Complaints procedure

To report something, use the Report link on any walk, profile, photo or tip. For anything else, including help with your account, email hello@fotowalk.co.uk. A person reads every message.

Fotowalk is run by one person. This page says how to tell us about a problem, what happens next and how long it takes. It covers everything the Online Safety Act 2023 asks a small service to handle.

How to get in touch

• Report link: on every walk, profile, photo and tip. You do not need an account. Pick a reason, add details, and leave an email address if you want a reply.
• Email: hello@fotowalk.co.uk. Use this for anything the Report link does not cover, or to appeal a decision.

Every report and complaint gets an automatic acknowledgement if you leave an email address. A person reads all of them.

What you can complain about

1. Content you think is illegal or harmful

A walk, photo, tip or profile that is abusive, threatening, hateful, sexual, shows someone's home or location without their agreement, encourages danger, or is otherwise illegal.

• Illegal content, or content putting someone at risk (a home address, a child, a threat): we aim to review it within 2 working days and take it down at once if it breaks the law or our terms.
• Everything else (spam, wrong information, unsafe advice): within 7 days.

2. Something on your land, or a route across it (the landowner route)

Choose "landowner" on the Report link, or email us, and say which walk and which part.

• We reply within 14 days with a decision.
• If the route or stop is on private land without public access, we remove that part, or the whole walk if it cannot be fixed. Removing a walk also removes every copy and contribution attached to it.
• We do not just add a "private property" label and leave the route up.

3. A decision we made about your content (an appeal)

If we took down or held back your walk, photo, tip or profile, or suspended your account, you can ask us to look again.

• Email within 28 days of the decision and say why you think it was wrong.
• We review it within 14 days. If we were wrong we put it back and tell you.
• Some decisions are made with help from automated screening (Jev, see the terms). You can always ask for a person to look again, and a person always makes the final call.

4. What happened to your report

If you reported something and you disagree with the outcome, or heard nothing, email us with the walk, profile, photo or tip. We look again within 14 days and tell you what we decided and why, unless telling you would put someone at risk.

5. How we run the service

If you think we are not doing what our terms or the Online Safety Act require (for example, not handling reports, or using automated screening in a way the terms do not describe), email us. We reply within 14 days.

What is not a complaint to us

• A walk author hiding your contribution. Authors can hide photos and tips on their own walk without a reason. Your contribution is not deleted: it stays on your profile and in your export. This is not an appeal we review, unless you think it is part of harassment, in which case report it as in section 1.
• Copyright. If someone has posted your photo, email us with the walk and a link to the original. We remove it promptly.

What we keep

We keep reports, complaints and decisions for 12 months, so we can spot patterns and review our risk assessment. See the privacy notice.

If you are still unhappy

You can contact Ofcom, which regulates online safety, though it does not decide individual complaints. For data protection matters, contact the Information Commissioner's Office (ico.org.uk).