Raising a Dispute
A dispute (the interface calls it a fraud concern) is your manual escalation path for a delivered placement that went wrong — the post never appeared, was deleted early, was altered, or ran in the wrong place. It freezes the owner's payout while the platform's team reviews the evidence, and refunds you if the concern is upheld.
Check the automatic protections first: declined or ignored bookings refund automatically, monitor-verified delivery failures auto-refund on insured plans (Elite and up), and guaranteed-view shortfalls make good pro rata on their own. A dispute is for what the automatics didn't catch.
When you can dispute
- Only after the post was published. Before that, the automatic accept/decline machinery covers you — if you try earlier you'll see "You can raise a concern once the owner has posted your ad."
- Up to 14 days after delivery — even if the payout has already been released to the owner. After that: "The window to raise a concern on this booking has closed."
- One open concern per order. While one is under review: "A concern on this booking is already under review."
Before you submit: check the evidence yourself
The review is argued over the same evidence you can already see:
- The "🔗 View live post ↗" chip on the order — is the post live, pinned, intact?
- The "🛡️ Delivery proof" archive — the frozen creative-as-booked and monitor captures, including any "edited since booking" flags.
If the trail already shows the failure, your concern is on solid ground. If it shows a clean delivery, read on to what a rejected concern costs.
Raising the concern, step by step
- Open your Campaigns page and expand the order's "Details".
- Click "Open a dispute". The chip also shows your plan's published resolution target (for example "48h SLA") — or "queue-ordered" on plans without one, which is honest rather than a countdown to a promise nobody made.
- The dispute form opens with a warning banner (see below). Pick a reason chip:
- "The post was never published"
- "It was deleted early"
- "The content was altered"
- "Wrong channel or audience"
- Optionally add detail in the text box ("Add any detail that helps us investigate").
- Click "Submit concern" and confirm the browser prompt.
On success: "Thanks — our team will review this. The owner's payout is held while we investigate." — plus your plan's resolution target in hours, if it has one.
What happens the moment you submit
- Held funds stay frozen. The dispute blocks the automatic release to the owner — and if the payout already went out (a dispute can be raised up to 14 days after delivery), the owner's wallet is frozen for the investigation instead.
- The evidence is frozen with it. The platform snapshots what its own monitor witnessed at that moment — every check, any flags, and the measured delivery numbers — so the review is decided on what the monitor saw, not on competing stories.
- Your resolution clock is locked in. The SLA is stamped from your plan at the moment you raise the concern — changing plans mid-review can't move the clock you were sold.
- The order shows its state. The order carries a "Dispute · open" badge with a live countdown to your resolution target (or "in the review queue"), and its normal actions are replaced with "Our team is reviewing your concern. The owner's payout is on hold."
- The owner is notified that a concern was raised and that their payout is on hold.
Outcomes
| Outcome | What you see | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Upheld | "Concern upheld" badge; the order moves to REFUNDED | You're refunded to your wallet |
| Rejected | "Concern reviewed" badge | The hold clears, the owner's release proceeds, and the concern costs you −0.5 reliability |
Either way the owner's frozen wallet is released the moment the concern is decided — a cleared owner isn't punished by the review itself.
The form says it before you type: if the review finds the concern doesn't stand, it costs you −0.5 reliability, and a pattern of rejected concerns costs more. A genuine concern is always safe — this only affects false or unfounded ones. Since Paid Promotions requires a minimum reliability score to book or bid, repeated unfounded claims can lock you out of new bookings until your score recovers.
FAQ
The owner never posted at all — dispute?
If the accept window lapsed or the owner declined, you were already refunded automatically — no dispute needed. If the owner accepted and the post then never appeared, that's exactly what the "The post was never published" reason is for, available once the promised window has come and gone.
Can the owner and I just talk it out?
The dispute flow exists precisely so you don't have to negotiate with the counterparty about money the platform is holding. If an owner responds to your booking with different terms, that's the separate counter-offer flow, which happens before anything is posted.
How long does the review take?
Plans with a published resolution target show it on the dispute chip and count down to it on the order badge. Plans without one are handled in queue order — the interface says "queue-ordered" rather than inventing a deadline.
The payout already released — is it too late?
No. You can raise a concern up to 14 days after delivery even if funds released; the owner's wallet is frozen for the investigation instead.
Will disputing affect my future bookings?
An upheld concern: not at all. A rejected one costs −0.5 reliability (more for a pattern), and your reliability gates booking and bidding. Check the live post and the proof archive before you submit — they're the same evidence the review uses.
Next: FAQ and troubleshooting — quick answers to the rest of the "why did that happen?" moments.