Ironman services

Lately we have seen multiple disputes about ironman services.
The most recent one being Kash
As a service provider who also offers Ironman services, I have many concerns regarding these disputes.
I will be using the dispute linked above as an example for this thread.

TOS
To start with, the user aknowledges the TOS, ( did not say I agree or anything ), however, Kash was told that a HCIM ( or Ironman ) can't really agree to the term ' We are not responsible for any wealth lost or missing'. Ok, so TOS does not realy matter in these disputes.

Proof
The disputer ( buyer ) did not have any proof that the provider got rid of the items. The provider can proof via Automatic Runelite Screenshots, and with multiple confirmations of the buyer, that the items were indeed obtained. Neither the buyer nor the service provider can however proof that the other party got rid of the items. The only proof that's here is that the items are no longer on the account.

Mod replies
Another point from a mod involved is ' If you're responsible for collecting items and those disappear, it seems reasonable to hold the service provider accountable for that loss.'
I'd say Yes and No. It makes sense that because the buyer pays for items, the seller has to deliver them. However, there's proof that the items actually were obtained.

Red Chins ( case specific )
As far as I know, the red chins can not be transferred to another account unless de-ironed ( they don't drop on pvp death and cant be drop traded ). Even if the service provider for some reason wanted to steal like 50$, it would make no sense to drop the chins.

Possible regrets
As an account seller, I do know that people sometimes regret their purchase. Some people buy on impulse. Other people think they will enjoy a specific account build, but find out later that they actually do not enjoy it. And other people buy an account when they have the money, but stuff in real life happens and they urgently need somem money.

This also happens with services. I do very large service oders, which sometimes take up to 6-12 months to complete. It has happened that customers ordered a lot of 99s when they had a lot of interest in the game, but months later quit runescape and asked to cancel the remainder of the service.

Conclusion
Disputes like these are hard to handle in my opinion, as there's no proof of who lost the items.
The service provider could drop trade the items to make some quick extra money.
The buyer could drop trade the items to basically get a full refund from the order. Especially after this case, more and more people will know about the ruling and what is to stop them from claiming the service provider lost the items, when in reality they just wanted a full refund? 1.4b is a lot of money. Maybe because of Covid the customer was tight on money and saw this as the only solution? Maybe he has found someone else who can do the service for much cheaper?

These are just my objective views here. I just think the system is flawed regarding these ironman services. The exact same problem is with Hardcore status lost, or items from the bank gone ( when the service is just skills/quests, not item gathering ). The ruling however seems to always be in favor of the buyer.

Solution
The only solution I see here, is TOS. Something as 'Even though this is an ironman service and you can not remove your wealth, in the event of any items missing, we are not held responsible'.
It might be kinda unfair, as this could then be exploited as well, but I don't see any other solution.

If nothing is done, any customer could just get a full refund by removing wealth themselves...
If nothing is done, I no longer feel safe offering ironman services and until something is done, I will no longer be offering any ironman services on Sythe.

TLDR: IMO the system is flawed where a buyer COULD droptrade items at any given time and claim a full refund from the service provider. Service providers HAVE to have a way to protect themselves from these possible events.

 

[Departure]

@Zora Just a Heads up on the chins Taken directly from the rs wiki.

"If a player dies with red chinchompas in their inventory or equipped, the chinchompas will disappear and cannot be retrieved, including safe deaths (i.e. Zulrah, Hespori). This is due to the fact that the chinchompa is a live animal, meaning it can run away. However, if you are in the Wilderness and die, the player who killed you can pick up your chinchompas."

So there was definitely an incentive to pk the account for the chins.

Also To avoid things like this in the future The customer should let The service provider change the password to the account so only he knows it. Also Tos cant supersede sythe rules so if the worker scammed items then yes they would still be liable (I dont know if that is what happened in this report.)

 

@Zora Just a Heads up on the chins Taken directly from the rs wiki.

"If a player dies with red chinchompas in their inventory or equipped, the chinchompas will disappear and cannot be retrieved, including safe deaths (i.e. Zulrah, Hespori). This is due to the fact that the chinchompa is a live animal, meaning it can run away. However, if you are in the Wilderness and die, the player who killed you can pick up your chinchompas."

So there was definitely an incentive to pk the account for the chins.

Also To avoid things like this in the future The customer should let The service provider change the password to the account so only he knows it. Also Tos cant supersede sythe rules so if the worker scammed items then yes they would still be liable (I dont know if that is what happened in this report.)

