Terrible appeal rejections
BeyondSour-ING
Posts: 31 ✭✭✭
Appeals were promising: they gave us a chance to escalate nominations that were carelessly reviewed to someone that would actually read the information provided and make an intelligent choice.. or so we thought.
My local group and I keep getting rejection reasons that make no sense, and I know we're not alone. Note that I wouldn't bother making this post if it was not a majority of appeals. Here are some examples:
Official public art rejected for being "normal":
Full nomination: https://imgur.com/a/rb79B72
It's an artwork, on this building since 2003, featured on Montreal's official public art website: https://artpublicmontreal.ca/en/oeuvre/les-declins-de-verre/. Rejected for being normal.
A bistro with for "visible faces":
Where are those faces?
A "regular" information board about unique construction methods:
Full nomination: https://imgur.com/a/QsBPadz
Originally rejected for being temporary, a link showing it's been there since the condo tower construction in 2019 was provided. Rejected for being regular.
A "normal" permanent picnic area:
Full nomination: https://imgur.com/a/MoG2Bva
Not the strongest nomination, but it's a bunch of picnic tables bolted to the ground with garbage cans. We were told that these areas can be eligible. That's as good as a picnic area can get. I don't know what a special picnic area would be.
An ice cream stand since 1973 that "no longer exists":
More info: https://imgur.com/a/TJKmGpW
They're closed for winter, ice cream stands don't make money in winter in cold areas. This opens for most of the year every year since 1973. With that same logic, soccer fields don't exist either because they're unusable when it's snowing?
A lookout rejected for not having a sign:
..is that even a criteria? A quick look at the picture and you can see the exquisite view. In the info it was provided that it's along a popular cycling path.
A higher education pavillon rejected for being a regular business:
Cegep is after highschool in Quebec. Higher education buildings are not regular businesses, they bring people together from all over the province.
A boat launch that doesn't have pedestrian access:
How would you get in your boat if you're not on foot.
Thank you for making appeals faster, but we don't want it if it's rushed and of poor quality. It's extremely frustrating to review for hours, get and use an upgrade, have it wrongfully rejected by the community, appeal it, and have it wrongfully rejected by what I can only imagine is cheap labour hired by Niantic. The community decision I don't blame, it's unrealistic to think free labour will follow the tedious process of learning every subtility of the criteria. But Niantic employees have no excuse, they should know better.
Please share your experience. And Niantic, you owe us respect for giving you our time and valuable data.
Comments
How about rejection for third-party photo, yet you took all photos and posted it in the forums HERE asking why it was rejected by the community, and the result in Google image search is the link to the forums HERE? Less than 36 hours after posting about the rejection, it was approved and no explanation/apology has been given.
My fave part is they always end it with, “ it has no significance.” After you have just sent them a small essay explaining the significance.
While I wouldn't accept about a third of these, the rejection reasons are atrocious. @NianticAaron, you need to talk to the appeal reviewers, this is getting beyond a joke. I'd rather they took longer and took the time to do them right
Some of those rejection reasons are bizarre.
Either someone on the appeal team is trolling you or had a liquid lunch then came back to work and did those
Yes, I just got an appeal back for a trailhead marker that was rejected for being a "normal signpost with no significance". Not the first time, either - I had another come back as "generic" earlier this year. Although the trail marker itself is not lovely, it's not the SIGN I was nominating - it was the trailhead. The sign was just a physical manifestation of the Trailhead concept, submitted as "promotes exercise and exploration" for eligibility, not the artistic value of the sign itself. The paths themselves are marked on Google maps, and I did submit a link to the park map in my appeal statement.
You'll be expecting Niantic to use adequately trained staff next :-)
Here are my last three appeals, all rejections.
I guess the paragraph I wrote describing how this was a locally owned gallery that displays and sells work by local artists was not long enough?
