Welcome to Codidact Meta!
Codidact Meta is the meta-discussion site for the Codidact community network and the Codidact software. Whether you have bug reports or feature requests, support questions or rule discussions that touch the whole network – this is the site for you.
1. Outline Codidact's complaints process? 2. What public bodies oversee Codidact?
I ask as general reference. I compare with UK corporations, as Codidact are "incorporated in the United Kingdom as a Community Interest Company (CIC), with plans to become a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) in the future."
Most UK corporations publish their complaints procedure, with timeframes, like Lloyds Bank.
1. Can Codidact do same?
2. If a Codidact user is unhappy with Codidact's final decision, what public bodies can users complain to? As examples, Lloyds Bank refers you to "Financial Ombudsman Service, and British Airways Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR).
1 answer
You have a slight misunderstanding here, I'm afraid. Companies like Lloyds Bank and British Airways are both part of highly regulated industries (banking and aviation). Those industries have their own specific set of regulations, regulators, ombudsmen, professional bodies, etc, which often require companies operating in these industries to take certain steps, such as publishing a complaints procedure and responding to complaints in specified timeframes.
Codidact doesn't operate in such an industry, so there is no professional body or mediator applicable to us. We don't have a complaints procedure as such; complaints are received and dealt with by our community team, and there is no public body to refer to in the event that a user disagrees with their decision. However, that doesn't mean we're anti-community or averse to complaints — here's what we have done.
We're incorporated as a Community Interest Company, which is a special type of private company that functions like a precursor to a full registered charity. (We do still have aspirations to register as a charity, but the process is complicated and expensive, which are resources we don't have right now). The legislation around CICs requires our directors, and by extension anyone acting on their behalf, to act in the best interests of the communities we serve. That kind of built-in accountability is exactly why we chose to incorporate in this way.
We also have aspirations to build an Arbitration & Review Panel composed of community members, and to include community members on our board of directors. These will both act as further checks and balances: including the community on the board will mean the community has a fundamental say in how the company operates, and while there's no public body to refer to should a user disagree with a decision we make, the A&R panel will provide an alternative independent body to serve that function. Both of these initiatives are somewhat stalled at the moment, likewise due to a lack of resources, but they both very much remain on our list of longer-term plans.
In the short term, we're still very much committed to doing right by our communities. That doesn't mean we'll agree with every complaint, or uphold every appeal, but we're here to do good for the folks here on our network, and it's going to remain that way. I and the rest of our community team will be happy to answer any questions you have about this — either here, or feel free to drop into our Discord to chat more directly.
0 comment threads
0 comment threads