Posters attempting to post ads on Craigslist the week before Christmas ran up against a brick wall. Craigslist is now requiring email verifications and phone authentications, but making them impossible to receive. Craigslist started requiring phone authentication for service ads a while ago, in an attempt to stop sex ads and scammers. Now their system is set to automatically “flag” ads that have too many numbers or the wrong wording. Unfortunately, like Google’s Panda algorithm, innocent parties are becoming victims. During the Christmas, 2011 weekend, the CL-Help forum was flooded with posts from those who had run afoul of the new system.
Email Verification Fiasco
Many posters complained that email verifications were never received. Those with Hotmail addresses and certain Internet providers seemed to be the most vulnerable. Posters with previously verified accounts received verification messages with each post saying that they would receive an email, which never came. Even when the emails did arrive, many ads never posted to the site.
Craigslist “Ghost” Ads
Ghost ads are those that are seemingly accepted, but never appear on the site. Craigslist has previously claimed that this is a glitch, but the massive amount of these ads lately has made users question the claim. Affected by this are legitimate posters who have never broken the rules, but whose ads somehow violate supposed guidelines that have never been posted. Even though other users on the help forum declare them in compliance, the ads simply never appear.
Some Phone Services Blocked from Authentication
I ran up against this problem over Christmas weekend. I was trying to post an ad for a roommate, and kept getting the phone authentication message. I tried to put in my Net10 cell number, but kept getting the message that it could not be authenticated. A trip to the help forum told me that while some people with Tracfone, the owner of Net10, had no problem with authentication, my number still would not go through. I had previously been verified at my old address in another town through a land line. I’ve never broken any rules, and when I got the authentication message before, I simply wrote to the help address and had my account privileges restored, but this time, a message to help only gives you an auto-reply with useless information.
From other messages I saw on the help forum, Craigslist has now blocked all pay-as-you-go phones, as well as all VOIP phones such as MagicJack, Google Voice, Boost and Cricket. This seems unfair in an economy where so many have been forced to abandon high-priced traditional cell service and land lines to save money.
Craigslist Lack of Customer Service or Site Support
From replies on the help forum, I learned that Craigslist has no support for “free” users, and since there is no charge for any post in my city, I have no recourse. Help desk inquiries only send canned replies, and there is no number to call. According to a customer complaint on the Contact Help website, dialing the toll-free number gets you switched around to several numbers until you finally get someone who tells you customer service is by email only, and hangs up on you. There are also many complaints on that site about the ad ghosting and phone/email verification problems.
Craigslist Alternatives
Before now, there has been no real alternative to Craigslist, which gave them the power to pretty much do what they wanted, but now two viable alternatives are becoming popular. eBay’s Kajiji, renamed as ebay classifieds, is a refuge for many of the disgruntled Craigslist users. Ooodle, a classifeds aggregator with partners such as the AOL, is getting attention and good reviews for real estate postings. I ended up putting my roommate ads on Oodle.
Can Craigslist survive this recent round of bad publicity and user dissatisfaction? Every time they pull the reins tighter, there seem to be fewer legitimate posts and more spam and scam posts. Even when you do get an ad posted, most of the replies are from scammers trying to harvest your email or phone number.
It seems the popular free classifeds site is about to reach its limit of usefulness. Despite its best efforts, it is being taken over by the same people its crackdowns are trying to police. Spammers and scammers always have time to find a workaround to the limitations, but legitimate users will simply find another place to post. Will this latest round of restrictions lose Craigslist the only legitimate users it has left?
References:
Craigslist Help Forum
Contact Help Craigslist Page
Oodle
Top Ten Reviews: Oodle
Oodle’s AOL Deal Boosts Network Scale
How eBay’s Kijiji and Others are Disrupting Craigslist
