Rules and how decisions work

Voting, turnout, secret ballots, who may vote, suspension, removing a member, small communities, keepers, and convenors and lead convenors.

Two ways to ask the community

A Poll is a question in the feed, like "Market on Sunday?". It shows what people think. It never changes anything by itself.
A Decision is binding. If it passes, your community's server carries it out by itself. Nobody has to press a button, and nobody can quietly ignore it.

The global community has Polls but no Decisions: anyone can join it, with 12 words or a sign-in, so one person with several accounts could swing a vote. Everything below about Decisions is about local communities.

What a Decision can do

About a member:

Suspend a member, or lift a suspension.
Freeze a member's credit, or unfreeze it.
Remove a lead keeper from an enterprise, or a leader from a project.
Remove a member from the community, or reinstate them. Nobody proposes a removal: that vote opens when an admin suspends the member (see "Emergency suspension"). In a large community a jury of members drawn at random decides it (see "A jury in a large community").

About the Commons:

Give beans from the Commons to a project or an enterprise.
Give a hardship grant from the Commons to a member.
Pay off a project's or an enterprise's debt from the Commons.
Forgive a debt that a member who left owed to the Commons. No beans move. The record stays, marked forgiven. Where a community keeps a Names list, this is started from there.

A grant can be for no more than the Commons holds now plus what came into it in the last 30 days. A bigger one is refused when you start it.

Who can start a Decision

Any active member whose credit is not frozen, and who has traded in the market. A trust badge is not enough. Admins can too. You can have one open Decision at a time. You must explain why, in at least 10 characters.

Who can vote

Any active member who joined before the Decision opened. A member whose credit the admins froze still votes: a freeze is about Beans, not about having a say. People who join during a vote cannot vote on it. Enterprise accounts cannot vote.

Nobody votes on a Decision to remove them, and they are not counted in its turnout. Where a jury decides a removal, only the jury votes on it (see "A jury in a large community"). A member an admin has suspended still votes on every other Decision while the community votes on removing them, and is counted in their turnout, so suspending someone cannot change a vote (see "Emergency suspension").

How votes count

Decisions about a member: one member, one vote. Yes or No.
Decisions about Commons beans: votes are weighted by trading. You can cast more than one vote, but it gets expensive: 1 vote costs 1 voice credit, 2 votes cost 4, 3 votes cost 9. Your voice credits come from your completed trades, counted up to 500 beans per trading partner. You get your full voice credits again on every Decision. They are never used up.
If you have never completed a trade, you cannot vote on Commons beans yet.
You can change your vote at any time until the vote closes.

Secret ballots

The app never shows anyone how you voted, admins included. Everyone sees the totals, and you see your own vote. Your vote is stored on your community's server with your account, so that it can be counted and checked. The owners and admins who run the server can take a copy of its files, and could look up your vote there.

Polls are anonymous too, unless the person who starts one makes it an open vote: then members can see who picked what. The poll says which it is.

How long a vote runs

Every Decision runs for exactly 7 days. Voting opens at once. When the 7 days are up, your community's server counts the votes and acts on the result.

Turnout

A vote only counts if enough people take part.

Enough people means 30% of the members who could vote and were active in the last 30 days. It is never fewer than 3 people.
For removing a member, where everyone decides it, it is 25%. Where a jury decides it, enough of the jury must vote (see "A jury in a large community").
"Active" means your app sent your community's server something in those 30 days: a post, a trade, a vote, a message. On the phone, just opening the app usually counts too, because it signs in for alerts each time it starts.
Turnout counts people, not the weight of their votes.

If too few people vote, nothing happens. The Decision closes as "unresolved".

How much Yes is needed

Most Decisions: 60% Yes.
Removing a member: 66% Yes, and at least 3 Yes votes, whatever the share. Two neighbours can't remove a third. Where a jury decides it, two-thirds of the votes cast, and at least 6 Yes from a jury of 12, or 9 from a jury of 18.
Undoing something (lifting a suspension, unfreezing credit, reinstating a member): more than half.
A tie always fails.

