receiving pm's asking for help/querying comp answers when you can't reply to the pm

fire**fly

i'm not quite sure how to word this
for several years on here now I've posted lots of mag comps/answers
& usually welcome pm's enquiring
if i'm correct/asking for verification etc,
to which I've always happily replied to,
but,
just lately have been having a spate of pm's regarding the mag comps answers,
I don't mind the pm's & would gladly reply & send them the pic where I've solved the puzzle but the pm's come from someone/s who doesn't let us reply to them as they have their pm options switched off,
I know through communication with other weekly mag comp posters they have had similar pm's where they can't reply to the person sending the pm's either,
as the pm's are not abusive or rude it's not a case of sending to the team & I can't think of another way to reply to the pm poster except to 'bump' the thread with the picture,

what i'd like to know is do you think it's fair/right that we can receive pm's asking/enquiring for help but we can't reply to the person sending the pm's



.

elsien

Just seems daft that people would ask the question without you being able to reply. And you have to actively turn off PM's as well so it's not accidental.
If it were me (as I'm not feeling over tolerant at the moment) I'd post in the thread telling people if they want the answer to turn their PM's back on as you can't respond otherwise. Although you'd probably then get jumped on by the people who object to any sort of conversation that bumps posts. The words no win situation come to mind.

Luckyone

It's a difficult one to answer because there could be so many reasons why this is happening.

1, The poster does not realise that they need to add the person they are pming to their allowed people to contact them to receive a pm back from them. ( I did not know this until I come across this myself, I thought because I had sent someone a PM they could reply kind of over ride the system )

2, The person may not need a reply. They have asked the question so know the person will check & that's enough for them

3, They may well be too uneasy/frightened/worried to turn them back on for any length of time due to the reason why they might of switched them off in the first place but would like to check it's right

xxx

Biker*Chick

Very fair point f**f - IMHO I would be tempted to put the forum user/s on my ignore list :eek: ....

...so they can either post their query publicly on your post/thread, or just accept that you have posted the correct answers and thereby acknowledge that you have painstakingly taken the time to:

a) purchase the mag
b) solve all the puzzles, and the effort involved to do so
c) check and double-check your answers so you are as sure as you can be they are 100% correct before you post them!

and, dare I add

d) if they continually have concerns that the answers you are posting may not be 100% correct, that they purchase the mag themselves and solve all the puzzles to see if they match yours!!!

oops - or am I being too controversial?! :rotfl:

mjm3346

If someone sends pms they should receive them, if they don't then ignore them.
Perhaps the forum software should be tweaked so PMs can always be replied to regardless of other settings.

elsien

Luckyone wrote: »

1, The poster does not realise that they need to add the person they are pming to their allowed people to contact them to receive a pm back from them. ( I did not know this until I come across this myself, I thought because I had sent someone a PM they could reply kind of over ride the system )


xxx

That one's news to me. I don't have a list of allowed people (unless the whole of MSE is allowed) and I've replied to people who've PM'd me who I've never spoken to before, with no problems at all.

mumto2boys

Personally if I couldn't reply by pm I would not reply at all. If they are that bothered that your answer is wrong, they should be posting it on the thread for a genuine bump to alert others you have perhaps made a mistake, or failing that, for fear of annoying the bumping police, post in here somewhere where they will get a fairly swift reply if not from you but from someone else who completes the mags themselves.

Luckyone

elsien wrote: »

That one's news to me. I don't have a list of allowed people (unless the whole of MSE is allowed) and I've replied to people who've PM'd me who I've never spoken to before, with no problems at all.

Sorry I have probably written it badly.

You can keep your Pm settings so you can PM anyone & anyone can PM you.

You can switch them off totally so you can not PM anyone & no one except the forum team can PM you

You can adjust your PM's so you can just have allowed people PM you.

xxx

CheCazzo

I 100% agree with Biker*Chick on this one. OP - could you just clear something up for me - has the pm'er ever raised a valid query where you've been minded to change the answer you already had? I'm guessing the answer to that is a big fat NO - in which case your pm'er is stirring the brown stuff and that's the only possible explanation.
As Biker*Chick suggested - this person should desist at once and go forth and fornicate - and on the way buy a copy of the magazine for themself then spend a load of time doing the puzzles.
Sorry - this person is trouble making and that is all.

elsien

Oh ok, didn't realise that. But surely if someone had chosen to change their PM settings, they'd know firefly couldn't reply?

CheCazzo

Elsien - I'd venture to suggest that OF COURSE they know that. Of course they do! That's the whole point. Trouble making - plain and simple.