I'm not sure why one would consider this "regular" or why that's a rejection criteria for a steel lookout tower you can hike to and then climb to the top of. It hasn't been used for fire spotting since the 1950's and is a hiking destination (of course, I explained all that).
Again with the generic thing. I wrote about how it's a historic structure at a tourist depot.
For the curious, here's the supporting photo:
My nephew tells me he had a trail marker rejected today. Apparently a mass produced abject and didn’t meet criteria. 🤷🏻♂️
It's almost as if the appeals reviewers don't read any of the supporting information provided, have no idea of criteria and just throw out a random meaningless reason for most of these. Makes the whole process look really poorly organised and unprofessional. Especially bad when volunteer reviewers are receiving threatening warnings for stupid reasons and have so little feedback on what they have even apparently got wrong. It's appalling!
One quick 5 minute search...
When we first welcomed customers to the store, the selection consisted of local art like wooden bowls, carvings, pottery, and other unique gifts. However, over the years, the selection has grown to include over 50 local and regional artisans as well as many unique gifts for all ages and occasions.
As a family, the Tinkers set out to make visiting the store an experience that is both pleasurable and relaxing. With a family atmosphere where all are welcome, the goal has always been to have the store feel like a safe haven for all who enter.
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Halls Top Fire Tower offers beautiful views of the Great Smoky Mountains.
Halls Top Fire Tower is a special untouched spot in the Cherokee National Forest. The road that leads you into the CNF is known as Halls Top Road just a few miles off of Interstate I-40. This road will take you 4.4 miles to the next turn onto Stone Mountain Road this road is 2.1 miles to the gate before the tower.
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The Leadville Colorado & Southern Railroad climbs roughly 700 feet as it winds its way through the trees of the San Isabel National Forest and over steep ravines pointing toward Freemont Pass until it reaches an old water tank that was used by the historic mining trains many years ago.
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That's without having the link to click on and Niantic are not paying me a dime.
Seriously @NianticTintino-ING @NianticAaron This is happening regularly and it's clear for lots of appeals nobody is taking the time to even look at what the submitter is saying.
I had some iconic architecture on a building rejected on appeal 3 times. First it’s “just carving with no significance”. Second appeal, “the location has no access”. - it’s covered by a footpath and is a multiple occupant residence, wondering how those who live there gain access?? 3rd appeal ACCEPTED 🤷🏻♂️🤷🏻♂️ I added a bit more to the description but that’s it.
@The26thDoctor-PGO Agree, you should be able to do any type of web search within 5 mins, maybe at most 10. I'd rather have the appeals team take the time to review than try to get the queue reduced. If Niantic really wants the appeals queue reduced, maybe they need to consider bringing in more appeals reviewers, instead of focusing on reducing the queue with the current number of appeals reviewers.
Also, as someone who worked in email customer service in the past, quality was more important than quantity. If customers are given all information they asked about and maybe more in their first email, they were less likely to respond back asking for additional information. We may also be more likely to get a "Yes" on the survey asking if we answered their question(s), or they may have replied back with a "Thank You" email.
Right now, I would be clicking "No" if there were surveys asking how the appeals team did.
The following is pure conjecture:
Niantic doesn't have a training process for Appeals reviewers, nor have they an Appeals staff. The paltry information they make available to us is all anyone has access to.
At least we, as Wayfarers, have a vested interest in the process. The Appeals reviewers are probably temporary workers wherever labor costs are lowest. They could be prisoners for all I know. I doubt any of them have ever played a Niantic game, and I doubt they retain the same people so they can continue to learn as they do the work.
They've been given nearly zero information to go on, get zero feedback, and have little incentive to care about anything beyond process stats.
My evidence for the above? Almost any good internal training material would be great for helping regular reviewers and Wayfarers. We haven't seen it because it does not exist.
Political prisoners are being forced to do appeals. That’s inhumane.
additionally, from my analysis in the wayfarer discord, they have forgotten exercise sign or trail marker. 90% of sign with trail name, or directional sign on the trail are rejected
Here's my contribution to this: what I saw as a pretty unique gateway to an important public grassy area in the town.
