Hi, I'm a new user and a new turker. I joined mturk around 6 days ago and have had a pleasant and productive time overall. Today, after having successfully completed more than 400 HITS, I login and find my very first rejection. I know rejections are almost inevitable when you're doing so many tasks. Still, it always hurts a little.
The first thing I do is check who, what and why. Much to my surprise, it was a not-so-great paying survey (1 dollar for roughly 15 minutes), which I had completed thoroughly, as I usually try to do. The reason? "I can't find your submission code on my database, so you probably forgot to click on the button at the end of the survey". Fair enough. It was probably my fault. It was me who forgot to press the button (it was on qualtrics I believe, where at the very end they give you a code to insert into the HIT page on mturk but you HAVE to press a button after you copy the submission code, so you have to submit your submission twice...).
If I acknowledge my fault here, what's to rant about then? The way the matter was handled. If you, the requester, as you clearly expressed in the notes of the rejection, assume the problem lies with me forgetting to press a button, why not just contact me directly and tell me something was wrong with my submission? Tell me to click the button? To retake the survey? Or ask for proof? Talk to me directly and we'll sort it out amicably and quickly.
After all, why would I ever fake a submission? Who, in their sane mind, would ever jeopardize one's own approval rate like this? The cons heavily outweigh any benefits. The penalty is huge. A rejection can ruin a worker's account, especially a new account.
Having said that, I contacted the requester and provided some sort of proof, hoping it would be enough to overturn the rejection. And I must admit I got it by pure luck, I wasn't exactly planning on it. After all, I complete so many hits that I even forgot I had completed this one in the first place.
This brings me to the final point: I learned a lesson in all of this. And that is to take as much evidence as possible (e.g. screenshots or videos when needed) for everything I do on mturk because chances are I'll need them to defend myself in such cases.
The first thing I do is check who, what and why. Much to my surprise, it was a not-so-great paying survey (1 dollar for roughly 15 minutes), which I had completed thoroughly, as I usually try to do. The reason? "I can't find your submission code on my database, so you probably forgot to click on the button at the end of the survey". Fair enough. It was probably my fault. It was me who forgot to press the button (it was on qualtrics I believe, where at the very end they give you a code to insert into the HIT page on mturk but you HAVE to press a button after you copy the submission code, so you have to submit your submission twice...).
If I acknowledge my fault here, what's to rant about then? The way the matter was handled. If you, the requester, as you clearly expressed in the notes of the rejection, assume the problem lies with me forgetting to press a button, why not just contact me directly and tell me something was wrong with my submission? Tell me to click the button? To retake the survey? Or ask for proof? Talk to me directly and we'll sort it out amicably and quickly.
After all, why would I ever fake a submission? Who, in their sane mind, would ever jeopardize one's own approval rate like this? The cons heavily outweigh any benefits. The penalty is huge. A rejection can ruin a worker's account, especially a new account.
Having said that, I contacted the requester and provided some sort of proof, hoping it would be enough to overturn the rejection. And I must admit I got it by pure luck, I wasn't exactly planning on it. After all, I complete so many hits that I even forgot I had completed this one in the first place.
This brings me to the final point: I learned a lesson in all of this. And that is to take as much evidence as possible (e.g. screenshots or videos when needed) for everything I do on mturk because chances are I'll need them to defend myself in such cases.
