Unwanted Pm's, how do you deal with them?
 

I have been getting several unwanted pm lately to the point where it is getting very irritating. All of them are how can I do this or can you code that for me etc etc of this kind.

At first I placed that notice in my signature about providing paid support only in private and that seems to have worked for the most part. But I still get unwanted pm's and when I politely inform them that I charge for my time in providing support in private, they are like: Are you serious? Or Are you crazy dude? Why can''t you do it for free and all that crap. At first I try to ignore them but it has become very annoying and extremely irritating how some people are so selfish and don''t care about others as long as they get what they want. It is getting to the point where you do not dare to post the solution to someone 's problem because you fear you will get that unwanted/unwelcome pm.

Has anyone else from your guys received unwanted pm's of this kind and how are you dealing with it? Thanks in advance for your answers and thoughts on this.

Work harder on ignoring them (and I mean not letting it bother you, not just no reply). If I'm in a good mood I politely tell the person to post their question in the appropriate forum, otherwise I just ignore and delete it.

My standard reply, unless it's something specific that can't be addressed on the forum, is just to remind them to ask their question in the open (and appropriate) section of the forums. Most of the time their simply forgetting that out here, they'll get replies from the community, not just me. And that the answer they get, will help others when searching with the same question. I also remind them that sometimes, no one knows the answer. But they're very likely not going to reply to your thread with the post "I don't know." That wouldn't be helpful. :)

I tell them I don't provide support via PM and they need to post in the forums like everybody else.

Usually I am like that too. I keep my cool and ignore them. But sometimes it becomes just too much. Especially when you get repeated unwanted/unwelcome pm's when you have already informed them politely that you do not provide free support. The level of selfishness of some people is simply disgusting.

The thing is Lynne, that sometime you just can''t get through to some people. No matter how polite and calm you are trying to explain something.

What people tend to forget, scratch that, they do not forget it, but they ignore it, is that we are all volunteers here and we try to help others in our time and dime. And the beauty is that those people do not even bother to thank the one that helps them nor do they try to pay it forward by helping others.

Thank you all for your replies btw :)

Im helpful if we've been discussing it in a thread and they feel they simply dont get it!, they'l pm me (un solicited pm's of course) and i try to get them on their way, those that ask "build me this..." also get told i'll look at it and set a price accordingly :), those that demand (or seem to demand) i fix something for them get pointed to the forums.

That said i am guilty of ignoring the ones who wont take no for an answer ;)

I don't usually have a problem getting people to understand that. Then again, I remind them it just says "coder" in my user title. Doesn't mean I am one. :rolleyes:

I know what you mean. I guess that was my way of saying that I don't think there's anything you can do, especially if you're looking for paid work, then you don't want to just turn them down flat.

I try to help people when I can if it is a simple problem that only takes a few mins I do it for free but I tell them that in a pm

I completely agree. There is nothing you can do short of disabling the pm system. With some people it is like you are talking to a brick wall. Regarding paid work, I turn down flat only those users that keep pming me to do free stuff for them even if I have been explaining it very clearly and politely to them that I provide paid support only in private. If they want free help and/or free work then they can post in the forums and/or wait patiently if they have already posted, until they get helped.

And what they do, they reply with something like this: "Dude, I posted at my thread like 10 minutes ago,{link here}. Why are you not replying me". Not to mention the un-understandable posts in very bad/broken english that make my head hurt for days lol :D

If it's a particular user, put them on Ignore and then you won't get their PMs anymore. I did have to do that for one user as he would sent me a link to his thread everytime he posted asking me to reply. After telling him several times to not do that, I put him on Ignore.

I have had users get upset that I ask questions and then don't reply immediately when they respond back. But, I don't live here. I check the place in the morning and I try to check it again in the afternoon. If they can't be patient and wait, then that is their problem, not mine.

If its genuinely something that should be dealt with by PM, I wll reply, otherwise, if I have time I will tell people the same as Lynne (but only once), other than that, I simply dont reply.

I'd rather post a question in the open forum. That way my being stuck in stupid some times, helps others.
Pm-ing for help takes away from that. The more opinions you get on a problem the more likely you are to reach a solution. You just have to patient getting those opinions.
If you have no patients then warm up the VISA cause it's going to cost you.

It's one of those things that sometimes people aren't just reasoning logically, sometimes out of frustration and/or desperation. They forget the whole point of the board is to help. They sometimes forget that there's a search feature, and often don't check it for it's useful filters. They forget that entire board is going to see their thread, as opposed to the one PM they've sent to one person who may or may not be online anytime soon. They don't really think about the fact that if I was participating in a thread, that their PM is showing up right above my New Post subscription to the same thread. Desperation has made them think they're going to get lost in the shuffle, and slow reply or no reply makes them think they're being ignored. They often say "please help me", which is very polite and certainly a virtue, but it's kinda why we're here. And they really sometimes do think someone has the answer, not realizing that if no one has the answer, well, as I said, that wouldn't be very helpful if everyone one of us bumped the thread saying, "eh, I don't know. Good luck!"

I would double that or send them an invoice first :)