Entrance Pillars at The Chapel Of St Mary, Tory, BoA
51.347112,-2.256244
Thanks for the appeal, Explorer! The object in question does not meet the Wayfarer criteria as it is a regular entrance to the chapel and has no significance.
The original submission was rejected on PRP grounds so my appeal statement attempted to address that:
Unique pillars at the entrance to the green space beside the chapel of St Mary, Tory. This is not a private residence, it is a chapel with public access. A public right of way runs through this gateway, past the chapel and down to Wine St. The green space beside the chapel is a celebrated destination for tourists to the town. It is the highest point around and from here you can see over 10km to the White Horse of Westbury. This makes is eligible under Exercise and Exploration criteria. There are also benches on the green space where you can sit to take in the view so that would fit social too. There are photospheres here so you can verify what I have said is true.
So i had a tourist cycle trail marker, which promotes exercising on appeal, rejected. The submission had a link to the trail, which has a large online presence. The description included a description of the trail, including terrain and landmarks. But fails because its a mass produced sign. Aren't all trail markers mass produced?
I get your submissions. I accepted your cycling trail. It’s clearly a named trail. But because it’s not a wooden post it’s apparently mass produced.
No, not all are mass produced. Many are marked with names to indicate certain places, others have mile markers, some may even be signs with information on the nature or history of the area.
However, yes, there are trail markers that are mass produced, such as the ones that use a colored marker to indicate that you're on that colored trail on the map. There are other examples, but this is the one I see when reviewing that seem generic.
With that said, seems very lazy for the appeals team to ignore the map link you provided, as it's additional proof that the marker is at the location you chose, and trail markers do promote exercise and, at times, exploration. You even included information for exploration in the description.
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That is completely irrelevant. A trail marker shouldn't be rated on the objects aesthetic or literal presence.
It's another sh1tty appeal rejection @NianticTintino-ING @NianticAaron
Yeah, that should've been accepted.
Uh, almost all of these submissions are absolutely terrible - and perhaps Niantic thinks so, too.
The appeals I used so far have all been approved - without exception.
In my local Discord today, a submitter posted the results of their appeal for an apartment complex sign. The community originally rejected for "not historically or culturally significant", which of course I think was justified. I would have loved to see the appeal confirm this and remind the submitter that nominations must be great places to exercise, explore, or be social with others.
Instead, Niantic rejected the appeal for being "on private single family residential property" and the submitter thinks all they have to do to get it accepted is to resubmit explaining that the sign is on the apartment grounds rather than on private single family property.
Appeal decisions should help submitters better understand what makes a great Wayspot and what doesn't instead of misinforming and confusing them.
Congrats on your appeals, I guess. You seem to miss the point where the rejection reasons are completely random. We know those nominations are not the strongest (even though we do think they meet at least one of the acceptance criteria), which is why they were appealed in the first place instead of being resubmitted.
You miss the point.
It's not about judging an individual submission but that on many appeals, not just the ones in here, the appeal team have consistently shown that they either don't understand the criteria or they are not giving an appeal more than 5 second of their time.
Hi, can you provide the co ordinates for this please. Are you able to resubmit easily?
Guess I can join in too.
With the supporting statement:
I provided roughly two paragraphs about how virtual reality can be intensive exercise particularly when playing in simulated worlds with your friends in the appeal text. It is a complete deflection of responsibility, instead saying that I should present it in a new nomination to the community instead. Niantic's appeal quality has almost always been shít.
My local community is getting a lot of appeals for trail markers coming back as rejects for mass produced. So far they have been the metal directional signs, professionally produced for the trails with the name of trail added at the time of manufacturing. Wondering if anyone has had a yellow disc appeal rejected, especially as you can buy a pack of these from ebay and easy to fake a trail with.