What To Do If My Facebook Account Has Been Disabled

This post was originally created in 2009. I have not updated it. The information on how to get your account back, is now outdated.

A number of years ago, a friend of mine was trying to promote her daughters acting career on Twitter. She asked me if I would help her create a Twitter profile page for her daughter. Of course I obliged and jumped right on it. Well OK maybe I waited a week or so. When the twitter profile Page was complete,@pamelastar313 We decided to get her family and friends who were on Facebook to become followers on twitter. This seemed like an easy task. So started my long journey into the Facebook den of inequity.

One by one I started sending her friends messages to let them know that they needed to become followers of her Twitter profile. When I got to about the 5th message, I got a pink box pop up and here is what it said: “Facebook systems determined that you were repeatedly using the same feature in a short period of time. Your activity caused your account to be flagged as potentially abusive. Once you close your warning, you must significantly slow down or stop this behavior. Further misuse of site features may result in a temporary block or your account being permanently disabled”.

After reading that message I decided I should stop.

A few days later I logged into my account and I got the most dreadful and feared words in all of Facebook: “Your Account Has Been Disabled”. Now I am sure if this has happened to you, I bet you did exactly what I did after reading those words. It probably happened in this order:

1. Thought maybe I typed in the wrong password. Not!!!
2. Maybe I typed in the wrong password again. Not!!
3. Hmnnn Am I using the right user name..Yessss
4. OK right about now you panic and totally forget about the message you got a few days before that.
5. You wait a few minutes and try it again.. Ohhnoooo 😦

I could keep going on and on. Eventually you email them and wait a few days or maybe even a few hours before trying again. At some point you admit to yourself that you are addicted to Facebook or as I say “Crackbook” and you cannot live without it.

I am going to take you through the process I had to endure for 3 weeks before I got my account back. During that time I used my personal account. But my mission was to get back my Social Media networking account. I mean come on now…seriously.. I had over 730 friends on this account. This account was also the one I used for my Fan page www.facebook.com/prundergroundconnect. I was not about to lose it. I was going to put up a respectable fight to get my account back.

Eventually after 2 emails from me and 2 emails from them I had my account restored. After it was restored I went to their forum and I kept reading about so many cases that were similar to mine. There were so many people really upset to have had their accounts disabled. Everyone of these people were seeking answers. The problem was that Facebook was not giving them the right answers. Here are some of the Excerpts of what I read:

“Frustrating!!! I cannot find contact information to email Facebook – anyone have the place to email?”

“She hasn’t done anything for her account to be disabled. Both of us have been sending emails, but there is no response. Please fix her account.”

“Any help to reactivate it or explanations would be appreciated. Can’t seem to get answers in the sites useless help section and there is no one to contact.”

That last one pretty much summed it up. The forum is more like a place to let your frustrations out with Facebook. I wonder If they read it and laugh at all the postings. I mean really.. I am sure there is someone from Facebook that monitors and reads all of the postings in their “Help Forum”. Remember Facebook we the users, are the ones that keep Facebook up and running. Without us, there would be no Facebook.

The problem is that Facebook has gotten so big, that the little people do not matter. It’s all about the mighty advertising dollar. They should look at how other companies help their customers using social media tactics. Not surprisingly, many of these companies use this very site to help their customers in real time. Word of advice Facebook… Try it…It really works when a customer can post on a real time forum and get answers.

OK there I got it off my chest. I was going to wait until the end of this article but I could not wait. So how did I get my profile back from Facebook? If you truly feel that you did not break any rules such as: impersonating someone, porn, threats, copyright infringement, using a bot, sex offender (had to add that), spam or any other major violations, then I feel if you follow these steps, you should be able to get your account re-activated.

1. Do Not Panic

2. Email them at disabled@facebook.com Do not fill out the form if it is a personal Facebook account. Email them directly at the above email address.

3. Be very polite when you email them. It is important that if you know what may have caused this that you let them know. It’s always best to be honest and sincere. Make sure you give them as much information as possible. Include all of the following
information:

* Full name
* Date of birth (month/day/year)
* Login email address
* Any additional information or questions (Honesty)

4. Do not at anytime come off really angry or bullish on your email. Do not make threats. Do not use foul language.

5. Email them just once, it is placed in a queue and responded to accordingly. Remember that Facebook has over 350 million
users. If Facebook was a country it would be the 4th largest country. So have patience. It can take over a month before
they respond.

