We are RuneScape Customer Support JMods - Ask Us Anything!

Why can't I have fun playing the game anymore? I just sort of stopped enjoying it. How do I get back into it?

There's been loads of changes made, and we've also got the Old School version of the game you can play as well if you prefer the more retro feel and style of the game. For me, I'd take it slow, enjoy the game with the new NXT client, play through some of the new quests and I bet you'll get back into it in no time. :)

Why isn't there a delay on removing the authenticator?

We're currently in the process of reviewing our entire account security offering, which includes adding a potential delay to the Authenticator. We need to carefully consider all of the options (such as making it an optional feature) and what support we'll offer for it.

Part of the process involved sending a survey to over 20,000 RuneScape players, so once we've had chance to digest all of that data, we'll be in a position to share more about what account security looks like going forward. :)

Jagex live chat customer support? Is it ever going to be a thing?

It's something we've been running on a trial basis for a few months now, specifically with Tech Support related issues. So far so good - but we're not yet in a position to roll out it across all contact types, but yes - it may well possibly be a thing very soon!

When will permaban appeals return for members/ex members?

We're looking to reintroduce permanent ban appeals sometime in 2017, which will provide players who believe they were hijacked at the time of the offence to submit their account for review.

How do you handle when someone who is not the owner of the account tries to take control of the account?

Our Customer Support Specialists can easily identify when a person coming in for an account clearly isn't the owner. In these cases, we issue what we call an 'N.Y.A', which stands for Not Your Account. This essentially tells the player to go away and stop trying to recover an account that they don't own!

Can we see any more player moderators specifically for oldschool rs?

Absolutely! This is something the Community Management team are currently working on with the Old School team, so expect to see more PMods in the OS game soon.

if theres proof the game messed up and cost players money why cant you guys give refunds or get our money back.

If a player loses items due to technical glitch or bug which wasn't their fault, then we can look at returning their items. For more information I'd check out this page here.

You say you are 100% certain on permanent bans applied on accounts, however, we have always seen legitimate players get banned and their bans get quashed, days later. Why is @JagexSupport giving everyone regarding a bot inquiry an automated response, when clearly your detection systems can be sometimes a little off?

Most cases are due to their accounts being hijacked. There have been exceptional fringe cases which have been detected by our internal review systems however, which are part of our quality assurance processes. We are looking at reintroducing ban appeals in 2017 for players who believe they were hijacked at the time of the offence.

Alright here i am at the motherlode mine some guy starts flaming me hard. I report him because now i am shattered on the inside. What are the chances he ACTUALLY get's punished?

Our team review all abuse reports sent in, and if there's clear evidence of someone using offensive language with the intend to upset or offend, then we'll take action (usually a temporary mute).

Psst - I'd add this guy to your ignore list - he sounds like a bit of a noob!

Is your office still in Cambridge? I walked past a few years ago when I was down there for work. Couldn't be bothered walking any further and got a sandwich from the van outside. 8/10, would recommenced.

It certainly is! We're based in the Science Park which is awesome. There are indeed a load of great sandwich vans around. ;)

Does the original owner always have the ability to recover an account he/she created?

I've told my friend to not waste his time on the account he bought 1 year ago. He is convinced that you guys over at Jagex will let him keep the account because he has gained over 500m xp on it and bought 1500$ worth of mtx since buying the account.

Help me out so i can get him to stop wasting his time and money on an account that can be recovered at any time by the original owner.

We'll always look to grant an appeal back to the original owner, regardless of how much spend, time invested or anything else a secondary owner may have. Your advice is right - he shouldn't bother as if he bought the account, then he isn't the original owner, and won't be able to provide the necessary evidence.

In your opinion, what's the number one reason as to why accounts get hijacked or stolen?

The primary reason people lose access to their accounts are due to either:

• Sharing their accounts / buying an account
• Falling for a phishing scam

Both are easily avoided - never share or buy an account, and always be on the look out for dodgy websites and offers! We've got a handy security page which provides details on how to keep your account secure, as well as a phishing prevention page which gives examples of common ways players have their accounts stolen.

Delay on removal of authenticator? This has been highly requested for so long.

Hey - I answered a similar question just a few moments ago - here's the reply:

We're currently in the process of reviewing our entire account security offering, which includes adding a potential delay to the Authenticator. We need to carefully consider all of the options (such as making it an optional feature) and what support we'll offer for it.