Ah did not know that about chins, thanks.

I don't think a unique password would help, unless you'd maybe involve a mod knowing the pass as well. If the service provider gets his own pass change, the buyer cant login. However, the buyer can again just change the pass. The service provider could claim the buyer changed it, but how can he proof that? The provider could just say he changed the pass to password123 when in reality it was something else.

I know TOS can't supersede Sythe rules, the problem is there's no proof who scammed what.

 

[Departure]

@Zora The provider could just take a 5 second clip of him logging in with the password for the first time and save it. The buyer would have to pick the same exact same password length which would be unlikely. But yes I agree its not fool proof.

 

@Zora The provider could just take a 5 second clip of him logging in with the password for the first time and save it. The buyer would have to pick the same exact same password length which would be unlikely. But yes I agree its not fool proof.

Yeah that's indeed a possible solution, thanks for the input.

About the Chins btw. In this dispute is was regarding a Hardcore Ironman, and the Status was not lost. I think its very unlikely the service provider would grief and remove the chins with nothing to gain from it.

 

Red Chins ( case specific )
As far as I know, the red chins can not be transferred to another account unless de-ironed ( they don't drop on pvp death and cant be drop traded ). Even if the service provider for some reason wanted to steal like 50$, it would make no sense to drop the chins.

You can table the chins (use them on a table in game) and it will spawn for another player.

I do see your concerns as valid and i'll have a discussion with staff regarding this.

 

You can table the chins (use them on a table in game) and it will spawn for another player.

I do see your concerns as valid and i'll have a discussion with staff regarding this.

Oh did not know that either haha, thanks. And thank you

 

[bababablacksheep]

I think one way would be for the service provider to be provided with a password change link, which then the only person who knows the password is the service provider - this would prevent anyone else from logging into the account - and if the owner of the account recovers during service - the TOS would be the service provider is not responsible for loss of wealth.

Till the point of a service ending the service provider records the bank as soon as the password link as been sent across to the owner of the account then logs out to show the service provider has logged and tries to log back in with the password, on that recording it will be clear if the service provider cannot log in that is the last state of the account.


This will be a drastic state of events to provide service to an ironman but i think this is the only way there is any real proof who has removed any wealth.


I think just stating a TOS not being responsible for loss of items is irresponsible of the provider, but it does indeed protect them against rogue Ironman owners.

 

[Superfluous]

I think one way would be for the service provider to be provided with a password change link, which then the only person who knows the password is the service provider - this would prevent anyone else from logging into the account - and if the owner of the account recovers during service - the TOS would be the service provider is not responsible for loss of wealth.

The issue with this is that, in this case, the customer had some agreement where he was sharing time on the account with the service provider.

@Zora Thanks for making this thread. I agree we need to set some ground rules about how we handle these sorts of reports. As you mentioned, there was also that mess of a report last month with the user whose ironman lost HC status. I would love to always side with ToS for these reports, but as was mentioned in the Kash report, the nature of the service he was paid to do (acquire items on an HCIM) conflicts with his ToS.

Does that make his ToS invalid and him liable? Or does it make the customer liable because he agreed to especially onerous ToS? I'm not sure. We're re-discussing this now and will provide an update shortly.

 

[Poat]

The issue with this is that, in this case, the customer had some agreement where he was sharing time on the account with the service provider.

At this point it would be the same as it currently is where it is near impossible to prove who removed the items, except now it would/should rule in favour of the service provider because instead of having them be the only one with access to the password there is now 2 or more people who could have done it, and they took away their only defence so they can train crafting while there is down time.

 

The issue with this is that, in this case, the customer had some agreement where he was sharing time on the account with the service provider.

In this case, the service provider should not have be the one held liable unless there's incredibly substantial proof the one working on the account (not the one who bought services) is at fault. Like previously mentioned, someone could have bought the services, decided they wanted to do it themselves and wanted a refund and, after being denied, decided to just drop everything that they paid for then report, where the service provider is held responsible. It doesn't seem right when there's a lack of proof whether the buyer or provider can prove who is at fault.

If anything, I feel that it should be a 50\50 split of responsibility. Just nobody can take no blame. Someone did something and unless there's definitive proof, neither can be fully held responsible. So in that case, a 50% refund should be issued and have that be the end of it. The only one hurting a lot would be the provider as they're out money that they worked for.

