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Disputes — the Seller's Side

Within 14 days of a post going live, the advertiser can raise a fraud concern on a delivered or completed booking — their claim that the placement was not honestly delivered. Disputes are rare when delivery is clean, because the platform's own monitor witnesses every placement. This page is what happens when one is opened against you.

What happens the moment a concern is raised​

  1. You are notified on the booking, in your activity feed and through your notification channels. The notice carries the dispute's own OFPD- reference as well as the OFO- booking it concerns — quote the OFPD- in anything you send about the review itself.
  2. The payout on that booking goes on hold. If it was scheduled it does not release; claiming it returns "A fraud concern on this booking is under review — the payout is on hold until our team resolves it."
  3. Your wallet is frozen. Payouts and withdrawals pause. Money already in the wallet stays yours and stays visible; it cannot move out until the freeze clears.
  4. You cannot accept new bookings while a review is open against you. Work already in flight can still be finished — and should be.

The window runs from the post going live, so even a booking that has already paid out can be disputed inside those 14 days.

Nothing is required from you immediately

You do not have to file a defence or gather screenshots. The review is arbitrated on the platform's own records, which already exist. If you have relevant context, contact support with the OFPD- — but the evidence that decides most disputes was collected automatically while your placement ran.

How long the holds last​

The wallet freeze is set for the full 14-day dispute window, and it is cleared the moment the concern is decided — on both outcomes. It is not a punishment and it is not open-ended: it exists to keep the money still while the question is open, and a review that resolves on day two ends the freeze on day two. If more than one concern is open about you at once, the freeze stays until the last of them is decided.

Some advertiser plans carry a published resolution deadline, shown as a countdown on the booking — 48 hours on Elite, 24 hours on Master and Ultimate. On the other plans the review takes as long as the evidence requires and gets queue order rather than a stated deadline; the booking says so rather than showing an empty countdown.

What the review looks at​

The Onflow Ads team arbitrates using evidence neither side can edit after the fact:

  • The monitor's check history — every visit to your post: existed or not, pinned or not, timestamped. An unconfirmed single reading is stripped from that record before it is exported, so a probe that never became a flag cannot be quoted against you.
  • The measured delivery numbers — the views, forwards, reactions and clicks sampled while the ad ran.
  • The signed proof archive — the creative frozen at delivery, your live post link, and every later capture showing whether the content drifted.

This is why the standing advice in Posting the ad matters: a post that went up on time, stayed up unedited for its full run, and had the channel to itself for the opening window it was sold with, produces a record that defends you by itself.

The two outcomes​

Concern rejected — the claim did not hold up:

  • The hold clears and your payout proceeds on its normal schedule.
  • Your wallet freeze lifts immediately.
  • Your reliability is untouched and no mark is left on your account.
  • The advertiser who made the claim loses 0.50 reliability instead, and a pattern of rejected concerns costs them a further 0.50 on top.

Concern upheld — the claim was found valid:

  • The buyer is refunded. On the Ultimate advertiser plan that refund is fronted from platform funds immediately rather than waiting on recovery.
  • Your reliability drops by 2.00 — the largest single penalty in the system, and the one with the longest road back: a 45-day clean stretch before healing even starts, a 6.0 ceiling on recovery, and 90 days before that ceiling decays back to normal. See Delivery monitoring and your reliability.
  • Any good-faith deposit on the booking is forfeited to the advertiser.
  • Your wallet freeze lifts once the decision lands.
An upheld concern is the most expensive event on the platform

Two points off your score, the deposit gone, the payout reversed, and six weeks before recovery starts. Everything on the checklist below costs minutes; this costs a quarter.

Disputes and everything else​

  • A monitor flag is not a dispute. A flag is the platform acting on its own confirmed evidence and it pauses only that booking's payout. A dispute is a human review opened by the advertiser, and it freezes your wallet too. Both can exist on one booking.
  • Insured placements refund without a dispute. When the monitor flags a placement an Elite-or-above advertiser insured, the buyer is refunded automatically and never opens a concern. For you the consequences are the flag's, and nothing more.
  • Retention escrow follows the dispute. A booking with an open or upheld concern does not release its retention slice.
  • Guaranteed-views placements settle their guarantee only after an open dispute closes — the dispute decides the money first.

Protecting yourself — the short version​

  1. Post inside the window, from the booked creative, without edits.
  2. Keep the post up for its full promised duration — 24 hours on a 1h/24h slot, 48 on a 2h/48h, 72 on a 3h/72h, seven days on a native one. Where the buyer paid for the pin extra, leave the pin alone; the platform releases it when the run ends.
  3. Publish nothing else in the channel until the format's opening window has closed — see The quiet window you owe.
  4. Keep @OnflowAdsBot as an administrator so the monitor can witness your delivery. Its clean record is your best defence.
  5. Submit the correct proof link, pointing at the exact ad message.
  6. If a change to a live ad is ever genuinely needed, agree it with the advertiser first, in writing.

If something goes wrong​

What you seeWhat it meansWhat to do
"A fraud concern on this booking is under review…"A dispute is open on that placementNothing is required; the review runs on records that already exist
"Your wallet is temporarily on hold while a concern is reviewed."The account-wide freeze is activeKeep delivering accepted work. The freeze lifts when the concern is decided, either way
Several bookings held but only one disputedThe freeze is account-wide while a review runsAll of them resume the moment the concern is decided
You cannot accept a new booking during a reviewDeliberate — you cannot take on new counterparties while a concern is openFinish what is in flight; letting an accepted booking lapse would add a separate penalty
Your score has not started healing after a decisionA frozen or under-review account does not heal, and an upheld fraud needs a 45-day clean stretch firstSee the recovery table in Delivery monitoring
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