When a Decision passes

Your community's server checks that it still makes sense: the member still exists, the Commons has enough beans. Then it acts.
If the Commons is short of beans for a grant, the grant waits until there is enough. It gives up after 90 days.
Only one grant can wait at a time. If a second grant passes while the Commons is still short, it does not wait: it closes for good, and the community must vote again.
If the person or enterprise is already gone, the Decision closes without doing anything.

Removing a member

In a community that votes, a member is removed only by the community's vote, taken by everyone who can vote or, in a large community, by a jury. The vote opens when an admin suspends them, and nobody proposes it. An admin can't remove anyone outright. Two things still do without that vote: where too few members can vote, an owner may decide it (see "A small community"); and, for now, an owner can remove a member together with everyone they invited, and everyone those people invited.
If a removal passes, the member is suspended and their credit frozen at once.
After 7 more days they are removed for good. In those 7 days, a Decision to reinstate them cancels the removal. A Decision to reinstate is an ordinary one, proposed by a member and decided by everyone who can vote, whoever decided the removal.
A member who deletes their own account cannot be reinstated, even after a removal. They can join again with a new invite.
When a member is removed, their posts are taken down. If they owed beans, the Commons pays the debt. If they had beans, those beans go to the Commons.
The community can vote to remove or suspend any member except an owner or admin of your community's server. They run the server itself, so a vote someone proposes cannot take that away; the app says so if you try. Nor does the vote that opens when one of them is suspended (see below). An owner can take an admin's role away first, and after that they are a member like any other.

Emergency suspension

An admin can suspend a member at once, for example to stop harm. They must give a reason that members can read.

At the same moment, a 7-day Decision opens on removing them: "Remove …?". An admin acting on a report can suspend the same way, and the same Decision opens.
While it lasts, the member's listings are off the Market and the map, and they can't invite anyone or answer a request to join. They can still answer in their chats with one person (not in a group's, an event's or an enterprise's chat), and finish or cancel deals they already have. It all comes back when the suspension ends.
It is decided as any removal is: by everyone who can vote (25% turnout, 66% Yes and at least 3 Yes votes), or, in a large community, by a jury (see "A jury in a large community"). The suspended member cannot vote on it, and still votes on every other Decision.
If it passes, they stay suspended for the 7 days of a removal's wait, and are then removed (see "Removing a member").
If it does not pass, or too few people vote, the suspension lifts when the vote closes. Where too few members can vote at all, an owner may decide it (see "A small community").
An admin cannot suspend themselves, and cannot suspend the server's only owner. Only an owner can suspend another owner.
An admin can suspend another admin. No vote removes an owner or admin, so whatever the vote decides, the jury's or everyone's, the suspension ends when it closes, and they keep their role.

On the global community there is no vote. The suspension lasts 7 days and then lifts by itself, unless an admin lifts it sooner. To keep someone out for longer, the admins suspend them again, or remove their account.

A jury in a large community

In a big community, putting every removal to everyone asks the same people case after case, and lets a campaign reach all of them. So once enough members could serve, a removal is decided by a jury: a few members drawn at random, each asked about one case. Everyone else reads the case.

