involved in the thread, I'll make the time to try to get the OP to come back to the thread.
I am not going to apply this retroactively to old threads where the OP disappeared and the company posted. The reason for this is that under these rules is that the older an abandoned thread is, the more likely that it will be difficult or impossible to get in touch with the OP. As of today, threads that were abandoned before July 8th 2014 and do not yet have a company rep reply in them do not qualify for Rule 2 or Rule 3.
Please note that I am using 15 days and 1 week as measurements for defining when some things must be done, not a certain number of business days. Holidays around the world vary. If this causes a problem, you can send your complaint to Omari from CommexFx. He's the one who claimed so many banking holidays as more reasons for not paying Prime4x clients. In Omari-land, there do not seem to be very many business days in a year. Ask me very nicely and I might give you as many as 2 extra days around real holidays.
3. Even a thread that is not abandoned can be labeled and moved if the OP ignores important questions posed in the thread. This is at my discretion, so please don't try to manipulate the system by posting irrelevant questions that are likely to be ignored.
Questions regarding the issue from FPA staff, company representatives, and FPA senior members always count. Questions about evidence from any source always count. If you don't know the answer, don't ignore the question. Instead, just admit that you don't know.
It is possible to miss a question. If the question is reposted and ignored a second time, that qualifies the thread for being moved to this folder.
Threads qualifying as resolved under Rule 1 will generally be moved to this folder within 1-2 weeks of any lingering questions being answered. If any new complaints from others are added to those threads, those people will need to start new threads in the Scam Alerts Folder if they want their issues to be dealt with.
Once a Rule 1 thread is here, I will consider the issue to be permanently closed. This means that if the OP felt pressured or was blackmailed, I need to be notified BEFORE the thread is declared to be resolved. If I find out after the thread is moved to the Resolved Issues folder, the time to let me know will have already passed. The OP may report new problems with the company, but any new complaints regarding the resolved issue will be ignored or deleted.
Threads qualifying under Rule 2 will be marked as Unconfirmed, Suspicious, Abandoned, or some other appropriate label of my choosing in the subject line. After making that change to the thread, I may leave it in Scam Alerts for an additional period of time before moving it here. Once the thread is moved, if the OP shows up again, I'll expect to see a medical report, police report, or other very convincing reason for the OP's absence. Without that, I will not move the thread back to Scam Alerts or allow new threads about the abandoned complaint to remain posted.
In the case of a Rule 2 thread, the company rep can use Contact Us to ask me to look at the thread. Please wait until at least 2 weeks after answering any relevant member questions. If you have left member questions unanswered and ask me to move the thread, I will either tell you to answer the questions and wait 2 more weeks after the last question. If you continue to ignore relevant questions posted in the thread, then it will be disqualified and will never be moved to the Resolved Issues folder.
Threads qualifying under Rule 3 are labeled and moved at my discretion. Company reps are strongly advised to try their best to get information and resolve issues. I have several members who do a very good job at notifying me of situations like this, so there should be very little need to ask me to look at a thread and see if it qualifies. Please note I will not allow any company rep to try to turn a thread into a Rule 3 situation by burying me in email arguments.
I can't recheck every thread every day. If anyone sees a thread that does qualify and hasn't had its subject line edited or been moved to Resolved Issues within a reasonable amount of time, please do not post in the thread. Instead, please use the Contact Us to send a reminder to FPA HQ. As already stated, polite inquiries will always be dealt with before demands.
The benefits to companies...
Once the thread redirect expire, resolved issue threads no longer tie the company's name to the Scam Alerts Folder. Search engines will usually catch up a few days to a few weeks later. I have no control over Google. If I would have already bought a private island and retired.
New complaints that come in and are abandoned are not hard to get moved to the Resolved Issues folder.
The benefits to traders...
Encouraging company representatives to get involved and fix issues should result in a higher percentage of trader issues being resolved.
Companies can no longer say "We don't want to post in the thread about the problem, since that will just make the scam complaint more prominent." as an excuse to not fix an issue.
This folder is read-only. Once a Resolved thread goes here, no new complaints can be tacked on to confuse the issue.
What about abandoned threads that the company representatives also hasn't posted in?
If you see a thread where the OP has already been asked several questions and hasn't replied, the best thing to do is ignore the thread. Adding a 3rd, 4th, or 5th "Any updates" or "Please give details" only makes the abandoned thread more prominent. It also pushes active complaints farther down the list. If the OP and the company can't be bothered to make posts or answer questions, then just ignore it.
A few threads are probably paid attacks on a company. Fewer posts in those threads will make them less important to search engines. Many more are angry clients who just wanted to complain and then gave up. Let them disappear from page 1 of Scam Alerts so we can all look at new, active complaints. If you see a pattern of repeated threads like this against one company, use Contact Us and send me links to the threads.
