Ironman services

I'd have to disagree with this. Every account should be treated with the same amount of care. I personally treat all my clients as if their accounts were HCIM. I play it safe because this is not my stuff - it's theirs. Even if we were to record, who's to say a provider couldn't just take the stuff after recording? Sadly it's not that difficult, plus it's easy to just fake a video. Having been staff on a private server before, I've seen it countless times (both convincing and not!) so I just don't see this working.

 

So, someone I had in an open ticket referenced this, and so i bothered to look into it. Never really posted here, but recently got into doing ironman services AFTER, i paid about 4b to get my ironman a 1.6b total bank.

When i work on an order i make sure it is explicitly clear, only one person at a time is allowed on the account. Worker included. When workers switch, they change the password. There is only one person allowed at a time. The moment the person asks to play during some time, i state explicitly it violates our TOS, If they choose to continue playing on it so long as they note the order will be delayed, and that the server itselfs has no liability for bans or lost items. It is very hard to prove anything. Who took what, you want a player to go to every death mechanic place to prove the items are not hidden there? Zulrah, tob, chambers, vorkath, grotesque guardians,hespori or litierally in some gravestone in BFE.

Ive also noticed a trend when people claim "scamming" regardless whether is actually realistic, the provider will always in some way offer a partial refund. Its impossible to tell what happened in the account. The usual TOS states, they are not liable for literally anything, yet scythe holds them accountable for it regardless of individual TOS. I say this because, one of the workers from an unnamed south american country, (cough cough) was accused of scamming when they phsyically didnt have power/internet. yet they were still refunded.

Regardless of anything else if you want solutions to how ironbanks should be handled. some solutions to consider are: The worker should post screenshots before and after every session they do this should include the last time the account was logged into. It can at the very least give a time frame. The customer should acknowledge they forfit the protection TOS offers if they wish to play on it during that time. And heres a reaally nutty solution. The provider can take full 100% responsibility if the owner of the account choses to let the server enable the authenticator on thier side. So it quite literally can only be the fault of the sever itself for any misplaced item, ban or mute on the account. Idk. This seems to be a place to spitball ideas, so while the latter being very extreeme might be a good solution to say ironmen who have a b+ bank. as its almost impossible to say what that bill is worth in terms of time and cost.

 

@whatskraken
Happy first Sythe post. You also mention a couple of interesting ideas for how we can address these issues in the future.

Basically what I'm hoping will happen is:
(1) Staff will provide basic guidance on how to approach these sorts of agreements. This will probably be a sticky, a news post, or both. You correctly bring up that several things could have been done to make the Kash situation safer for both parties involved before the trade was initated, for example not sharing the account between owner and service provider. That said, Sythe will always allow people to conduct risky business agreements, and so...
(2) ToS will stabilize and standardize over time. I've mentioned in the past that I want a "market" for ToS; in other words, competitors would compete on price and ToS (and business practices and things like that) in order to attract buyers and maintain their reputation. It's not too different than issues with RWT bans five or ten years ago. Originally, only a few people knew how to RWT effectively, but eventually everyone caught on. We've started relying on ToS relatively recently in the grand scheme of things on Sythe, and not all service providers are on the same level yet. Hopefully this will change quicker if we achieve point 1 in the near future.

But those are just my thoughts. If there are more actionable things we can do I'd be curious to hear people's ideas.

 

Just food for thought but everyone whose eager to push blame back on the service provider for long video proofs are they also willing to pay the premium for a more expensive service?

People often hunt for the cheapest service they can get when really you need to not only consider the trust worthyness of the owner but also the worker.

Ultimately some level of trust is required between provider and client and as an iron you are entrusting something that can't easily be replaced to another person. Would you choose someone more trust worthy or someone as cheap as possible?

If your wanting the cheapest possible solution I think the client potentially bares some of the risk here as someone who values there time more and is trying to build a bussiness won't throw it away so easily.

 

There's 2 options,

#1 He needed the gold and was hoping he could double up on it.

#2 He was a good client and got scammed losing 1.4b.

There's only 2 ways to flip the coin, lets just hope users focus on providers who are actually trusted with tons of ironman feedback from now on.

