What does it mean when a member is ‘paused?’ Who does that and why?
~~When I'll be away from the site for a while, it's a way for me to communicate it, so people don't feel I'm ignoring them. There are other times it is equally useful.~~ I was thinking about the "deactivate" setting. I was unaware of the pause.
If you go to the FAQ thread, you'll see that members get paused by the site when they haven't necessarily done anything wrong, but there are issues that need to be worked out. A pro's payment details might be scrambled, for instance.
Users themselves can mute or deactivate their profiles from the settings menu.
I don't have the data but my sense is that the majority of paused accounts return to normal activity.
The timescale is usually between a few days and a fortnight.
From what I've seen so far most members (if not all) that have their accounts paused are Pros that have some sort of administrative problem with the site like not having paid their 15% , not having their credit card on file so the site can take their fee, members that put in their profiles that they're Pros but haven't applied to be one, members that have inappropriate names or pictures and probably a few more things I'm not aware of.
Thankyou everyone!
Deactivated is very confusing in the context this particular website uses it. I’ve always interpreted that as they were deactivated! permanently. So, I remove them from friends and favorites, etc. This needs to be changed so that users know whether the “site” deactivated them or “the user” deactivated themselves. The site needs to display it as “User Deactivated” or at least Temporarily Deactivated. Deactivated is assumed to be permanent.
@nature700 I don't quite follow. If an account is deleted by the member then it no longer exists, that's pretty clear. And banned (by the site) is also pretty clear.
Deactivated just means "not currently active" which describes the situation perfectly. A user-implemented action meaning, I'm not currently doing stuff on this site. The word carries no connotiations about the future.
@CuddleDuncan Yes, this. Same thing as deactivating Facebook where you can deactivate and disappear for a bit but if you log back in again, you're back. Deleting your account is permanent.