6. If you are lucky, you will receive an email stating that your account has been re-activated. It will give you a short summary of why you may have been disabled and a warning. Do not respond. Consider yourself lucky.

If you receive an email such as I did:

Hi Alex,

Facebook aspires to be an environment where people can interact safely with their friends and people they know. Accordingly, we expect accounts to reflect mainly your “real-world contacts.” We do not endorse contacting strangers through unsolicited friend requests as they may be considered annoying or abusive.

To prevent this type of behavior, Facebook has limits in place that restrict the rate at which you can use certain features on the site. Your account was disabled because Facebook determined that you were going too fast when sending friend requests, despite being warned to slow down, or because your friend requests were being rejected at a high rate.

After further review of your account, we have determined that you violated our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities by misusing our site features to harass other users. We will not be able to reactivate your account for any reason. This decision is final.

Thanks for your understanding,

Remain Calm…Take a deep breath and answer them back politely. Believe it or not, It is a real person who responds to your emails.

I will get the frustration out for you by dissecting their response:

1. First thing I noticed was “Hi Alex” you say it like if we were friends who have not seen each other in years and were about
to give each other a hug. Ahh hello you just canceled my account.

2. They were my real world contacts. You guys really need to do something about this click through rate. You disabled my account because you thought I was spamming and harassing these people that had contacted me. Why don’t you just email them and
ask them If I was spamming or harassing them?

3. I was not sending friend requests. I was in-boxing people. Again, if you just emailed them, you would see that I know them.

4. Now here is a good one. You determined that I was HARASSING other people. Ahh hello… did you get any complaints about me or was this determination done because I going too fast when sending friend requests?

5. This one is just a killer: “We will not be able to reactivate your account for any reason. This decision is final.”

6. They saved the best for last. I am not even going to answer this one. What is wrong with this statement: “Thanks for your understanding” OK maybe I will, “Understanding you’re kidding me right!! I don’t undertsand….arrgghhhhh

OK so now that I let out my frustration, what do I do next? Well my friends, it is not over yet. This part will be the most important part. It is like giving a closing argument when your opponent has won the battle. It is not over until you try one more tactic. No, do not beg for mercy. HERE IS WHAT YOU NEED TO DO NEXT:

1. Even though they said the decision is final…it’s not. Reply to the sender. I say this because you will now be sending this email to a real person who is working on your case. Yes my friends, a real person. Not just an auto-responder.

2. Look at the name on the bottom of the email. When you reply to the email, answer to the person. So you should reply something like this: “Hello Jane” when replying directly to the person it becomes alot more personal. People tend to relate better and be more sympathetic to your needs than starting like this: “I do not understand why”

3. Again do not come off arrogant or nasty in your email. Picture yourself being on the receiving end if that email. I know you’re probably saying; “What about me and what they did to me” Forget about your feelings.

4. State your case to the detail. When it happened to me, I admitted that yes I ignored the rules. I apologized to them with an explanation. Be very detailed and even if you have to give them the account information or any information pertaining to what you did wrong…Do it. So if you used a bot, admit fault and give them the address of where you got the bot. If you were spamming, admit it and tell them it was done in error.

5. Finally, review the email and send it to them. Please make sure it is not harsh and that you do not attack them.

Remember this person is dealing with this issue all day, everyday single day. When they receive an email that does not come off with anger, they respect it and it increases your chances of having your Facebook account reversed.

I have had many friends who had their accounts reversed after taking my advise and following the steps listed above. If you follow what I tell you, believe me they will reverse it

Here is the email that was sent to me after I pleaded my case:

“Hi Alex,

Please keep in mind that we cannot provide you with any specific numerical limits for using the friend feature, since the warnings and blocks on your account are not determined by a pre-set numerical limit. Rather, warnings and blocks are determined by a number of different factors, such as speed, time, and quantity. This means that when you are allowed to resume using this feature, you must monitor the nature in which you do so (i.e. the speed at which you send and reply to friend requests, how many friend requests you send in a certain amount of time, etc.), rather than attempting to abide by any specific numerical limits. If you have any further questions, please visit our Help Center at the following address: http://www.facebook.com/help.php

Thanks for your understanding,”

I hope this helps everyone who is having this problem. Remember this will not work if you broke a major rule as I stated it the beginning of the article.

Update: I wrote this blog post in 2009. many of the steps I listed on here, are no longer available on Facebook. Facebook has changed the way they deal with disabled accounts.