Why The Ban for Sockpuppeting? - Satisfaction Report

Lnorkle on 24/02/2017 - 10:18
Last edited 24/02/2017 - 11:37 by 2 other users

Came back to the Catch the Deal bargain, as I had received my order quickly and totally as described, only to find them banned due for 'Sockpuppeting'. I note the ban is for 1 month.

I'm not going to start a war with the hardworking ozB mods, but thought I would mention that I was a happy customer. Perhaps if I could find some additional information on what happened, I would better recognise this negative behaviour in the future.

In fact my original post was going to be how impressed I was, as the order was despatched same day, arrived in a couple of days, and the product was indeed as described 200 individually boxed and wrapped Finish Quantum dishwasher tablets. As far as bargains go, it was half the price of what I'd pay for them on special at Coles/Woolies.

Anyone else have good/bad reports?

Related Stores

Catch The Deal

• 

  exc3113nce on 24/02/2017 - 10:23

  +5

  Hi norkle, Sockpuppeting is part of the rules. See here

  If you are caught sockpuppeting, then you will be banned

  • 

    norkle on 24/02/2017 - 12:30

    Totally get sockpuppeting is bannable, I just didn't personally see the sockpuppeting. Now that my order has arrived, I just wanted to support the guy, as it was a bargain (to me).

• 

  supnigs super skids on 24/02/2017 - 11:04

  +4

  hey, seems to me you just did it again.are you assoiated with COTD?

• 

  spackbace on 24/02/2017 - 11:34

  Sockpuppeting can be many things. Normally it's someone associated with the company voting up the deal, or commenting and raving about how good it is

  Nothing to do with the business itself, merely how they market themselves. Anyone associated with a company is told to play by the rules, but some try to slip through the cracks in an effort to make their stores look better.

  Thankfully the mods have many tools available in order to weed out companies doing this, unlike other sites which just let it happen.

  • 

    Clear on 24/02/2017 - 11:38

    Other sites (Hotukdeals) just ask for bribes ;)

    • 

      spackbace on 24/02/2017 - 11:40

      +1

      And SD just keeps front-paging anything that gets them credit from the click-throughs ;)

  • 

    Diji1 on 24/02/2017 - 12:03

    -1

    Also normally it's some well known names (no suspicions about Spackbace just to be clear) around here upvoting themselves as we occasionally see when they hilariously forget to logout and answer themselves as themselves. :p

  • 

    norkle on 24/02/2017 - 12:32

    So do you think in this case the mods could 'see' the sockpuppeting, but the average ozB user couldn't?

    • 

      spackbace on 24/02/2017 - 12:37

      Probably. Email address, IP address etc

    • 

      spackbace on 24/02/2017 - 12:52

      +1

      Just as an idea, have a look at their past deals, and see how many new accounts have voted on the deal. Accounts with no posts, no comments, haven't voted on any other deals. That in itself rings alarm bells for me, and frankly I avoid any company that has to resort to those sort of tactics.

    • 

      Moderatorneil on 24/02/2017 - 13:09

      There are many flags that normal users can see like

      • New users posting deals
      • New users posting deals for stores where few or no deals have been posted
      • Blocks of votes from new users
      • Suspicious comments from new users

      However this doesn't mean that they are sockpuppeting/astroturfing. We all were new users. That's why it's important to report any suspicions you see.

      Internally, there are loads of things that detect this behaviour and help us investigate.

      • 

        norkle on 25/02/2017 - 17:08

        Appreciate the reply mod @neil. Is the only way for me to know someone is a new user, is to look at their profile page? Or is it more obvious when looking at their posts?

      • 

        Moderatorneil on 26/02/2017 - 22:22

        @norkle:

        For deal posts, there will be an L or P next to their post.
        For voting, you can see the account creation date of their account.

        Everything else, yes you'll have to click on the profile.

        However, and I can't stress this enough to everyone, please use the report link. Don't accuse people publicly as falsely accusing users is not inviting to new users to OzBargain.

• 

  hell0 on 24/02/2017 - 11:39

  +1

  Maybe Catch of the Day/Deal partakes in too much dodgy marketing and its too hard now to differentiate between real and fake opinions.

  The ban is because it sways public opinion for/against a business based on lies & takes away the integrity of forums such as ozbargain. Even whirlpool realised COTD was sockpuppeting years ago.

  "as described 200 individually boxed and wrapped Finish Quantum dishwasher tablets. As far as bargains go, it was half the price of what I'd pay for them on special at Coles/Woolies."
  Let's see how your dishwasher holds up after using these…

  • 

    neil on 24/02/2017 - 12:17

    FYI, Catch The Deal (OP is discussing) is a different company than Catch of The Day.

  • 

    norkle on 24/02/2017 - 12:29

    My point was I was expecting the worst, and figured the guy was maybe not describing them correctly as 'individually boxed' (thinking he meant the bags of 40 or whatever), but they are in fact individual tablet, individually packaged and boxed. I laughed out loud when I opened them, because I figured he had the description wrong but I'd give it a try.

  • 

    norkle on 24/02/2017 - 12:33

    Short of chemical analysis, they look like the real thing to me. It actually seems crazy that they are individually wrapped (this created confusion in the original post), but they are.

    • 

      Master Bates on 24/02/2017 - 13:28

      +1

      Perhaps they are left overs from a marketing campaign; they usually come individually wrapped.

      I imagine it costs the manufacturer more to hire people or outsource to marketing firms to distribute, so Catch the Deal bought the stockpile cheaply and is selling it on.