When a jury decides. It depends on the rule your community has, and "How this community works" shows it. The default, Automatic, uses a jury once at least 100 members could serve on one, and has everyone vote until then. The owners can choose Everyone instead, or A jury, which needs at least 36 members who could serve (below that, everyone decides). It is settled when the member is suspended and kept on the vote, so a rule changed, or a community growing past 100, changes nothing about a vote that is already open. If a whole jury can't be seated, everyone decides.
Who could serve. A member who could vote when the vote opened (see "Who can vote"), and who joined at least 30 days before the start of the day the vote opened, so that people invited just before can't fill it. Nothing else is asked: not how active you are, not your trading, not your credit, so a member whose credit the admins froze can serve. Enterprise accounts can't, nor can the member the vote is about. The admin or owner who suspended the member is on the list too, and is passed over when the jury is drawn.
The draw. The jury is 12 members, or 18 once at least 1,000 members could serve. Nobody chooses the members by name: not the admin who suspended the member, not the member, not the owners. The members who could serve are put in an order by a fixed calculation (a SHA-256 hash) on the list, the day and the key of the member the vote is about, and the first in that order are the jury. No random number is chosen, so anyone who runs the same calculation gets the same jury. That includes the admin who suspends: the calculation uses only facts anyone can read and the day of the suspension, so the admin can work out in advance who a given day would seat. The admin does choose the day, but only one try a day, and each is on the record.
Passed over. Some members are passed over, and the next in the order takes the seat. They are the admin or owner who suspended the member, and anyone with a link to the member that the member couldn't have made alone: someone who blocked them, who reported them in the last 90 days, who invited them or was invited by them, who started a chat with them, who completed a deal with them in the last 90 days (bought from them, answered one of their listings or lent them something), or who has a deal open on one of their listings that they asked for. Nobody is told who was passed over or why, a juror included.
Serve or step aside. Each juror is told by an alert on their phone, if their Direct Messages alerts are on, and finds the case in Commons, under Decide, where Serve and Step aside wait. They have 72 hours to answer: Serve, and then vote, or Step aside, which asks for no reason and tells nobody why. Voting is an answer too. Once you have voted you can't step aside, but you can change your vote until it closes. A juror who doesn't answer in 72 hours, or who leaves, is removed or is suspended after being drawn, loses the seat, and the next member in the order is drawn in their place. A juror who hasn't answered is reminded after 48 hours, and every juror who hasn't voted is reminded on the vote's sixth day. Nothing extends the 7 days: a juror drawn with less than two days left is told so.
Who votes. Only the jurors. Everyone else can read the case and the member's answer, and sees "Only the jury votes on this." The member can answer the case as before, and the jurors are told when they first do.
How many must vote. At least 9 of a jury of 12 (13 of 18) must vote, or nothing is decided. Removing then takes two-thirds of the votes cast and at least 6 Yes (9 of 18). A tie fails. If too few jurors vote, the suspension lifts when the vote closes, as with any removal too few voted on. An owner can't decide a jury's vote in its place.
While it is open, the card says "A jury of 12 members, drawn at random, decides by 5 Nov." and counts the jurors who have voted, like "7 of 12 jurors have voted". It never shows how many said Yes or No until the vote closes, to anyone, an admin included. A juror is told only about their own seat; nobody else on the jury is named.
When it closes, the card says how it ended: "The jury voted to remove Dave (9 of 12).", "The jury kept Dave.", or "7 of 12 jurors voted, too few to decide. Dave is back." The totals show, and so do two lists of names: Voted and Didn't serve. The lists never say how anyone voted, and never why someone didn't serve: they may have stepped aside, not answered in time, left, or been passed over for a link to the member. A name on the second list says nothing about which. If it passed, the member stays suspended for the 7 days of a removal's wait, and is then removed (see "Removing a member").
Check the draw. On the vote, anyone can tap Check the draw. Your app takes the list of members who could serve, which your community's server gives to every member, works out its fingerprint (a hash) and compares it with the one the server recorded when the vote opened. It says that the draw checks out, or that the list the server gave doesn't match its own record. Once the vote has closed it also works the draw out and checks that the names listed under Voted and Didn't serve are the first ones it picks. The apps check the list; they don't show it.
What the check can't do. Whoever runs your community's server can change what it stores, and a server that rewrote the list, its record and the jury together would pass the check. The check catches a list or a jury that doesn't match the draw, not a server's owners who are set on cheating. And because the calculation is public, someone who runs it themselves can work out who is probably on a jury, before the vote opens or while it is open, though not who was passed over. A juror who is pressed can step aside before they vote, and no one can see how they voted.

The rest of a fair vote is the same (see below): the member is told at once and can reply, the vote names who brought the case, a false case can be hidden, and the cool-down and the limit on repeat suspensions apply. Where a jury decides, the alert that a vote has opened goes to the jurors, saying they were drawn, and to the member, not to everyone.

