Safety, holds and appeals
How Agoo Forms checks a form when you publish it, why a form can be held, what a person on Agoo's safety team may decide, what a takedown or a paused workspace means, and how to appeal.
Agoo is in early access. This page describes the feature as it ships to early-access organisations; screens are illustrative.
The people who answer your form trust it with what they type. To keep that trust, Agoo Forms checks forms when they're published, lets anyone report one, and has people on Agoo's safety team decide what happens to a form that breaks the rules. It's the same safety team, policy and record of decisions as the rest of Agoo.
What no form may do is in the acceptable use policy: in short, no phishing, no asking for passwords, PINs, one-time codes or card details, no taking payments outside Agoo's own payment step, no pretending to be a bank, a network, a government body or anyone you don't represent, no scams, harassment, hate or threats, no collecting a child's details without a parent's consent, no collecting sensitive details without a lawful reason, and no spam.
When you publish
Every form is checked as you choose Publish:
- Most forms publish at once. The link works straight away.
- Some are held for a person. A form that seems to ask for passwords, PINs, one-time codes or card details, or that uses the name of a bank, a mobile network or a government body when your workspace isn't verified as them, waits for a person on Agoo's safety team. You see "We're checking this form, usually within a few hours. It isn't taking responses until then." There's nothing you need to do; you're emailed when a person has looked.
- A new workspace's forms are read again. Within a minute of publishing, Agoo's checks read the forms of new workspaces, and of some others, such as forms people have reported. They can hold a form for a person to look at; they never take a form down.
A new workspace can publish only a few forms on its first day. That's to stop someone making a workspace just to send out a scam; it doesn't limit how many responses your forms take.
Asking for money
Collecting a Mobile Money number or a bank account to pay someone, or to be paid, is normal. What no form may ask for is the PIN, the password, a one-time code or a card's number, whatever the reason. If people need to pay you, use Agoo's own payment step when it arrives.
Reports
Anyone who opens your form can choose Report this form and pick the rule they think it breaks. You're never told who reported it. A person on Agoo's safety team looks at each report. Some reports, such as one about a child's safety, or several people saying a form is after passwords or payment details, stop the form taking responses while they look.
What a person may decide
Agoo's checks only sort what the safety team looks at first, and can hold a form for them. Every decision is a person's:
| Decision | What happens |
|---|---|
| Nothing wrong | A held form opens again and takes responses as before |
| Change asked for | The form stays closed until you change it and publish again, and a person checks the new version. The email says what to change |
| Taken down | The form stops for good. Its page says it was taken down for breaking Agoo's rules, names the rule, and tells anyone who typed a PIN or password to change it. Publishing again doesn't bring it back; only an appeal does |
| Publishing paused | Nobody in the workspace can publish, for a time or until a person lifts it. Its published forms keep taking responses |
| Workspace suspended | The workspace is read-only and its forms stop. People who open one see "This form isn't available: the workspace that made it has been suspended." It ends on its date, or when a person lifts it |
Your workspace's Owners and Admins are emailed each time, with the rule, what it means and what to do next, and the bell on agooforms.com shows it too. Safety, in your workspace's side bar, lists every hold and decision from the last two years; its Owners, Admins, Builders and Analysts can read it.
Nobody on the safety team reads your responses to decide. They see the form as respondents see it, and your workspace's name and history.
Appealing a decision
An Owner or Admin can appeal a decision once, within 90 days of it:
Open the decision
Open Safety in your workspace on agooforms.com, or follow the link in the email, and choose Appeal on the decision.
Say why
Write why you think it's wrong, or what you've changed, in your own words (10 to 2,000 characters), and send it.
Hear back
Someone on Agoo's safety team who made neither the decision nor its case looks again, within 7 days. They may keep the decision, undo it or change it, and you're emailed what they decided and why.
A hold while a person checks isn't a decision, so it can't be appealed: it ends when they've looked. Builders and Analysts can read the record but can't appeal.
If your organisation uses Agoo
An organisation's workspace is checked the same way. Being verified as your organisation means your forms can use its name without being held for it.
Privacy and retention
Mark answers personal or sensitive, keep sensitive answers sealed, choose how long answers are kept, and know what respondents are told, under Ghana's Data Protection Act.
Reporting a form and your data
For anyone who answers a form on Agoo Forms. Report a form that looks wrong, and ask its maker for a copy of your answers, a correction or deletion, with the dates they must answer by.