Writing.Com 101

Shopping for Yourself: Gift Points may be spent on Writing.Com products such as t-shirts, mouse pads, and coffee mugs or services such as paid memberships and Costumicons. Click Shop in the left navigation menu to visit the Writing.Com Shop and peruse the possibilities for your next purchase by Gift Points.

Shopping for Others: Gift Points may also be used to purchase products and memberships for other members. To purchase Writing.Com paid memberships for another member, click on Points/Shop with Gift Points in the left navigation menu and choose the membership you would like to gift, then insert the member's username. The system will automatically deduct the required Gift Points from your account and gift the member with the subscription that you purchased. To purchase Writing.Com products for another member, visit a member's "Wish List"  from within their Community tab in their portfolio and choose an item that he or she wants. The system will automatically deduct the required Gift Points from your account for the item and its shipping/handling charge, and we will mail that member his or her gift! Or just surprise them by sending them a chunk of Gift Points and tell them to buy what they want!

Send Merit Badges and Awardicons: Show your appreciation for members and items on Writing.Com by awarding them with Merit Badges or Awardicons. You have the option to include a physical Merit Badge or Awardicon if you wish. See "Merit Badges and Achievements"  and "AwardIcons" .

Advertising Items::All advertising of items and links within Writing.Com is done using Gift Points. Advertisers choose the amount of Gift Points that they would like to pay for a click to their item or link. Click My Account/My BidClick Bids in the left navigation menu to visit this page and promote your items within the community. For more information, see "BidClick System: Sponsored Items, Links & Genres" . You can also use BidClick to promote items belonging to other members.

Request Reviews of Your Own Items: Click on Community/Request a Review in the left navigation menu, and peruse the review styles of reviewers who have filled out their Reviews tab headers. When you find one that matches the type of feedback you are looking for, go to their Reviews tab header and read the rest of their information. You can check out their reviews in the listing below the header. If it checks out, you can fill out the request form at the bottom of the header and use Gift Points to request a review of your item or Book entry. For details, see Review Requests.

Add Auto-Rewards to Your Own Items: Increase your chances of getting those reviews by automatically awarding your reviewers with Gift Points. For complete information, see "Auto-Rewards" .

Rewarding Authors: Suppose you read a poem that brings you to tears and touches your heart in such a way that you would like to reward that author for their time and effort. You can award Gift Points to that author when you submit your review, or send them an email with Gift Points attached to it. At the bottom of his or her item, fill out the Review box or Email Comments form, input the amount of Gift Points that you would like to send, and click Rate/Review. The system will automatically deduct the required Gift Points from your account and will note your GP reward with the review notification or email.

Rewarding Reviewers: Want to thank someone for a helpful review that they gave you? Send Gift Points right along with your thank you email! At the bottom of the review reply form or the email, simply input the amount of Gift Points that you would like to send and click submit. The system will automatically deduct the required Gift Points from your account and will note your GP reward in the email. You can also do this from your Reviews tab in the Reviews: Pending Response listing.

How many Gift Points should I give as thanks for a review or when someone helps me?
Such transactions are voluntary, and there is no fixed or expected amount for such things. How much a person decides to give usually depends on factors such as how many GPs they have, and how significant the help they received was to them, so it can vary widely. You can check out the ranges of what other people do by looking at the amounts offered for AutoRewards, and the amounts included with other support forum posts.

Can I use Gift Points to pay for part of an order from the WDC Shop, and use another method to pay for the rest?
No. To keep things as simple as possible, the site requires you to use only one form of payment for any order.

What you can do instead is to purchase enough Gift Points in the Shop to have enough to pay for all of the order with Gift Points. Then make another order for what you want and pay for it completely with Gift Points. For physical items, first go through the order process up to the point where the total cost has been computed, including shipping and handling, so you know how many Gift Points you need to buy.

Where can I buy a paid membership with Gift Points?
Go to Points/Shop with Gift Points in the left navigation menu.

When does the site charge a service fee for using Gift Points?
Gift Point transactions fall into two categories -- with and without a service fee. If there is a service fee, the system tells the member who pays it ahead of time. Generally speaking --

The site charges a service fee when part of a two-way transaction is automated, such as in member-to-member purchase situations -- for example, AutoRewards, Review Requests, survey completion payments and purchases, C-notes, purchases from member-run shops using GP payments, commissioning a custom Merit Badge, etc.

The site does not charge a service fee when members handle a one-way transfer themselves -- for example, direct transfer using the GP form; along with an email, a review, a review reply, or an IM; as a review reward sent from the Public Reviews page; extra GPs sent along with a purchased C-note, MB, or Awardicon; via a forum post; using Group GP functions; tipping chapter authors in Interactive Story items; etc.

The site does not charge a separate service fee when members use Gift Points to purchase things or services from the site, whether for themselves or someone else -- for example, paid memberships or items from the WDC shop, Merit Badges, Awardicons, creating Trinkets, creating and maintaining item aliases, item transfers, username changes, BidClick advertising, etc. When purchasing physical items from the WDC shop, there is a separate charge for the shipping and handling that varies with weight and where the item is being sent, but an order costs the same whether you pay for the order with Gift Points or some other way.