Hello Wayfarer Team,
I am writing to appeal a recent series of rejections and a subsequent warning email I received regarding my nominations in Guwahati.
I’ve been nominating lately my neighbourhood and exploring other neighbourhood to add more wayspots.
Recently, many of my nominations—including local shrines, murals, and park playsets—have been rejected with the reason “Abusive.” Furthermore, I received an email stating that I am not adhering to player guidelines. I believe these rejections and the warning are the result of a misunderstanding of a single nomination rather than a pattern of bad behavior.
The Context:
One of my nominations, the Rajdhani Masjid (Dispur), was rejected for a location mismatch. I placed the pin at 26.141501, 91.786124, which is the primary pedestrian entrance gate. While the structure’s center is approximately 15 meters away, the pin was placed specifically to ensure Safe Pedestrian Access on the sidewalk, which is a standard practice for large religious structures.
The Issue:
Following the rejection of the Masjid, almost all of my other nominations were rejected as “Abusive.” These include:
Local Mandirs/Shrines: Permanent religious landmarks.
Murals: Public art installations on pillars and walls.
Park Playsets: Permanent exercise and play equipment in public spaces.
These objects are clearly visible on Street View and satellite imagery. They are high-quality candidates that meet all Wayfarer criteria. It is illogical for a “House of Worship” or “Public Art” to be categorized as abusive. I have always aimed for pinpoint accuracy, and any minor deviation (such as the entrance-point placement for the Masjid) was done to follow safety guidelines, not to deceive the system.
Request:
I kindly ask the Wayfarer team to:
Review the “Abusive” flags on my recent nominations to see if they were applied in error.
Rescind the warning on my account, as I have acted in good faith to improve the local map with high-quality, permanent points of interest.
Provide clarity on why permanent community landmarks (Mosques, Temples, Murals) would be flagged as abusive in this region.
Because of all this my other nominations that were on pin point accurate waypoints were also somehow rejected claiming they were abusive but they were mostly local cafes, shrines, murals, etc which I know are under the criteria for nominations I don’t think so they deserved to be rejected.
I am a dedicated player who wants to contribute positively to the Niantic Waypoint database. Thank you for your time and for reviewing my case.
Coordinates of the Masjid for reference: 26.141501, 91.786124
Coordinates of the park melody chimes at Rupeshwar park for refference: 26.158879,91.784281
Coordinates of the cleaning Awareness Mural for reference:26.155279,91.785438
It has been previously noted that when a nomination is rejected as “Abuse” then any nominations still in the process can be removed at the same time.
Please Note: The term Abuse in this is meant as “Abuse of the Database” and not necessarily anything in the images / text.
Looking at the map, lack of Street View where you have placed the pin is not helpful.
Personally, I would have placed it at the entrance on the main road (see image below).
It doesn’t look like it was an attempt to place in an empty cell (positioned in the same cell) but there are other reasons to deem as Abuse.
Hopefully a member of staff could take another look and make a comment.
Once sorted you may have to re-submit the others.
Good Luck.
My bad,
I have just been setting up the tools and didn’t spot the “Imported Wayspot”.
OP: It does seem that the position you placed the Pin was seen as Abusive as if placed in the spot I suggested it would not have become a Pokestop / Gym.
Unless you can show evidence that the place you placed the Pin is a legitimate “Entrance” then it seems that the warning was correct.
I appreciate your response to my complaint but ig i pinned the waypoint at the backgate of the masjid and it’s not the concern if I’m wrong here then I’ll apologise andaje sure won’t do such mistakes in future but I got flagged by niantic and got a warning message on my pokemon go app and an email regarding this and even all of my other nominations for rejected.. I’m afraid my account will suffer in future and I am pretty concious about my pokemon go account
As long as you play by the rules in the future you should be ok
You are not helped by the lack of Street View but as someone from out of town that wanted to visit the Masjid which is the Entrance that I would be expected to use?
If you are confident that the Entrance at the side of the building is the regularly used Entrance then you could appeal. Are there any signs at the Front saying to use the side entrance?
Remember that it isn’t about one of the entrances that the people attending the location may use but where would none users of the building first come in to contact with it.
As @wooperIooper states, play by the rules and your account should be OK but if you do not want to risk it then there is nothing wrong with stepping back from Wayfarer until you feel more confident. Any “strike” on your account will be removed after 1 year as long as you don’t get any more.
Good luck with whatever you decide.
Thankyou for your response I’ll make sure will not repeat these mistakes in future but want to clarify one last thing I happened to get s warning sign from niantic can you please explain the whole thing of this..like how did I managed to get this when will it become dangerous to my account and how to remove or prevent it
Here is more about the Wayfarer Abuse Enforcement Ladder Policy:
Its one day warning. It will pop out everytine you login.
Next strike might be suspension including pokemon go
I suggest you to be careful for one year
How to?
You should have an alert on this screen. Click on your profile (the orange-R-circle at the top-right) and you should see it there.
This is what it looks like for me when I have a DM from staff