 

[Mastiff]

This was a good read though i find it hard to believe as an ironman myself the reason that i would do this to my own account ever just because of the time wasted, the only reason i could see was if i would be genuinely quitting. The best way to circumvent this from happening would be what was mentioned before in my opinion. A one time password given to the person doing the work & the owner not being able to log into the account until maybe a verified middleman logged in & changed the password, it is what i would probably do while charging a very large premium for this kind of service.

 

This was a good read though i find it hard to believe as an ironman myself the reason that i would do this to my own account ever just because of the time wasted, the only reason i could see was if i would be genuinely quitting. The best way to circumvent this from happening would be what was mentioned before in my opinion. A one time password given to the person doing the work and the original owner not being able to log into the account until maybe a verified middleman logged in and change the password, it is what i would probably do while charging a very large premium for this kind of service.

See the problem with that though is that Sythe no longer has a Middleman rank. And even then, someone still would know the password. At that point, the MM could get blamed. There's no "solid" way of doing any of the ironman stuff.

 

[Mastiff]

See the problem with that though is that Sythe no longer has a Middleman rank. And even then, someone still would know the password. At that point, the MM could get blamed. There's no "solid" way of doing any of the ironman stuff.

There has to be a way to get it done right and safe even if it was the service provider having a 1 time password and screen sharing while the owner changes the password and watches them log out. It might require a lot more work but there has to be a way to do it safe for everyone.

 

Me as an ironman player who is sometimes ordering some things, i am usually taking screenshots of my most valuable items in the bank and giving the provider an unique password link.
if in some cases the customer wants to login into the account, the service has to be cancelled for not violating the tos.
tge customer can also ask a screenshare or screenshot of the actual bank/bankvalue to make sure everything is still on the account.

 

There has to be a way to get it done right and safe even if it was the service provider having a 1 time password and screen sharing while the owner changes the password and watches them log out. It might require a lot more work but there has to be a way to do it safe for everyone.

Unfortunately there's never a perfectly "safe" way of doing things in a market like this. It requires a large of amount of trust from both parties and that trust isn't always enough for some. Some people are just greedy. I wish there was a perfect way of doing it but there just isn't.

 

maybe you could put BoP (Burden of Proof) on the service provider, meaning if items go missing from an account its automatically there fault if they can't prove it wasn't them. make them set very clear cut hours and record the entire session spent within the timeframe on the account, and have the owner of the account change their account password at the end of every single session. So that every minute that the service provider has access to the account is accounted for via video so they can prove they didn't take some items. This is a lot of work for the provider and everyone tbh and most people probably cba but it establishes a good way to create definite proof right? not very experienced with irons at all, but maybe this is on the right track?

 

[Mastiff]

maybe you could put BoP (Burden of Proof) on the service provider, meaning if items go missing from an account its automatically there fault if they can't prove it wasn't them. make them set very clear cut hours and record the entire session spent within the timeframe on the account, and have the owner of the account change their account password at the end of every single session. So that every minute that the service provider has access to the account is accounted for via video so they can prove they didn't take some items. This is a lot of work for the provider and everyone tbh and most people probably cba but it establishes a good way to create definite proof right? not very experienced with irons at all, but maybe this is on the right track?

I think we keep coming to the same conclusion but what i feel like you posted would simply just be too much work for people trying to clear their day everyday to do something like that. The one time password has to be the answer i have an ironman personally and i believe that when i hit a couple 100m worth of bank and if i continue to order services at all i will have my own tos. It will include that i will be giving the provider a 1 time password that they will set and they will be accountable for the wealth on the account until the password is changed just to protect myself i dont really see another answer.

 

maybe you could put BoP (Burden of Proof) on the service provider, meaning if items go missing from an account its automatically there fault if they can't prove it wasn't them. make them set very clear cut hours and record the entire session spent within the timeframe on the account, and have the owner of the account change their account password at the end of every single session. So that every minute that the service provider has access to the account is accounted for via video so they can prove they didn't take some items. This is a lot of work for the provider and everyone tbh and most people probably cba but it establishes a good way to create definite proof right? not very experienced with irons at all, but maybe this is on the right track?

That's extremely unrealistic. Some of the people who work for providers work anywhere from 12-15+ hours a day easily. Do you have any idea how big a file would be if someone had to record the entire time they were working? While the idea is there, that's not going to happen, especially if not everyone has that good of a computer. I know from my own experience there's no way I would be able to record for a solid 12 hours while working.

 

yeah I totally get that its a shit ton of work especially for all day work, but maybe for like niche work on high level HCIM's or max bank irons etc where it is even more important than usual