Shocking way to treat your customers from patreon - UNBELIEVABLE

[rover8200]

So this whole patreon thing is a 2 way street. I get a service from patreon that benefits me and helps me “do” you tube. Lots of positives about patreon generally as a concept and some good positives about the specific patreon service and mechanisms.

However this relationship is a 2 way thing… I am a customer of patreon and I pay patreon a substantial amount of money each month and that money is growing as my channel grows and I put work into making it grow and telling people to signup to patreon. If the relationship with patreon fails, I loose out and patreon loose out. If the relationship succeeds we both succeed. I respect patreon… But it has just done something to me that shows it has no respect, and threatens to unravel years of investment and time.

So my account got suspended for breach of terms and conditions. Specifically for "I took a look at your creator page and I see that your reward tiers and/or posts involve a raffle or giveaway. "

The first thing to say is I dont do any raffle or lotto or random chance to win giveaways. I do a giveaway which sends a gift out to members of a tiering and I work my way through those members and when they have all received a gift I go back to the start (round robin). Patreon gave me this method themselves. I created this gift tiering a few weeks ago and indeed I did the first giveaway to my oldest patreon in that tiering and announced it on there.

Second thing to say is patreon advise they are contactable for support on twitter… But they have messaging turned off. So you need to update your “help” information so its actually correct. I suspect this will never get done. I will keep check though and keep asking you to correct it. Tied into this you have very very poor support structures in place. I have sent so many emails about this because I am getting contacted by virtually all my patreons asking if they should stay or go and whats going on etc. So Im under extreme pressure to resolve and your support portal takes about 24 hours to reply. Ive received one reply and it was zero help and they did not answer any of my questions.

You never stated which tiering is breaching your conditions either. Very vague I have other tierings involving gift packs which potentially could be an issue (they are not lottos either though)… So very poor communication generally either way.

Im asking for another point of contact apart from the gentlemen from support (morgan) because this chap does not seem to switched on. none have been provided.

finally. In light of all of the above… And as a customer thats been with you for years. Wouldnt it simply be better for you to contact me than to ban the account. the sheer amount of panic you have caused is unreal. And Im stuck in limbo with no support.

I really hope someone from patreon reads this and steps in and can help. And going forward I would love to put in place some sort of better relationship with you guys where we can actually talk if you have concerns prior to you banning my account.

In the meantime Im sitting here and it will be another 24 hours before the wonderfull “morgan” replies to my questions with another email that doesnt answer anything.

[sambeawesome]

I do a giveaway which sends a gift out to members of a tiering and I work my way through those members and when they have all received a gift I go back to the start (round robin).

I thought they said you couldn’t do this method, as it still falls under their “giveaway” terms?

I looked up the giveaway thread, and they state that here:

Lotto style giveaway

Hi @rover8200 and everyone! My name is Diogo and I’m on the Trust and Safety team. I hear your concerns and would like to try and help First, as several people mentioned in this thread, the main reason why Patreon doesn’t allow benefits that involve any sort of gambling is due to laws and regulations regarding gambling, in the US and internationally. We also do care about and work to ensure there’s no scammers/scams on Patreon, but that is true beyond raffles and gambling and is…

Lotto style giveaway

Imagine someone becomes your patron today. You already have many other patrons. How long would that new patron need to wait to get that benefit? 1 month? 10 years? If it’s unclear, it becomes a matter of chance whether someone stays your patron long enough to get that benefit, because they can’t know when that will be. In another scenario, you gain two patrons in the same day. One of them gets the benefit after 1 month, the other after… well, they’re still waiting… This allows the first patron to make a decision on remaining a patron or not having already gotten the benefit they wanted, while the second patron is “stuck” waiting for a reward they don’t know when will come. You see how this still adds an element of chance to your patronage?

That might be the reasoning behind the suspension. Hopefully you can get in touch with them and fix the issue so you can get your page back soon!

[rover8200]

they are simply not replying now. Or if they do they will reply again in another 24 hours. the first reply answered none of my questions. They dont even tell me which tier is breaking their terms and conditions and how it is breaking it I have no idea how to work with them to fix it. I have no idea what Im supposed to fix. And on top of this there is no one to contact… I asked them lots of questions so they could get back to me with more specific info and they ignored all that and basically just said the same thing.

[Temrin]

This blog post may also help as it lays out things you can do as well.

https://blog.patreon.com/patreons-stance-on-raffles-lotteries-and-giveaways

Though, yeah, I recall being told at one point that working through the list of patrons in a tier was valid too. They really should have just contacted you first instead of suspending. They -KNOW- how much chaos this causes (and how unclear/unhelpful the initial emails and responses have been) because many creators have told them so. It’s sad that thier process hasn’t changed.

