Do you allow your moderators to ban members?

[Strawberry]

Yes, having been in both positions, I think it's a fair decision to let moderators ban members. I have trusted people to make the right decision and I would say I've also been trusted to make the right decision. It also depends on what your admin team looks like - I was once part of a forum where I was only 1 of 2 global moderators and we had 1 admin who never logged in over the weekend, so it was really down to us both to hold the fort. It was quite a busy forum too, especially when it first launched, so I wouldn't have been able to do my job without having that permission.

 

[Shortie]

There's a forum where I'm the Moderator Team Lead, I was actually given the power to ban but I never did. The initial forum owner started the forum with my assistance and inputs. At one point, he hired another mod and gave him the same power, the guy banned members like they were fighting 😂. It was when we were reviewing his mod duties we had to find out and demoted him because he didn't even follow the forum's mod policy in banning.

That is shocking. I guess that is another reason I don't allow mods to ban as well. I always give new mods a time period to see how they do their job and then I give a decision in the end. Letting them have banning powers allows them to just go off the road and ban left and right for no reason and that can sometimes be their reason for wanting to become a mod.

 

[Heatman]

That is shocking. I guess that is another reason I don't allow mods to ban as well. I always give new mods a time period to see how they do their job and then I give a decision in the end. Letting them have banning powers allows them to just go off the road and ban left and right for no reason and that can sometimes be their reason for wanting to become a mod.

Exactly! If we haven't worked together for a long time for me know what you're capable of doing even when provoked by other members without letting your emotions and power get to your head, I'm never giving you that much power to ban.

 

[Reverie]

When I've given that power I require there be a layout of what would earn a ban.

We had light warnings and hard warnings. 3 light warnings (depending on what it is about - which I also had laid out) would = temp ban
2 hard warnings would consider a banning - but this would be discussed.
If user is spamming the forum up with inappropriate images and that sort of activity would equal instaban.

We just had a good communication log about warnings and what not - I would trust them to follow through with the system we had in place.

 

[Ravenfreak]

When I did have moderators, I'd give them the okay to suspend but not ban members. I'd want them to run it by me first regardless though, just to be sure what rules the member broke. Sometimes people may not be in the right head space and may have things going on that causes them to say things they really do not mean to say. Likewise sometimes moderators may take things too personally, and I'd rather the whole staff team know what's going on before banning someone.