Hi there. I'm Toby, the Head of this great community.
If you'd like to get help with joining in or just want an explanation on what the community is about, head over to our "How to get started" guide here.
The O2 Community is a great place to get advice from others, discuss pressing issues about the network and its features and to have off-topic discussions too. However, to make sure it remains an enjoyable, constructive and safe place to spend your time, below are some guidelines to follow.
Community Guidelines
1. No personal info
Like any other website, the community forums can be viewed by anyone or searched via Google and other search engines. Your O2 community username will be visible to everybody but your real name and email address will only be viewed by the Community Team. For your safety and privacy, please do not post personal details such as phone numbers, address details, email address, Private Message content, BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) PIN, sensitive customer service message content, IP addresses and other account information on the forum for everyone to see. If you see any personal information, please report it using the “Report inappropriate content” button on the post itself.
Your information will be treated in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
This guideline accounts for the details of O2 staff members too. Please do not reference staff members by full name, or divulge any of their contact details without their permission.
About Live Chat (personal conversations): Please don't mention any chat advisors by their name and avoid copy-pasting the whole chat transcripts on here - instead, make a comment on the experience itself. If the transcript is absolutely needed in your feedback, post only the part you need (e.g. a few sentences).
2. Search first
Use the search function before posting a question to see if you can find the answer to your question from previously-posted threads. We have a guide on the community search function here.
2.1. If you still can’t find what you’re after, don’t be afraid to post a question. Asking questions is as much a part of contributing to the community as answering them.
3. Say thank you
You can thank people for their help by giving them “Kudos” – just click on the blue button below the post. You can also post a thank-you reply. If you agree with another member’s point in a discussion, giving them Kudos is a good way of indicating so. However, please do not manipulate its functions by doing such things as making alias accounts to assign Kudos to yourself, or by asking friends/other members to do so in posts. You can however ask members to Kudos any helpful posts in your forum signature, but only in this form.
4. Respect each other
New members and regular contributors alike - everyone has the right to post their views, as well as ask a question, regardless of their knowledge.
4.1. Don’t hold other members up for negative judgement or belittle them if they get something wrong; we were all learners once! It’s a great opportunity for you to teach them about the community and the help they are giving.
4.2. Be pleasant and constructive – no offensive, defamatory or abusive language.
4.3. No unlawful, libellous, damaging or injurious submissions.
4.4. No spam (repeated post/views that do not help a member in their thread).
4.5. Do not post in all CAPS; this is considered yelling. Please keep it down.
4.6. Public naming and shaming of other members for whatever negative reason is disrespectful. Such posts will be edited or removed.
4.7. Our Community staff are as much a part of the Community as everyone else, so please extend your respect to them too.
4.8. Please consider this guideline when you have conversations with each other in Private Messaging as well as on the public forum side.
5. Pointless posts
Pointless posts are posts that do not offer value or contribute to a discussion. They also deviate from discussions. If a member is asking for advice, before you reply, make sure you read the previous replies first and understand also what the original poster is asking. Try and make sure your replies are helpful and relevant to that thread. If you have a discussion point that is related, try to make sure it is still relevant.
6. Community self-moderating
If you see something that you think needs to be addressed, feel free to report it so that it can be looked at. This is done when members believe someone isn’t following the guidelines. Members do this by using the “Report Inappropriate Content” link in the bottom-left corner of each post.
6.1. If you have reported something, there is no need to reply on the thread in question that you have done so. The report is enough and the moderation/admin team will pick it up.
7. Stay on topic
To help everyone, please try to stick to the topic, and start a new thread if there is something unrelated you’d like to discuss. If a thread starts to head off-topic, a member of the Community staff may move the comments/thread somewhere more appropriate. Remember also that we have a whole section for off-topic content here in case your topic/comment doesn’t fit into any other category.
8. Advertising
No advertising of non-O2-related items for sale or external commercial websites/web-pages offering products for sale.
8.1. Please don’t advertise goods/services for sale. Other websites are specifically set up for this task, are much better at it and have the staff to support disputes. Advertising means posting links to products in threads out of context, as well as creating threads to advertise a specific product.
8.2. Please do not use this community to advertise or promote other communities or groups, neither publicly or via Private Messages. If in doubt, please contact a member of the Community management team with the full URL you intend to post.
