Purpose
This document outlines the UGC Payment Contingency Initiative, designed to address occasional delays in payment processing that occur when submitted machines (labs) are approved but not yet built or tested due to pipeline congestion or resource constraints.
Our goal is to ensure a smoother contributor experience and maintain trust within our contributor ecosystem, while still protecting the integrity and quality of our platform.
Contingency Policy Overview
✅ Eligibility
- The author’s submission must have been formally approved by the UGC review team.
- At least 30 calendar days must have passed since approval.
- The machine is still not yet built or released for internal testing or public deployment.
- The author must be a “repeat author” with at least 3 previously approved and released machine submissions.
📌 Contingency Action
If the above conditions are met, we will initiate early payment to the contributor under the following agreement:
- The contributor must confirm acceptance of the terms outlined below.
- Payment will be processed without waiting for the full build/test cycle.
📩 Contributor Confirmation Requirements
Contributors must:
- Acknowledge that they are receiving early payment before machine build.
- Agree to remain responsive and available to address any build or testing issues that may arise after payment.
- Respond to follow-up questions or fix requests from the UGC team within a reasonable time frame (typically within 1–2 days).
⚠️ Consequences for Non-Compliance
Failure to respond to communications or refusal to support issue resolution post-payment will result in:
- Immediate ban from future UGC submissions, either temporarily or permanently, based on severity.
- Potential withholding of future bounties until the issue is resolved.
Implementation
This initiative will be applied on a case-by-case basis and will be at the discretion of the UGC program management team. Contributors will be contacted individually if they qualify.