My local guides points deducted last week around 400 points. How is it happened without my knowledge? How my points return back?
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My local guides points deducted last week around 400 points. How is it happened without my knowledge? When I get my points return back?
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Good question!
There are many reasons contributed points can be droped, Please check in advance if you have marked your contributions as private. Additionally, some of your contributions may be marked private if they do not adhere to our Maps User Contributed Content Policy (reviews, photos and videos). This results in a points loss. Please take some time to check your contributions and check what has been marked as private.
By the way there are a few updates to how your answers to questions about places on Google Maps are stored and how you need to enable a setting to answer future questions:
- You must enable general activity in My Activity to answer questions about places on Google Maps.
- Any answers submitted when this setting was disabled may be removed, and as a result, your Local Guides points will be removed for those contributions.
- When you visit My Activity, you will be able to see answers you shared and control what is saved.
- If you delete a specific answer, or if you delete the activity for the day, or have the 3 month / 18 month deletion enabled, it will delete those answers.
- If you delete answers to questions during any time frame, your answers will be deleted from Google Maps, and as a result, your Local Guides points will be removed for those contributions.
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Hi @KarthicKumar1989 , I am sorry to hear about your situation. As you have posted for the first time on Connect, kindly introduce yourself at Introduce Yourself — January 2025,
About your issue, I cannot see your Google Maps profile as it is restricted.
Steps to display your Maps profile link publicly
Tap/click on your profile picture
Select Preferences
Then select Profile
Scroll to the bottom of the page. Just above your signature settings, you will see this:
Not checked box.
Check the box like this:
Checked setting for showing Maps link publicly.
Then hit the blue Save Changes button.
The system periodically checks our contributions and duplicate contributions will be taken down and recalculate our points. There is an answer for this question by Connect Moderator @ErmesT, please see. It might be helpful
https://www.localguidesconnect.com/t/reducing-the-points/356296/3?u=prasadvr
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This is not correct, @AbdullahAM! If a review or media is hidden by the SPAM filter, i.e. not visible to the public, you do not loose any points.
However, there are two occasions, I did experience the reduction of points:
- A point of interest was changed into a geographical feature. Since we are not allowed to post to the latter, Google did reduce my points. In that case, I was able to appeal and after several weeks the points were reinstated to a normal point of interest again. See here for the story.
- The owner of a business not only closed permanently, but also completely deleted the listing. In this case, I also deleted the pictures showing “Unknown place”.
In both cases, I did receive an email saying “Your review wasn’t posted”, but there were other similar cases, when I did not get any notification.
Please see here and I used this appeal form.
Tagging @ErmesT , possibly he does have more explanations.
@KarthicKumar1989
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@KarthicKumar1989 it seems, you posted exactly the same topic twice. I already responded to this one this morning.
FYI @PrasadVR
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@WilfriedB , I didn’t view his first post. Thanks for the update.
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… and I didn’t see this one in the morning. They both were posted within 2 minutes, but in different categories. This one (Google Maps contribution stories Attraction Local business Accessibility India) doesn’t really fit, but the other one is better.
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Hi @KarthicKumar1989 , welcome to Connect and thank you for asking.
Also thanks to @PrasadVR and @WilfriedB for tagging me here.
First of all I want to inform you that, to keep Connect organized, I merged your two identical post. In this way you will not receive duplicate answers. If you post in the wrong category of Connect you can easily change it by editing the header of your post.
Did you noticed for which kind of contributions you lost the points? Knowing this could help a lot to troubleshoot your issue.
There are two most common reasons for loosing points:
- The place where you contributed has been removed from Google Maps, as mentioned by @WilfriedB . In this case the review will disappear and the photos will be associated to an unknown place.
- You deleted some of your answers. This can be done manually from your profile in Google Maps (on desktop only) or on My Activity, like @AbdullahAM tolkd you. Please read: New in Google Maps: A Better Way to Manage our Answers, for more details
Let me just add a note about the deduction of points because our contributions are against the rules.
In theory you are right, @AbdullahAM , and it is mentioned in Local Guides points, levels & badging - Computer - Google Maps Help
“My points went down. What happened?
Points may be deducted if your contribution is determined to be in violation of our content policy. Contributions that violate our policies do not count toward your Local Guides level.”
However they says “may be”, not “will be”. It means that it depends of the type of violations (e.g. fake edits).
As it is possible to appeal for photos and reviews most probably Google will not reduce points if they are mede private, like Wilfried said.
Again, @KarthicKumar1989 , please try to identify the contributions where you lost the points.
Thank you
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Hi @RhiannaD , It looks you posted a comment first time on Connect. Please introduce your self here
https://www.localguidesconnect.com/t/introduce-yourself-january-2025/467910
Please share more about yourself as below:
1. Name:
2. Location:
3. What I love about being a Local Guide:
4. Favorite thing to explore:
5. Fun Fact about me:
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Hi @WilfriedB
Thank you for your comment
It is not my own idea or i think. It’s was an answer for a Google Moderator and i saved it before, i need to search it for the link.
@ErmesT, if the information is not correct now then it need to updated on the moderators post.
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Hello @AbdullahAM it seems, the key is, as Ermes said, the rules say “may be reduced”, not “will be reduced”.
In the past, I had several hidden photos and saw a reduction only in those cases, I described.
In any case, it is always good to identify and be aware of the hidden media.
Can you kindly share the link, @AbdullahAM
If you are referring to the ones shared in your previous reply: Flexible privacy settings for your Google Maps profile - Google Maps tips & tricks - Local Guides Connect, please note that in there there is not a mention of point drops. That post is simply related to privacy, and to the possibility to hide our public profile
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Hi @ErmesT
Let me search for the link, as it was an old post and i just save the context of the reply.
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Thank you @AbdullahAM
I think you can find an official reference here: Local Guides points, levels & badging - Computer - Google Maps Help
“Private reviews, edits, or photos
Reviews, edits, or photos marked private by Google are in violation of our policies and are visible only to you. Private reviews, edits, or photos do not count toward your Local Guides level.”
That part seems to confirm what you said, and for a long time I was thinking the same. However, while they mention the Local Guides Level, there is not a mention of points in there. My experience, also confirmed by @WilfriedB , is that points are not deducted when a contribution is made private.
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