[rover8200]

Imagine someone becomes your patron today. You already have many other patrons. How long would that new patron need to wait to get that benefit? 1 month? 10 years? If it’s unclear, it becomes a matter of chance whether someone stays your patron long enough to get that benefit, because they can’t know when that will be. In another scenario, you gain two patrons in the same day. One of them gets the benefit after 1 month, the other after… well, they’re still waiting… This allows the first patron to make a decision on remaining a patron or not having already gotten the benefit they wanted, while the second patron is “stuck” waiting for a reward they don’t know when will come. You see how this still adds an element of chance to your patronage?

I just saw this sorry… But this logic is completley wrong. It is not a matter of chance. It is not a lotto or raffle and that is not how a lottery or raffle works and it is more definetly NOT random. Its sequential and guerentee’d. Yes when is a variable, but the “when” is always a variable.

If this banning is because the round robin method is being defined as a lotto then they need to change the wording of their terms and conditions. In fact based on my tiering wording a patron knows how many I am sending out and roughly when they should expect something, and Im happy to communicate this out. The logic in the above statement is none existent. Its like I could say if you join this tier I will send you something, but you apply the same arguement and say I dont send the item on monday, I might send it on wednesday or in 6 months time, then this patreon is STUCK waiting for a reward they dont know is coming… And there fore this adds chance. So I could get banned for this, even if my tier said I will send everyone that joins a gift. Totally unfounded logic that does not tie in with their own terms and conditions. Even if they disagree its clearly totally unclear what is allowed and what is not. And to go and ban the account this way is just wrong.

[sambeawesome]

If it was something that was once approved, I can definitely see an issue here then. I was just going off of what I remembered from the previous thread where they said no. The conflicting info is certainly annoying to say the least. They definitely need to get some clear and consistent language going.

Seems pretty standard for most brands to suspend/ban with little to no info as to why. Twitch and YT do the same thing, it’s extremely unhelpful if you want to fix whatever they thought was the problem, if there was one at all.

Like I said, hope they get back to OP soon.

[rover8200]

thank you temrim… But I am completly in line with their terms in the URL you provided
https://blog.patreon.com/patreons-stance-on-raffles-lotteries-and-giveaways

They state
## What are raffles, lotteries, and giveaways?

On Patreon, a raffle is defined as a contest that your patrons must pay to enter in order to receive a randomized chance of winning a prize.

When trying to figure out if a Patreon benefit would be considered a raffle or not, ask yourself the following two questions:

** Did everyone have to pay to enter the contest (i.e., by becoming your patron)?*
** Would the winner of the contest be chosen through pure chance (i.e., a drawing or a lottery)?*

If the answer to both of those questions would be yes, then the benefit in question is a raffle and is not allowed on Patreon. Other forms of contests that share the two characteristics mentioned above, such as lotteries or giveaways, are also not allowed on Patreon.

AND

## Does this mean creators can’t organize contests at all?

Now you know why we don’t allow raffles and games of chance on Patreon. But does that mean that you can’t organize any form of contest with your patrons?

Running other forms of contests on Patreon is allowed as long as they fulfill the following qualifications:

** Winning the contest doesn’t depend on luck/chance*
** A patron’s chance of winning can’t be increased by paying more money (like by pledging at a higher tier)*

---

My giveaway is total in accordence with these guidelines.

[Temrin]

Yeah, its standard but I think it’s a poor custimer choice decision unless the offense is like… grave. But I do understand that as a business, sometimes these are helpful on the business side. Even if they just changed their emails to actually state the problem instead of being vague, not only would it save their time troubleshooting with the creator but save the creators time (and put them in less of a position where they might miss a pay day because their account is still suspended due to lack of quick response.)

A compromise on the email would be nice, since I’m pretty sure contacting before suspending wont happen lol. Crossing fingers. XD

[rover8200]

they have not even told me what specifically is wrong. Its the vaguest banning ever. I will do whatever needs to be done and work with them in any way to sort it. Problem is I have no idea what to do and morgan their support guy does not want to reply. In the meantime Im loosing money and future support. this will drag on for days or weeks. horrible thing to go through.

[mindy]

Hey @rover8200, thank you for making this post and bringing this situation to our attention.

Firstly, I want to apologize for the experience you had with our team as this is not the experience we want our creators to have when interacting with any member of Patreon. I completely understand the panic and anxiety you must have felt during this and that is the opposite of what we want creators to feel when communicating with our Trust and Safety team.

Secondly, I was able to escalate this issue to a more senior member of the team who has since unsuspended your account effective immediately. They will continue to work you on this and be able to answer all your questions about our raffle policy. I read the message they have just sent you and it provides a lot more specific detail to help clear up confusion.

Thanks again for sharing this feedback with us and feel free to DM me if you need any further help.

[rover8200]

I cant explain the relief that the account is up and running. first and foremost anything I have to do in order to be compliant is my priority. But my position is still that I am already compliant.

Ive replied back to the email. with answers to your questions and the whole history of this lotto/raffle thing to when it first emerged as a problem.

Thank you for getting me back… I know there are things still to resolve but at least Im up and running for the time being.

[mindy]

You’re welcome, I’m very happy we were able to get your account back up and running while you continue working with the Trust and Safety team. They’ll provide more guidance and are the best people to resolve this issue.