Yellow Hat

 

Also as cheap as gold is now its like .45-.48 I doubt an ironman who spent thousands of hours would trade it for $450 especially when paying more than that for a service < almost the same.

Yellow Hat

 

That's all completely accurate,

The real issue is that people who own 1b+ on an ironman account don't understand the risk when ordering services.

Lets say an ironman spent 1000 hours to get 1b thats less that .05 an hour... A service provider could put a worker on there that only see's 1b+.

Lets be honest most clients don't understand the rules or understand how to scam a provider.

Chances are the worker cleaned it and the client had no idea how to manage a scam.

Most real clients don't even use the forums other than finding a provider, a client, or gold.

We need more sympathy for clients less space for the providers workers to take advantage of the TOS for Sythe.

Either way it is what it is and there's no real way to ever prove a worker scammed an account normal or iron.

If workers were held responsible there would be multiple providers with DNT atm.

Its a sad fact that we are working in a black market with most providers abusing the fact that employees / themselves can scam without any consequence.

Yellow Hat

 

If we blame the provider then the scammers who know how to abuse the system will abuse us all.

However if we allow providers to scam and abuse clients we wont have any clients to deal with in the long run.

Clients need to be more careful and workers need to be better vetted, its all that it comes down to.

It's funny there hasn't been an issue with him until it was worth 1b+...

Either way it is what it is we can't change what this is right now.

Yellow Hat

 

Has it come to the point where every provider should screen record someone acknowledging completion of service?

IMO probably, there is a lot of issues surrounding services (Scam quits, dying on HCIM, etc). It drives me to believe that it's best if all providers just record and entire play session. Of course, that is tedious but seems like it would save tons of time on the providers end dealing with reports, save moderators time, and ensure safety.

 

I AGREE THAT CUSTOMER AND SERVICE PROVIDER MUST COME TO A MUTUAL AGREEMENT BEFORE THEY START THE SERVICE.

 

There's two big problems with recording that people are failing to realize.

1. Let's say that providers are now required to record. If they fail to and something goes wrong during the service, like Kash's example, he's the one liable because there's no proof he didn't do anything. Think how many clients some of these bigger service providers, like @Limiq or @Baod or something get at a single time. More often than not, their workers work on several things at once. Do you realize how difficult it would honestly be to record that many things at once for literally 15 hours a day? It's unlikely to happen. It's way too hard on a common-person's computer.

2. Storage. People fail to realize how much space these recordings take up, then stack on the fact these have to be stored for who-knows-how-long. Having multiple files that are 15+ hours of recordings just isn't going to happen. And what, you want a moderator who does their work for free to sit and watch a 15 hour skilling video to make sure nothing is taken? Yeah, that definitely won't happen.

Recording, while good in thought, just won't work no matter what.

 

I think I read some time ago that one of the bigger service providers got their own client which they work through. This client records all kind of information when a worker is on a customer's account to ensure the customers safety.

 

Impossible as some services take weeks, and months of 10-16 hours a day fam as well playing multiple accounts at once. <3

Yellow Hat

 

Services providers can just take their whole bank, when agreed to "not responsible for any items / loss".
They will just say "prove it" that it was me. it's like a free get out of jail card for some service providers here on Sythe.

 

A unique password link directly given to the worker might be a good way to solve it but then the client can just claim he never rechanged the password etc.

Idk wish there was a real solution just doubt we have one anytime soon with it.

Wish we had official service provider applications like MM style had

Yellow Hat

 

Only problem is the service provider you buy from almost never is the one on the account its a worker.

 

I feel like the verdict of this report was very well to say the least strange... and now myself who has orders open on ironman accounts right now does not feel safe one bit this just showed that depending on the tos you agreed too right now if a worker read that shit can take my items and run. This most worries me because when I get a service done all I see is time the time it will take but for example a Venezuelan worker who can live off 100$ for a few weeks why wouldnt they just take my gear? Most all service providers have the same tos as the kash report did whats to stop this from happening to me?

A one time password with a recorded log in while I change the password is going to have to be the option for me moving forward.

 

I'm sure that's okay for some providers to do. Like myself. I wouldn't mind being the one to change the pw so only I knew and recording the login but I got sure wouldn't record my entire session. I could call and screenshare but that's it