9. Proprietary rights
Do not submit anything that infringes trademarks, copyrights or any other proprietary rights of any person or company.
10. Illegal, inaccurate & damaging material
Do not post links to or information about pirated and illegal software. These will be removed.
10.1. Don’t post information that is inaccurate or intentionally damaging to someone. This includes but is not limited to links or information to websites or servers that contain viruses, inhibitive malware etc.
10.2. Due to the complexities and potential for causing irreversible damage to your device, we do not allow open discussions of flashing firmware onto devices as this can void your warranty, cause software issues & conflicts, and in some cases could render your device useless. O2 are unable to provide support in any of these cases we’re afraid and we, therefore, don’t allow these discussions on the O2 community.
11. Impersonating O2 staff and other O2 Community members
Do not impersonate O2 staff or other O2 Community members in any way.
12. Staff members posting
Some members of the Community are O2 staff but post in an exclusively personal capacity. If you are an O2 staff member, you will need to include the following statement in your signature: “I work for O2 but my comments and opinions posted here are solely my own and do not reflect those of Telefonica.” If you need help with this, send a private message to the the community team.
13. Usernames
Inappropriate usernames are subject to permanent suspension.
13.1. The term ‘inappropriate’ is as defined by the Community Management Team.
13.2. This includes obscene, defamatory or abusive, libellous, damaging, injurious, foul, swearing, racist language, advertising of goods, services and websites.
13.3. Should a permanent suspension to occur, it will not affect the mobile service you have with the network, however.
13.4 Please do not use the company name of O2 in your username, as well as a username that appears to be critical of other companies. If so, you may be asked to choose an alternative username by the community team.
13.5 Please do not use the company name of O2, or the names of O2 products and services, in your username.
14. Avatars
Do not use avatars that may be considered inappropriate (reasons such as those listed above).
15. Post full answers
When responding to a query in the help forum, please ensure that you have your full answer ready before posting on a thread.
Small edits are of course fine. If you are unable to edit your post but want to add some information that will be helpful to others, send a member of the Community team a Private Message and you can discuss it with them.
16. Breach of guidelines
Any breach of these guidelines may result in editing or removal of comments/threads or may result in a temporary or permanent suspension from the community – however, the Community team will attempt to reconcile any issues through discussion before a suspension is even considered in most cases.
16.1. O2 may also take legal action wherever appropriate. We’d rather not do that, so please keep to the guidelines.
16.2. Any offensive content or abuse made towards staff as a result of a temporary suspension or moderation will not be tolerated. It will also affect any chance of a suspended account being allowed back on the community.
16.3. Creating an alternative account to circumvent moderation activity will not be tolerated.
17. Disputes
In the event of disputes or clarification on any of the guidelines the Community Management Team’s decision is final.
17.1. If you wish to escalate any discussion or dispute you may have with a member of our Community team regarding the guidelines and their implementation, please ask for this to be raised with a Community Manager.
17.2. Please do not discuss moderation that has affected you on the public forum, as this is a matter to be dealt with individually with the Community team via private message.
17.3. If the community team sends you a private message to discuss community conduct, guideline issues or anything else, we'd really like to chat with you and see if we can find some middle-ground. Please respond to private messages from the community team. You may not always agree with our actions, but private messaging is there for us to explain why we do things (always for the greater good of the community). However if such private messages are ignored, we cannot discuss/resolve things calmly with you and may need to resort to more drastic actions such as a community suspension.
18. Content
The majority of Content posted on the O2 Community is created by members of the public. The views expressed are theirs and unless specifically stated are not ours. We are not responsible for any Content posted by members of the public on the O2 Community or for the availability or Content of any third-party sites that are accessible through the O2 Community. Any links to third-party websites from the O2 Community do not amount to any endorsement of that site by us and any use of that site by you is at your own risk. Any content that needs to be removed as a breach of any guidelines will be done so by the Community staff team.
19. Accepted Solutions
It is very acceptable to ask a member to accept one of the replies they receive to a question as a solution, but you cannot ask for your own posts to be accepted as a solution.
20. Updating of the guidelines
Please note these guidelines are subject to updates without notice. We urge members to check these guidelines on a regular basis. For a full set of O2 Community terms and conditions in relation to the main O2 website, please visit this page.
