What Actions We Take

At Whatnot, we are building a platform that brings millions of people together to shop, sell, and connect around the things they love.

We believe that supporting sellers to create a great customer experience is key to that mission. When buyers feel confident shopping on Whatnot, they keep coming back, strengthening the entire community. That’s why we champion fair, transparent selling and reinforce these values in our Community Guidelines.

To keep Whatnot a trusted platform, we take action when users violate our Community Guidelines.

How we approach enforcing our policies

We take enforcement seriously—but we also believe in fairness. When a user violates our Community Guidelines, we take action that’s proportional to the violation, while also taking into account a user’s existing Trust & Safety record. 

Less severe violations may result in a warning, while more serious violations will lead to temporary suspensions, revoked selling access, or even a permanent ban. At Whatnot, Trust & Safety violations are cumulative, meaning multiple violations (even if less severe) will lead to a ban eventually. Our goal is to maintain a trusted platform while giving users the opportunity to course-correct when possible.

What happens if you violate our Community Guidelines?

Depending on the violation and the seller’s existing Trust & Safety record, sellers may face the following penalties:

• Warning: We’lll notify you of the issue and provide guidance on the relevant policy.
• Suspension: You'll temporarily lose access to Whatnot for 2 days or 7 days, depending on the violation.
• Revoke Selling Access: If you are a seller, we’ll revoke your ability to sell or go live on Whatnot.
• Ban: For repeated or serious violations, we will permanently ban your account.
• Discovery Restricted: For certain violations, we may temporarily make your account less discoverable to users in Feeds and Recommendations. This will give you time to ensure you understand the policy and work toward full compliance. Your shows will still be visible on your profile, in Search and on the “Followed Hosts” feed.
• Other Penalties: You may lose access to certain product features such as Direct Messages.
• Ongoing investigation suspensions: During serious ongoing investigations, we may temporarily suspend access to your account while we carry out our review.

Do violations expire? 

While most violations expire after 180 days, if you’ve been banned or offboarded, those account level penalties are permanent. 

Appeals

If you think a penalty has been applied to your account in error, please respond directly to the email you received with relevant information and we will review your appeal. 

Account Health (BETA)

If you have access to the Account Health Beta dashboard, you’ll be able to monitor your Seller Performance Rates and Policy Standing in the dashboard.

There are five states for Policy Standing, corresponding to the penalties above:

• Excellent: Your account is in good standing. 
• Good: You’ve received a warning on your account. Additional violations could result in more warnings or stronger penalties. 
• Fair: You’ve received multiple warnings. Additional violations could result in further penalties including suspensions or bans.
• Poor: You received a 2-day suspension. Additional violations will result in additional suspensions or stronger penalties.
• Very Poor: You received a 7-day suspension and, if you are a seller, your selling access has been revoked. Additional violations will result in additional suspensions or ban. 

If you receive a violation, we encourage you to prevent additional policy issues by reviewing details in your Account Health dashboard, emails from Trust & Safety, and reviewing our Community Guidelines.