A small community

At least 3 Yes votes. Removing a member needs at least 3 Yes votes, however few vote No. In a community of 7 active members, 3 of the 6 others must say Yes; in a family of four, all three others.
Too few to vote. When fewer than 3 members, not counting the one suspended, can vote, the vote can never reach its turnout. It still runs its 7 days, and it says "Fewer than 3 members could vote. If nobody else votes, the owner decides when it closes."
The owner decides. While that vote is open, an owner of your community's server, never an admin, may decide it, with a reason members read beside the case. The member is told, and can reply to it. If an admin hides the case as shown to be false, the owner's reason is hidden with it, and an owner can't decide a vote whose case is already hidden.
When it closes, if still fewer than 3 members could vote, the owner's decision is carried out: the member stays suspended for the 7 days of a removal's wait, and is then removed. The vote says "Decided by the owner: too few members to vote". An admin can still stop it in those 7 days, with a reason everyone can read.
If more members could vote by then, they decide, not the owner. If no owner decided, the suspension lifts when the vote closes, as with any vote too few people voted on. The owners hear of every decision an owner makes this way.

A fair vote on removing a member

The member is told at once. When the vote on removing you opens, BeanPool tells you on your phone, and the web app tells you the next time you open it.
You can reply. In Commons, open Decide and tap Reply to this case on the vote about you. Everyone who reads the vote sees your reply beside the case. You can change it until the vote closes, unless an admin takes it down (below).
The vote names who brought the case: the admin who suspended the member. If an owner used the server's password, it says an owner did.
A false case can be hidden. When a case is shown to be false, an admin can hide it. Members then read the admin's reason in its place. Hiding a case doesn't stop the vote: an admin stops it by halting it, which lifts the suspension.
A reply that harms someone can be taken down. If a reply gives someone's address or phone number, or threatens them, an owner or admin can take it down, with a reason. The reply is deleted, and members read the reason in its place. The member is told, and can't write another reply on that vote. The vote carries on.
A false accusation can be reported. The member the vote is about can tap Report this case as false. The report goes to the admins and owners, and names whoever brought the case.
No second case for a while. After a vote on removing someone ends without removing them, whoever brought it can't suspend that member again for 90 days. Another admin can, after the first 30 days.
A second suspension within 30 days is an owner's. In those 30 days only an owner can suspend the member again, and with a new reason. The vote then says "Second pause in 30 days", and how the last vote ended.
No third suspension in 90 days. A third suspension of the same member within 90 days of the first is refused to everyone. If there is more to decide, a member proposes a Decision.
The owners hear of every suspension, without being told who it was or why: the vote shows that to everyone who can vote.
Everyone who can vote is told. When the vote opens, each member who can vote on it gets an alert on their phone, if their Direct Messages alerts are on. The alert never says who the vote is about. Where a jury decides, only the jurors get an alert, saying they were drawn.

What admins can and cannot do

Your community's server has owners and admins. They look after it.

An admin can stop an open Decision, but must give a written reason. Members can read it on the Decision.
If a removal has passed and is in its 7-day wait, an admin can stop it, or make it happen straight away.
An admin can hide the case of a vote on removing a member once it is shown to be false, with a reason members can read. They can also take down the member's reply if it harms someone, with a reason members can read.
An admin cannot remove a member without the community's vote. Where too few members can vote, an owner may decide it (see "A small community"). Where the people who run the server have switched community votes off, the admins remove members themselves.
Owners and credit-committee admins can make a confirmed member a voucher on the names list.
Admins can give a member a trust badge. This also gives that member the trust that badge needs, so it deepens their credit line.
Admins sort out stuck trades, but never one they are part of.

