Etsy Community Changes Cause Chaos As Sellers Unable To Access Forum Despite Being Logged In
Etsy announced changes earlier this year to take most of their community forum private, restricting access outside of technical issue and announcements only to active sellers using their Etsy accounts, but implementation of the changes on March 26 did not go smoothly as many sellers were unable to access the private areas despite being logged in.
Anyone else having an issue? I can see Announcements and Technical Issues and nothing else. I signed out, then signed back in with no access on desktop.
Yes, I am also having an issue. It says that I need to be a seller and be signed in, if I want to access the forums. I am both of those things, but still being "denied" access.
While access was restored for many sellers within a day, others said the issue persisted for over a week.
I also cannot access any seller forums. I am needing to research some issues and threads came up on Google search but I can't access anything. Have logged in and out multiple times and nothing changes.
How was this bungled so badly, tons of people with no access. Please fix it as I am in dire need of access to forums.
An Etsy moderator responded on April 3rd saying they believe they had finally corrected the issue for most sellers, but if anyone was still experiencing problems they should contact community staff directly for assistance.
Thanks everyone for the reports! During the implementation of our new process - requiring log in to view most posts in Etsy Forums to help protect user privacy - we know that some of you experienced access issues.
We believe we’ve fixed most of these issues as of today, and we apologize for any frustration this may have caused. Please refresh your login and you should be able to access all forums if you’re an Etsy seller — click here, and we’ll log you back in automatically.
If, after trying to log back in, you are still having trouble accessing all forums, please reach out to us directly via community [at] etsy.com so we can investigate further. Many thanks again!
The decision to take most of the forum private was positioned as an effort to help protect users from spam and scams that have been proliferating through the platform, but notably the move may also help the company avoid public scrutiny by media, analysts, shareholders and others who read community posts for information about a wide variety of issues on the platform.
Liz Morton
Have you been locked out of accessing the Etsy forums even with an active selling account? Let us know in the comments below!
