Replying in time, and marking yourself away

When someone writes to you for the first time, or asks to book a session, you have two working days to answer. Answer in time and nothing happens. Leave it unanswered and every live listing you have here is paused until you resume it yourself.

What starts the clock

Only first contact from someone new starts it:

the first message in a conversation you have never written in

a booking request

Six messages from the same person are one question, not six. The clock starts when the message actually reaches you, so one held back by the automatic message check starts nothing until it clears.

You have two working days

After one working day you get a reminder by email and as a push notification. After two, your listings are paused and the person who wrote to you is told you are not available right now. Working days are Monday to Friday in your own timezone (Schedule → Preferences). Weekends and days you have marked away do not count.

Question arrives            Reminder          Listings paused
Tuesday 10:00               Wednesday 10:00   Thursday 10:00
Friday 20:00                Monday 20:00      Tuesday 20:00
Friday 20:00, away Monday   Tuesday 20:00     Wednesday 20:00

What counts as an answer

any reply you send in that conversation

accepting or declining a booking request

declining the message request, which is an answer too, and the sender is never told

Only silence counts against you.

What never counts against you

a message the automatic check flags, or one a moderator flags later

anything sent by an account that is then banned

a message the sender deletes, or a conversation they leave

If your listings are paused

You get an email, and a banner sits across your dashboard while every listing you have had approved is paused.

Sign in and open Listings (on some of our sites it is called “Consultations” or “Engagements”).

Each paused listing says why it was paused.

Open the ⋮ menu in the top right corner of each one, choose Resume and confirm. It is live again straight away.

Nothing comes back on its own, and the email carries no one-click link on purpose: read the message you missed before you return. Answering matters more than resuming, because the person who wrote to you was pointed to other listings when yours were paused.

The same question never pauses your listings twice. A new unanswered question starts a new clock.

Going away

Say so before you go, and none of this applies while you are away.

Open Schedule → Availability.

Under Special days, press Add special day.

Choose Date range, then set First day and Last day. Leave Full day ticked and the status on Unavailable.

Save.

While those days last, nobody can start a new conversation with you: your public page shows the date you are back instead of the message button. Conversations already under way carry on as normal, and a question that was already waiting is frozen until you return.

One range covers up to 90 days, and deleting any day of a range deletes the whole range. Part of a day (a start and end time instead of Full day) counts as busy time rather than an absence: it closes those hours for booking and leaves messaging on.