Dispute Policy

What disputes are for

A dispute asks BountyPad moderators to review a disagreement about a specific bounty or submission. Before opening one, re-read the bounty's requirements and judging criteria: disputes are not a way to overturn a project's reasonable judgment about quality or fit. Common reasons include:

• Unfair rejection: work that met the published requirements was rejected.
• Requirements not met: the project believes submitted work doesn't meet the bounty's terms.
• Non-payment: approved work wasn't paid.
• Plagiarism: a submission copies someone else's work.
• Other breaches of the Bounty Rules or Content Guidelines.

Opening a dispute

Either the contributor who made the submission or the project owner (or a project admin) can open a dispute. You give a reason, a written statement and up to 10 links to evidence, such as screenshots, files, posts or transaction records.

The other side is notified and can add their own statement and evidence, and both sides can update their statements while the dispute is open. Only one dispute can be open for the same submission at a time, and the bounty is marked Disputed until it is resolved.

Disputes are private: only the people involved and BountyPad moderators can see them.

Timing

Open a dispute as early as you can, and before the bounty's review window ends. The review window is enforced by the escrow program, and a dispute does not pause or extend it. After the window ends, the escrow can no longer pay anyone, and anyone can return the unpaid funds to the project's treasury, even while a dispute is open.

How moderators review

A BountyPad moderator reviews each dispute, marks it under review, and then resolves or dismisses it with a written explanation that the people involved can see. Moderators may dismiss disputes that are abusive, duplicated or outside this policy. They consider:

• the bounty's published requirements, deliverables and judging criteria;
• the submission, its revision history and the team's review notes;
• timestamps and on-chain records of funding, payouts, cancellations and expiry;
• both statements and the evidence provided.

What moderators can do

Depending on the outcome, moderators can:

• hide content, such as a plagiarized submission or a misleading bounty;
• freeze a project in the BountyPad interface, which stops BountyPad from preparing that project's transactions;
• adjust reputation, for example by recording a lost dispute on a profile;
• block malicious links;
• ban accounts that break our Terms or Content Guidelines.

What moderators cannot do

Moderators cannot move escrowed funds. The escrow program has no administrator override: nobody at BountyPad can force a payout, reverse a payment, redirect funds or extend a review window.

A freeze only affects BountyPad's interface. The escrow program keeps enforcing its own rules: a project owner can still use it directly, and anyone can return unpaid funds to the project's treasury once the review window ends. A dispute outcome is a moderation decision. It doesn't decide the parties' legal rights, and it doesn't make BountyPad responsible for any payment.

Outcomes are not guaranteed

Many bounty disagreements turn on judgment (quality, creativity, originality or fit) and can't always be objectively determined. Moderators make a good-faith decision based on the information available, but we don't guarantee any particular outcome, that a decision will be right, or that a dispute will be decided before a review window ends.

If you believe a decision was wrong, email [contact email] with a link to the dispute. We may take another look but are not required to. This policy doesn't limit any legal rights you have against the other party.

Conduct during disputes

Keep statements factual and respectful. Fabricated evidence, harassment, threats, or opening disputes to pressure the other side can lead to reputation penalties or a ban. Opening disputes is rate-limited to prevent abuse.