Polls

Any active member whose credit is not frozen can start a Poll with 2 to 4 answers. It runs for 3, 7 or 14 days.
You can have one open Poll at a time. You can start one Poll for the whole community a week, counted from when you started your last, even if you closed or took it down. A Poll for one of your groups does not count towards that week. Your community can have 5 open Polls at once.
A Poll posted to a group can only be answered by that group's members and convenors. Observers can read it but not answer.
A member whose credit is frozen can still answer a Poll. You can change your answer until the Poll closes. The person who started it can close it early.
A Poll is anonymous: everyone sees only the totals. The person who starts it can make it an open vote instead, so members see who chose what. That choice is made when the Poll starts, and can't be changed in the app after the Poll is posted. An owner's AI assistant can change it on a Poll it made, only until the first vote.
On the global community, a closed anonymous Poll also says how many of its votes came from new or 12-word accounts, if any did. Every vote still counts.

Enterprises and keepers

An enterprise is run by its keepers. One of them is the lead keeper.

Joining: you ask to become a keeper and say how much of your earned trust you pledge (it can be 0). You cannot pledge more trust than you have earned by trading, across all your enterprises. The lead keeper approves or declines.
Pledging in a community that confirms its members: a confirmed member can also pledge part of their known credit line, up to half of it. That part does come off their own line.
Objection window: when an enterprise already has more than one keeper, the lead's approval waits 3 days. Any other keeper can object in that time, and one objection cancels it.
Removing a keeper: the lead can remove an ordinary keeper. The same 3-day window applies, and any other keeper can object.
Community admins: an admin of your community who is not a keeper of the enterprise can approve a keeper, or remove an ordinary keeper, at once, with no 3-day window. This is so a stuck enterprise can be helped.
Stepping down: any keeper can step down. If the enterprise is in debt and your pledge is needed to cover it, you must wait until the debt is smaller or other keepers pledge more. The only keeper cannot step down; they add another keeper first, or wind the enterprise up.
Your pledge backs the enterprise's credit line. A pledge of trust you earned is never taken from your own balance or your own credit line.
A quiet lead: if the lead keeper has done nothing in the app for 30 days, the other keepers can choose a new lead from among themselves. The vote runs up to 14 days, with Yes and No. It passes when more than half of the other keepers say Yes. If the lead comes back and does anything in the app, the vote is cancelled. While the lead's account is suspended, nothing they do counts as coming back. Keeper votes cannot be changed.
Votes among the keepers: in an enterprise with two or more keepers, any keeper can propose paying Beans out of the enterprise's own account (never more than it holds, never to themselves, and to a keeper only out of what it has earned, with the 1.5% trade fee), removing a keeper, or, in an enterprise but not a project, making another keeper the lead. The keepers at the time it opens vote; more than half must vote; 60% Yes to pay out or remove, more than half to choose a lead. It runs 7 days or ends sooner once the answer can't change, and is carried out by itself. Only the keepers see it. While it is open it shows how many have voted; Yes and No show once it closes. Nobody sees who voted how, but in a very small group the result and who has voted can show it. These votes never touch the Commons or anyone's standing in the community: those are community Decisions. A vote can't remove the lead (vote for a new lead instead), the only keeper, or a keeper whose pledge covers a debt. A keeper can't propose their own removal; they step down instead.
If the lead leaves or is removed, the longest-serving keeper becomes lead at once, and the other keepers can replace them straight away. If no keeper is left, the enterprise is paused.
Winding up: the lead keeper, or the only keeper, can start closing an enterprise. So can a community admin. There is then a 7-day wait, and any keeper or a community admin can cancel it. An enterprise in debt cannot close until the debt is paid or the community writes it off. Nothing finishes a wind-up by itself: after the 7 days, the lead keeper, the only keeper or a community admin has to finish closing it, and it can't be finished while a trade is still open. When it closes, any beans left go to the Commons.
Cancelling a project: before a project reaches its goal, its leader or a community admin can cancel it, and every pledge goes back to the person who made it. A pledge from an account that has since closed (deleted, or an enterprise that has wound up) goes to the Commons instead, as the rest of a closed account's beans did, and everyone else's still goes back to them. If it has no leader, its only collaborator can cancel it; with two or more and no leader, only a community admin can. Once you stop helping run a project, because you stepped down or were removed, you can't cancel it, even if you started it.