One final note. There are many times where I know information that is not posted publicly. Even a thread declared as Resolved a long time ago may be kept in Scam Alerts if I have any reason at all to suspect that the resolution wasn't true. The movement of threads here is designed to improve relationships between traders, companies, and the FPA. In the case of abuse or suspected abuse, I reserve the right to leave any thread in Scam Alerts permanently. I regret having to do this, but the actions of some companies make it necessary.
I hope to see many threads moved to the Resolved Cases folder and hope that I never have to hold any back for more than a few days.
My thanks to several valued friends and colleagues for input on this idea. I hope it works well.
I plan to lay out the rules as clearly as possible. I am doing this because I do not intend to spend my time debating which threads do and do not belong here. What I am implementing is much more fair than the current system of leaving resolved issues inside the Scam Alerts Folder. I will admit that the handling of abandoned complaints is not 100% fair. I do say that it is much more fair than it was. If some company wants to pay the costs for the FPA to hire several more full time staff members to try to track down the original poster (OP) in older threads, I'll consider expanding the rules. If a thread doesn't currently qualify, I'm not going to change the rules to make the person who can send me the most complaints happy. If too much time is wasted, I will have to cancel the whole plan, move all the threads from Resolved Issues back into Scam Alerts, and delete this folder. If that happens, I'll be sure to let everyone know which company representatives triggered the decision.
Only the OP's complaint applies to whether an issue is resolved or not. If the OP's issue is fixed, then the thread is resolved no matter what other complaints there are in the thread. If the OP's issue is not fixed, then the thread is not resolved no matter how many other complaints in the same thread have been fixed. The FPA actively encourages members with complaints to open their own individual threads.
"Resolved" is defined as the situation has been explained or dealt with to the satisfaction of the OP or else all money owed has been send to AND received by the OP.
Any attempt to convince the OP to report an issue as resolved in exchange for a partial payment of money owed or before payment is received is considered by the FPA to be blackmail of the company's client. If a company representative is worried that the OP will not follow through on reporting a resolved issue, then please involve the FPA in the final part of the negotiations.
If I become aware of a company using blackmail to force a trader to report an issue as resolved before it qualifies as resolved, that thread will not be eligible to be moved to the Resolved Issues folder. If I am warned in advance, I may temporarily mark it as resolved and temporarily move it in order to try to get the client paid. In the end, it will come back to Scam Alerts and warnings about the company blackmailing the client will be added.
For a thread to be moved into the Resolved Issues folder, one of three things must happen...
1. The OP must declare the situation to be resolved. If there are any serious questions regarding the resolution, the OP needs to return and answer those.
For companies with any prior reports of pressuring clients into accepting partial settlements or posting that an issue is resolved before really resolving it, any FPA member may ask if all payments were really sent and received.
Rule 1 will apply retroactively to threads were I have already added "Resolved" to the subject line. I will consider other old threads where the OP has indicated that the issue is resolved on a case-by-case basis. Use Contact Us to ask me to look at any thread like this. Please remember that asking nicely is much more likely to get the results you want. Aggressive demands for instant action will always given the lowest priority.
A vaguely worded "It's fixed" from the OP will generally trigger questions. If the OP doesn't return to answer those questions in one week will make the issue be considered permanently resolved.
2. The OP makes one or more posts before abandoning the thread AND a company rep posts in the thread. The company rep post needs to be an explanation that the complaint is without merit, a public assurance that the issue has been fully resolved to the satisfaction of the OP, or a question asking the OP to provide the information needed to identify the person and the problem. The post by the company representative must be made within 15 days of the last post in the thread by the OP. If there are any questions posted about the claimed resolution of the thread, the company representative must provide adequate answers within 1 week of those being posted. If the OP returns within 1 week of being invited back to the thread, then the issue is not abandoned. If the OP fails to return, the the thread will be marked as abandoned.
This is where I warned that the system is not 100% fair. Yes, there are a few people who have created accounts at the FPA solely to smear a company. I am convinced that there are many more people who had real complaints and gave up instead of pursuing the issue to resolution or to a Traders Court guilty verdict. I do not have the time or the staff time to hunt down everyone who complained about a company 3 or 4 years ago. If there is a new complaint, it is abandoned, and if your company will get involved in the thread, I'll make the time to try to get the OP to come back to the thread.
I am not going to apply this retroactively to old threads where the OP disappeared and the company posted. The reason for this is that under these rules is that the older an abandoned thread is, the more likely that it will be difficult or impossible to get in touch with the OP. As of today, threads that were abandoned before July 8th 2014 and do not yet have a company rep reply in them do not qualify for Rule 2 or Rule 3.
