Hi all
Unfortunately, as Chrissy says, today (or yesterday for some of us!) has been a very stressful day - indeed the most stressful and hateful I have seen in all my time on the forum
What we have to remember though, is that all this havoc was limited to an incredibly small group of members - 2 or possibly 3 in fact out of
5020 registered members.
We have resolved the situation with the main culprit BAMATWIT by banning him after giving him the required warnings. It then became clear that he had re-registered on the forum as TTMAutos and began the same thing again so I then banned all posting from his IP address.
This (crosses fingers) seems to have resolved that problem.
The other problem members ianwzxr and COWBOY seemed to be bickering mainly with each other via the reputation points system. ianwzxr has now pledged to leave the forum, and if this is the case then that problem should also now be solved
It is really regrettable that these few individuals gained such obvious enjoyment from their messing about on the forum, and I reiterate that no member or moderator is expected to put up with being verbally abused.
- With regards to the system to adopt should such a situation arise again, then I would say firstly PM the member and ask them politely to stop doing what ever it is. Try to keep the PM as brief as possible along the lines of:
"Dear Member,
It has been brought to my attention as moderator of the forum that you have broken our terms of membership by . . . . (whatever / swearing etc).
I would formally like to ask you to stop doing this. Failure to do so will result in the warning system being used, ultimately resulting in your possible banning from the forum."
From experience this is usually enough.
If the same behaviour continues then a moderator for that particular area of the forum should give an initial formal warning. Just be reasonable with the time length given. This will be a matter for the moderator to decide depending on the severity of the offence.
The same proceedure applies to the second warning.
Since the third warning will result in a ban I would suggest a further PM to the member warning them of this - they then have the opportunity to change their behaviour again before the ban.
If the behaviour continues then the ban should be given by the moderator - making sure they are careful with their powers
I understand that things developed very quickly yesterday, and I am personally happy that everybody involved did everything they were required to do.
Let's now look forward to a more peaceful life on the forum
Thanks again everybody for your patience.
Ian
. These people abusing the system are really making me :x.
!!!