faq

We realize that our idea is innovative and brings with it a lot of questions. But as innovative as it may seem in the digital world helping each other is as old as humanity! We’ve tried to answer some of the most common questions here, but we are always happy to be asked more. Our final goal is to contribute to a better world, and for that we need improvement! (check out our principles and manifesto to get more info on this) If you can’t find your answer here, ask away through our contact form. We love thinking of and providing answers, and we enjoy getting into debates as well đŸ™‚

The FAQ page is divided into four sections to make your life easier (because that’s what we do!):

Human Behaviour

Ts & Cs

Philosophy

The App

Human Behaviour

No. In We-Guild, any help you give someone or you receive from someone else is considered a gift. There is no formal obligation whatsoever to help someone, even if they’ve helped you in the past. Users understand that not everyone will be in a position to help them when they need help even if they’ve helped them in the past.

We strongly suggest you don’t add people you don’t know in person. As we will say many times, only connect with people that you know in person and trust.

Absolutely not. It’s always up to you to decide if you can help others when they ask for help. Helping other members of your We-Guild network is a voluntary gift to someone else and you’d always need to consider if you’re in position to help.

One of the most asked questions! Two points about this:

  • Firstly, you should only link up with people that you know in person and trust. Yes, we know that you will also receive help requests from friends of friends (your far friends, remember from the How it works?) but it’s always totally up to you to accept the help request or not. In any case remember that your far friends are the trusted individuals of your trusted individuals, but ultimately it’s your say.
  • And, secondly, even if someone gets help but not for the reasons they mention, it will still be accounted for as a help exchange. This means that it will still have an effect on the colour of that user on your network. (And also on your colour on their network.) You may not have helped for the reasons someone asked, but you still helped them and this will be transparent to both of you!

We-Guild empowers you with the information and then you decide what to do with it.

Although We-Guild wants to promote the joy of helping others as much as the reassurance of being helped, the way it works is based on providing a tool that enables maximum reciprocity. However, if those in your network don’t seem to reciprocate when you need it, especially after you’ve helped them quite a bit, all We-Guild can do is to make really transparent that that is what is happening.

The point of We-Guild is to break this barrier.
If being a user of the app is not enough in itself for some people to ask for help when they need it, we will try to take more active measures to prevent this from happening as soon as possible. Reciprocity is key.

You can add up to 20 friends to your close network.

You can ask for as long as you need it as it will be up to you to decide if your circumstances demand so. We-Guild doesn’t plan to set any limit on this. Your friends will surely understand the nature of such circumstances.

It is like in real life in that it is ultimately up to you to decide how much and how long for you can ask for help.

Ts & Cs. Fees, refunds,
your rights as a member

Not yet as We-Guild is still developing. We are working hard on a prototype for a max of 100 users right now so if you’d like to be part of those initial 100 users sign up for the waiting list!

We-Guild will be initially paid by monthly fees from users. We are planning to have a £2.99 user monthly fee and this will include transaction costs. This means you will receive the full amounts whenever you exchange help with other members of your network.

Just close your account and no more payments will be taken.

Whatever data we keep about you will never be more than what is purely essential for the running of We-Guild and it will be at the very least cared for in accordance with the latest relevant legal requirements.

Yes. This is essential for how We-Guild works as it is this information that We-Guild processes and displays to you through the app in ‘the We-Guild way’.

For as long as you are a user as this is for as long as you may want to access it. After that, for as little as may be required by the relevant official governing body.

No. In We-Guild, any help you give someone or you receive from someone else is considered a gift. There is no formal obligation whatsoever to help someone, even if they’ve helped you in the past. Users understand that not everyone will be in a position to help them when they need help even if they’ve helped them in the past. (Yes we said it already but just saying it again!)

Ethics and principles.
The philosophy behind We-Guild

No. We-Guild is a platform that facilitates people helping each other out by chipping in for each other when in need.

On top of that, it distributes the cost of an incident (let’s call it like that) after it’s happened, not before. Unlike insurance, it’s not based on the likelihood of something happening but on it actually happening.

No. In We-Guild any amount of help can flow in either direction at any time so it’s not a pyramid or a Ponzi scheme.

  • The money from your fees goes towards paying for the costs of running We-Guild. We-Guild has overheads, people that work for it and all those kinds of things that have to be paid for, just like any other business. As part of how We-Guild runs, We-Guild abides by a full transparency policy that includes open accounts to any member that wishes to have access to them.

  • The money with which you help your friends goes mostly to them as a small fee will be charged by the online payment processing platform that We-Guild will use. We’ll bargain hard to try keep this as low as possible but, in any case, as a user you’ll always be informed of how this is broken down so you know exactly what the friend you’re helping actually receives.

Excluding having a bank account to run the business, no, we don’t.

By regular fees paid by the members.