Part of the process involved sending a survey to over 20,000 RuneScape players, so once we've had chance to digest all of that data, we'll be in a position to share more about what account security looks like going forward. :)

also will expired mutes from years ago (2007-ish) ever be deleted? or will they just remain on file

Expired offences and mutes don't have any impact on an account. Whilst they won't be deleted (as it is a factual, historical record of an account history), they don't mean anything so have no impact on things like PMod suitability etc.

Yougottlittup got a permanent ban because he swapped gold to OSRS with a RWT account but he did not know that so is there any way to swap gold without the risk of losing your account ? swapping gold is not against the rules so this seems a bit odd to me

Each account is unique and their incidents are too. I'm keen not to get drawn into specific cases here, but the evidence has been confirmed and the action taken correct.

@jagexinfinity Couple questions..

Why isn't there extra security when logging into your account on the website? such as having to put in an authenticator code to access the page I mean it would defiantly stop a lot of account hacking as if a hacker was to attempt to hack someone they won't have their auth /phone to be able to attempt steal an account that doesn't belong to them

And

Why is that when an account is recovered it removes all security on the account such as email/authenticator? If it was to get hacked by someone else other then the owner then it's basically giving someone the account the authenticator is supposed to Keep the account secure but if it gets removed upon successfully recovering an account it's not that secure.

It's a great point - we are looking at how we may be able to add the Authenticator to the website as part of our account security review.

If an account recovery appeal is accepted (and the e-mail changed) it means the appeal contained some really strong information. As the Authenticator is linked to the e-mail, if it changes, then the Auth is disabled too.

Can you explain your stance on account sharing in general? It's very much in a grey area, and I've seen lots of people who account share with their friends or more commonly their bf/gf in long-distance relationships, sort of as a statement of trust and commitment. In most cases, the trust is great and it goes fine with them.

I know all the risks from account sharing and the disputes about ownership (and account locking) that can result, but when it actually concerns the rules and taking action against it through offences, no action seems to be taken, so is it more of a 'do at your own risk' type of thing?

Also, I don't remember where I've read it but what about FC account sharing (for running a community FC) - I've read somewhere by a JMod that it's fine as long as it's to add/remove people from friends/ignore lists and no XP is actively gained (by multiple people?) on the account. How does the auto account-locking system behave in that way, and generally, though? Some FC accounts have lots of different IP's, and in many cases do not get auto-locked.

It's against the rules and players should avoid it.

We're not going to detect and start banning players who share a low level account for the purposes of managing an account. We're mainly focusing on players who share an account for an unfair purpose, or begin selling them.

Shared accounts almost always result in ownership disputes and problems later down the line!

Why does rs3 continue to get more pmods, and since Reach got fired from osrs, no more new pmods have been made on here?

PMod recruitment across both games has been frozen whilst the team take a look at their processes and how they want to move forward with it. It's definitely something they're keen to do (recruitment), so watch this space.

If this has been already answered can someone please link the answer <3

Can anyone clarify CS's stance on using something like teamviewer to play?

Our ICU team easily detect bots and macros. Teamviewer won't result in a ban, as long as the game is being played fairly, and you're not gaining an unfair advantage.

One more.

In the past I've seen accounts get locked because it was hijacked/stolen/etc. Has there ever been a scenario like this where you awarded the account to someone that was not the original owner?

The reason I ask is I remember a post on /r/runescape about a user who actually went into Jagex HQ to try and get an account back, but was denied because they weren't the original owners.

So we've got an automatic system which can detect accounts at risk and lock them to ensure they remain safe and secure.

If someone other than the owner comes in and tries to recover the account, then our team will be able to identify that (due to a lack of evidence) and essentially deny the appeal.

There are rare occasions where an account is shared and lots of information is compromised, and an account appeal is accepted to someone who isn't the original owner, but is able to provide extensive details, including credit card information, passwords, real life details, e-mail addresses (and may want to set an e-mail which was previously used on the account) and comes in from a similar IP address and GEO location, etc etc.

We did indeed have someone come to the office to try and claim ownership of an account, but when pushed further, admitted they had bought the account from eBay!

As one of the questions of 'The Drop' mentioned that you can use either your phone or your computer for an authenticator, which authenticator for the computer do you recommend?

Also I wanted to say that CS week so far has been a very refreshing event while also having a very useful purpose.

Thanks for the feedback :) Glad you're enjoying yourself!

We recommend Authy - a lot of players use it and seem to have a pretty good experience. That'd be my recommendation.

