Good morning to you all.  By now, I hope you've had a chance to read my two other posts in this series.  Specifically:

"How To Delete A Post Reported By Another Member"

"How To Delete A Post That You Are Reading"

This final instalment of the series deals with "How To Ban A Member".  Pardon the fact that the introductions are relatively the same on all 3, however, this is for the benefit of future Forum Leaders that may read any one of these on their own. 

Banning a member is an important and necessary part of your arsenal as you work with fellow members to keep your forums clear of bashing, profanity and spam. 

However, it shouldn't be wielded lightly.  For example, you must only ban members that have that have violated the AGORACOM 6 Rules of Use.  We put a fun slant on them but please make sure you are familiar with them and kindly refer to them if you need to when deciding to ban a member.

As a HUB Leader, you have sole discretion over deciding whether or y not a member should be banned.  As a general guideline, however, we would recommend that members be warned via post deletion and warning (refer to the 2 links above).  Pay particular attention to an offending member's rating.  If they've been around for a long time,  made good contributions to the HUB but can get testy once in a  while, you migh want to give them some slack while keeping them in check.  Newbie offenders obviously get less consideration

Having said that, there are clearn instances when a member does not deserve the benefits of a warning and you should go straight to termination.  For example:

•  Vulgarity and Profanity
• Obvious Stock Bashing
• Personal Insults Towards Members
• Spamming of other stocks, sites or products

We're all relatively intelligent and civil people here, so we trust your ability to recognize such instances and deal with them appropriately when they come.

As such, once you've decided that a member needs to be banned, here is the process.  It only takes a minute and is the exact same process you go through for deleting a message, so don't worry about the number of steps below.  I've just taken extra care to be as descriptive as possible:

Banning A Member

If you are reading a post that warrants the termination of a member, select "Report This Message As A Violation" at the bottom of any post (red flag icon). 

Alternatively, another member may have already reported the violation.  

Either way, you are on your way to complete the following: 

1]  Go to your HUB Controls box (Underneath the button that says "You Are A President Plus")  and click On "Violations"

2]  You will see a list of violation(s) for the HUB

3]  Locate the one you are dealing with and select "process".  This will show you a copy of the post, who posted it, who reported it and the reasons for the reporting.

4]  At this point, you have to make a decisioin about simply deleting the post or outright banning the member.  For this exercise, assume you are going to ban the member. 

5]  Scroll down to "Action" and select "Ban User" from the pull-down menu. 

6]  Right below that is a "delete" pull-down menu.  You can choose to delete either the offending post or EVERY post he has ever made.  You should only select "all messages by this user" if in fact there is no value to most or all of his posts.  Otherwise, select "only this message".

7]  You will see an automated message appear in the box titled "To Poster".  This is a standard termination message sent to the offending member.  However, you can add to it if you wish.

8]  The box titled "To Reporter" will be empty.  If the violation was reported by another member, a quick thank-you would be a good idea. 

9]  Scroll down to "Ban Reason" and give us a quick reason for the deletion.  We need it as a reference for the future.  The best thing to do is simply copy and paste the offending post as it is right inside the violation page that you are now on.  Feel free to add a synopis of his history such as "has bashed the company on several occasions".

10]  Hit "Save" and it is all done.  The post will be deleted, the offender will be terminated, points the reporter will be thanked and points will be earned by the reporter.

**Question.  What if you have the same offending member come back and different aliases?  Please report him to us and we will take additional measures that we can not reveal here.** 

That is all folks.  Thanks and let us know if you have any questions.

Regards,
George