It is a company owned and run not only by its workers (a workers’ co-operative), but one where other stakeholders also own and run it. Such groups can be users, funders, employees, founders… See the P2P Foundation Wiki definition of it if you want more.

We-Guild is a multi-stake holder co-operative registered at the UK Mutuals Public Register with number 4824.

We’re glad you asked. We’ve written a longer answer to this one.

Of course! The more the stronger (and the merrier!). It’s up to the users to use the platform with their trusted ones.

However, since it is not international (yet) you’d need to based in the UK.

Join our newsletter if you are not UK based but want to know when we will reach your country.

No. So far it is UK-based only.

Join our newsletter if you are not UK based but want to know when we will reach your country.

No. We’re very strict about this one (and other ones). In fact, ‘slow social’ is our first principle. Check our principles on our About page.

How the app works (tech help)

At We-Guild we like to pride ourselves in making the information as user-friendly as possible and that goes as well for how you use the app.

Everything is set up so as to make it as any-user-friendly as possible and, if you think anything could be even more user-friendly than it currently is, let us know and we’ll look into it!

Yes of course! The We-Guild app will be accessible from mobile, tablet and desktop devices.

We will enable you to look for your friends by name or email.

Once they also have an account with We-Guild you’ll be able to find them via the ‘search for friends’ option and, when they appear, you’ll be able to click on the ‘add friend’ icon that appears next to them. They’ll then receive your friend request and as soon as they accept it you’ll be friends in We-Guild too.

There is an icon on the bottom right corner of the screen (with a bundle of banknotes and an exclamation sign) with which you can place a help request at any time.

You click on the icon, enter the amount of help you require, the reasons for it and your thank you message and We-Guild will distribute your request.

Check the next question to find out how We-Guild splits your help request among the members of your network.

Close friends will get allocated 60% of the total and far friends 40%*.

Whenever someone asks for help, We-Guild splits the amount requested between the members of that person’s network, both close and far friends.

From there it will be then split equally among these two groups respectively – just like Celina in the video! But remember that these allocations are just suggestions and each user can help a member of their network in need with however they want as long as there is a help request.

* If you have less far friends than twice your amount of close friends this ratio will gradually shift towards 100% to close friends and 0% far friends. This is to avoid someone having really few or no far friends in their network even if they have close friends (yes, it’s possible!) so that they don’t miss out the 40% altogether.

Everyone in your network (all your close and far friends).

Though we are considering adding an option to send certain requests only to some people if you want (though they will be allocated a higher suggested donation each as it’s less to split your request with).

Whenever you get a notification that a member of your network is asking for help you can click on it to see it on your ‘friends requests’ section of the app.

In the friends requests section you’ll see what the suggested amount is based on We-Guild’s splitting system (see earlier question) and you’ll be able to help them with an amount of your choice as the amount calculated by We-Guild’s splitting system is just a suggestion!

Your far friends are your friends’ friends.

When you ask for help We-Guild sends your help request (in its split form) to your far friends too so as to distribute your help request among more people so it’s less to each member of your network (close and far friends).

Your far friends are your close friends’ close friends but, ultimately, it is always up to you who you help and how much with.

You can unlink a close friend whenever you want and their close friends will not be far friends of yours anymore.

We-Guild will keep the record of help exchanges with this user in its database so that if you two decide to link up again in the future the state of the exchanges where you left it will be brought up again.

You cannot unlink a far friend as, technically, you are not directly linked with them. If you don’t want to have that far friend in your network you can just block them (see next question).

Yes.

  • If they are close friends with you that will instantly also unlink them from your network (so you will not have their close friends as your far friends).
  • If they are far friends you will just not see each other on your network – as if you didn’t exist for each other.

    If you block someone who is neither a close or far friend you will not be able to find each other if you attempt to under the ‘search for friends’ option.

Currently We-Guild is designed so that you cannot have more than 20 close friends in your network at any time. This is to make sure that you can keep a certain level of trust as, with too many people as close friends, anonymity would start setting in and it would bring less responsible behaviour.
There is no inherent limit as to how many far friends you can have but yes, you are right in guessing you couldn’t have more than 380.

This one is completely up to you!

Of course! Whenever you ask for help you’ll also be given the option to write a thank you message that your friends will receive whenever they help you out.

However, We-Guild doesn’t operate any kind of private messaging facility.

By requesting and accepting linking up with those who are not close friends with you (yet!) and by requesting and giving help.

When you ask for help you will enter the amount you’re asking for, your reasons for it and the thank you message. From this they will get their suggested amount to help you with after it’s been split by We-Guild and your reasons for it. If they help you they will then get your thank you message.

One of We-Guild’s main innovations! We’ll leave it to the How it works section for you to find out about this. But wait, there is also a video about it!

© 2021 We-Guild Co-operative Limited.
Mutuals Public Register number 4824.

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