Groups and convenors

A group is run by its convenors, and one of them is its lead convenor. Whoever creates a group is its first lead convenor.

Some groups are open to anyone. Some need a convenor to approve you. Some are by invitation only.
Any convenor can approve and invite members, remove a member or an observer, change a member's or an observer's role, make someone a convenor, remove posts and messages, and edit the group and who can join it.
Only the lead convenor can remove a convenor, or take the convenor role off someone. The group's own vote can also do that.
Nobody can remove the lead convenor, or take the lead off them. Not another convenor, and not a community admin — admins have no say inside a group. Apart from the lead handing it over, only the group's own vote can choose a new lead.
A suspended convenor: while a convenor's account is suspended, they cannot use any convenor power, and their own powers as lead wait too. They stay a convenor, and the lead stays the lead; it all works again when the suspension ends. Other convenors carry on as usual, and members keep chatting and posting. A suspended member cannot start or join a group either, until the suspension ends.
Handing the lead over: the lead can make someone else the lead. It can be another convenor, or a member, who becomes a convenor at the same time. Once it is done, the lead cannot take it back.
Leaving, as the lead: hand the lead over first. If nobody else is in the group, the lead can simply leave.
The last convenor cannot step down, and cannot be removed while the group still has other members. If nobody else is in the group, they can simply leave.
A group's own vote. A group's members and convenors can vote on the group's own things: choose a new lead convenor, make someone a convenor, make a convenor a member, remove someone from the group, change who can join it, or close it. Any member or convenor can propose one; observers watch but do not vote. Everyone who was a member or convenor when it opened can vote. More than half of them must vote. Removing someone and closing the group need 60% Yes; the rest need more than half. It runs 7 days, or ends sooner once the answer can't change, and then the app carries it out by itself. Votes are secret and cannot be changed. A group's vote never moves Beans and never changes anyone's standing in the community, and admins cannot stop it. A closed group takes no new members and no new messages, and its posts and events are cancelled. Its chat stays to read. You will find the vote on the group's page, under Decisions. To ask a group what it thinks without changing anything, post a Poll to the group.
A quiet lead convenor: if a group's lead convenor has done nothing in the app for 30 days, the group can choose a new one. Its other convenors vote — or its members, when none of the other convenors was made a convenor by the day the lead was last active. Only people who were already there on that day take part: members who joined the group by then, or convenors made convenors by then. Anyone who joined, or was made a convenor, after that cannot propose, be proposed or vote, and is not counted. If you leave the group and join again, you count from when you joined again. If nobody who was there is left, no vote can open, and the group's screen says so. Any of those who take part can propose someone from among them, themselves included. The vote runs up to 14 days, Yes or No, in secret. It passes when more than half of those who answer say Yes. If the lead comes back and does anything in the app, the vote is cancelled. While the lead's account is suspended, nothing they do counts as coming back. The person chosen becomes a convenor and the group's lead. The quiet lead stays a convenor when it was the convenors who voted, and becomes an ordinary member when it was the members. You will find the vote on the group's own screen, above the roster.
A rogue lead convenor can be removed by a community Decision. This is coming in a later update.

Vouching

Owners and admins are vouchers by role, and an owner or credit-committee admin can make a confirmed member a voucher on the names list. Each voucher receives a budget (100 to 2,000 Beans, with a community default of 1,000 Beans).

Vouchers can vouch for newcomers on an invite, or for members already inside from their profile, choosing from presets of 25, 50, 75 or 100 Beans from their budget. Each voucher can vouch for a person once (raisable up to 100 Beans total), at most 3 vouchers can vouch for one person (up to 300 Beans total), and a voucher cannot vouch for someone who is below zero now. Trust badges never give this right.

The same guide is in the BeanPool app, and works there without a connection: open Settings, then "Help & how it works" under BeanPool. Every other rule, guide and manual is in the Help Centre. Guide version 165.