What's the strangest Account Recovery summary you have ever read? Or the strangest details someone has provided with you in an attempt to prove ownership?

There's two which spring to mind...

One player sent us a link to a letter from their 'mom', which was signed 'my mom'. Very convincing!

The second is someone who said they'd been talking about eating pizza in game a few hours ago, and sent a picture of the pizza they were talking about. Certainly made me crave pizza for the rest of the day...

So forum temp bans actually come with an in-game mute. Do you guys work with the forums guys/are you the same as the forum guys?

The team responsible for the Forums are the Community Management team, who are different to us (Customer Support). We work really closely with them however, which includes building processes in regards to forum & game offences.

Would implementing a system where the owner of the account has to provide official verification documents (i.e. picture of ID, passport etc) be viable and effective in proving ownership of an account?

For sure, and it's something we're considering in our account security review :)

Would you say someone who uses a touchpad/tablet or touchscreen on their phone to play runescape runs a higher risk of triggering a false ban for macroing?

The ICU team responsible for anti-cheating have lots of sophisticated systems to detect macros and bots. Essentially, anything which provides a really unfair advantage is a cause for concern. Touchpads / tablets are a big thing in 2016 and we can identify them apart from macros/bots.

On a scale of 1-10, what's your favourite berry?

25.

Wish there was a way to communicate w old friends ingame. They seem to have deleted me (been inactive 4+ yrs) maybe send them r.s mail ?

If they've deleted you and have their privacy settings enabled then yeah, it's going to be tricky! 'RS mail' is an idea which has been suggested before - you're best posting on the Forums if you think it should be added into the game :)

I run a fan website for Old School which uses the official GE API to pull prices for items. There's a limit on your end which makes it difficult to update a lot of prices in a reasonable time frame.

How can I get in touch with a staff member who I could discuss this issue with? There doesn't appear to be any relevant category for support tickets.

Thanks

Hmm - I'd try e-mailing [email protected] - someone should get back to you :)

What do you love about your job the most?

What do you hate about your job the most?

Have you ever been recognized by a player IRL outside of major events such as Runefest?

I love being able to help our customers out and reunite them with really old accounts. :)

I hate it when we have to investigate hijackers, as they're no fun, and waste our time.

I was recognised once on a train - but other than that, nope.

[deleted]

You should be able to appeal the offence - if you've already used the appeal, then I'm afraid the mute is permanent.

What was the funniest excuse you received to be unbanned? And did they get unbanned?

We get loads if I'm honest. One person said their cat committed the offence (it was a mute offence), and we did remove the mute. Not because we believed them... but because the evidence wasn't clear enough and they didn't deserve the offence in the first place!

What are the requirements to becoming a RuneScape Customer Support JMod?

We're mainly looking for really cool people who get what delivering great, memorable experiences is all about. CS JMods need to be mature, level headed and have a great attitude. There's no qualifications required - we prefer experience over education!

We're not looking for people who want to sit in front of a screen and copy scripts or use a headset - this is much more about using judgement and owning the customer issue.

Have anyone on the Customer Support team ever gotten hacked and what was their experience with the Customer Support?

As far as I'm aware no one in the CS team has had their RuneScape account hijacked. I'd like to think their experience would be pretty stellar though!

Can there be an optional login pin added for people that can not use authenticator? I know a problem me and many people have is that we just do not have a smart phone, a log in pin on top of a bank pin would help fix that security gap.

It's a good idea. We're currently reviewing our account security across the board, and this is something we will consider. :)

What are some of the more humorous appeals/questions you've received?

We had someone who sent us a picture of a letter signed by 'my mom' to prove they owned the account... that always sticks out in my mind!

Back on the account sharing topic, I understand the necessity to not allow little John and Jimmy from school to swap accounts back and forth as it's quite easy for each other to steal and take things from each other.

A blanket rule of course is the best way to negate all ill effects but am I really to believe that my wife of 10+ years isn't allowed to "access" the account but she can have access to my paychecks, tax info, 401K and even my social security number? Or is this more along the lines of a don't ask don't tell?

Love the game regardless.

Honestly, if an account is being shared within the same house hold then we're not going to know. If problems later down the line occur and things get messy, then we'll naturally frown upon it.

The rule is don't share your account - in most cases it's risky and will end up not going to plan!

I was recently scammed along with a few other people by the same person. I reported him and so did the others, is there or will there ever be any way to find out if any action was taken or a way to get items back?

We don't return items lost due to an item scam, but we do take action against scammers. Rest assured we'll be onto them.