Please note that I am using 15 days and 1 week as measurements for defining when some things must be done, not a certain number of business days. Holidays around the world vary. If this causes a problem, you can send your complaint to Omari from CommexFx. He's the one who claimed so many banking holidays as more reasons for not paying Prime4x clients. In Omari-land, there do not seem to be very many business days in a year. Ask me very nicely and I might give you as many as 2 extra days around real holidays.
3. Even a thread that is not abandoned can be labeled and moved if the OP ignores important questions posed in the thread. This is at my discretion, so please don't try to manipulate the system by posting irrelevant questions that are likely to be ignored.
Questions regarding the issue from FPA staff, company representatives, and FPA senior members always count. Questions about evidence from any source always count. If you don't know the answer, don't ignore the question. Instead, just admit that you don't know.
It is possible to miss a question. If the question is reposted and ignored a second time, that qualifies the thread for being moved to this folder.
Threads qualifying as resolved under Rule 1 will generally be moved to this folder within 1-2 weeks of any lingering questions being answered. If any new complaints from others are added to those threads, those people will need to start new threads in the Scam Alerts Folder if they want their issues to be dealt with.
Once a Rule 1 thread is here, I will consider the issue to be permanently closed. This means that if the OP felt pressured or was blackmailed, I need to be notified BEFORE the thread is declared to be resolved. If I find out after the thread is moved to the Resolved Issues folder, the time to let me know will have already passed. The OP may report new problems with the company, but any new complaints regarding the resolved issue will be ignored or deleted.
Threads qualifying under Rule 2 will be marked as Unconfirmed, Suspicious, Abandoned, or some other appropriate label of my choosing in the subject line. After making that change to the thread, I may leave it in Scam Alerts for an additional period of time before moving it here. Once the thread is moved, if the OP shows up again, I'll expect to see a medical report, police report, or other very convincing reason for the OP's absence. Without that, I will not move the thread back to Scam Alerts or allow new threads about the abandoned complaint to remain posted.
In the case of a Rule 2 thread, the company rep can use Contact Us to ask me to look at the thread. Please wait until at least 2 weeks after answering any relevant member questions. If you have left member questions unanswered and ask me to move the thread, I will either tell you to answer the questions and wait 2 more weeks after the last question. If you continue to ignore relevant questions posted in the thread, then it will be disqualified and will never be moved to the Resolved Issues folder.
Threads qualifying under Rule 3 are labeled and moved at my discretion. Company reps are strongly advised to try their best to get information and resolve issues. I have several members who do a very good job at notifying me of situations like this, so there should be very little need to ask me to look at a thread and see if it qualifies. Please note I will not allow any company rep to try to turn a thread into a Rule 3 situation by burying me in email arguments.
I can't recheck every thread every day. If anyone sees a thread that does qualify and hasn't had its subject line edited or been moved to Resolved Issues within a reasonable amount of time, please do not post in the thread. Instead, please use the Contact Us to send a reminder to FPA HQ. As already stated, polite inquiries will always be dealt with before demands.
The benefits to companies...
Once the thread redirect expire, resolved issue threads no longer tie the company's name to the Scam Alerts Folder. Search engines will usually catch up a few days to a few weeks later. I have no control over Google. If I would have already bought a private island and retired.
New complaints that come in and are abandoned are not hard to get moved to the Resolved Issues folder.
The benefits to traders...
Encouraging company representatives to get involved and fix issues should result in a higher percentage of trader issues being resolved.
Companies can no longer say "We don't want to post in the thread about the problem, since that will just make the scam complaint more prominent." as an excuse to not fix an issue.
This folder is read-only. Once a Resolved thread goes here, no new complaints can be tacked on to confuse the issue.
What about abandoned threads that the company representatives also hasn't posted in?
If you see a thread where the OP has already been asked several questions and hasn't replied, the best thing to do is ignore the thread. Adding a 3rd, 4th, or 5th "Any updates" or "Please give details" only makes the abandoned thread more prominent. It also pushes active complaints farther down the list. If the OP and the company can't be bothered to make posts or answer questions, then just ignore it.
A few threads are probably paid attacks on a company. Fewer posts in those threads will make them less important to search engines. Many more are angry clients who just wanted to complain and then gave up. Let them disappear from page 1 of Scam Alerts so we can all look at new, active complaints. If you see a pattern of repeated threads like this against one company, use Contact Us and send me links to the threads.
One final note. There are many times where I know information that is not posted publicly. Even a thread declared as Resolved a long time ago may be kept in Scam Alerts if I have any reason at all to suspect that the resolution wasn't true. The movement of threads here is designed to improve relationships between traders, companies, and the FPA. In the case of abuse or suspected abuse, I reserve the right to leave any thread in Scam Alerts permanently. I regret having to do this, but the actions of some companies make it necessary.
I hope to see many threads moved to the Resolved Cases folder and hope that I never have to hold any back for more than a few days.
My thanks to several valued friends and colleagues for input on this idea. I hope it works well.
