Community guidelines

Say what is true, answer people properly, and behave at a viewing the way you would want a stranger to behave at yours. Almost everything below follows from those three ideas.

These guidelines apply everywhere you can write or be seen on Pasaran: listing titles and descriptions, photographs, message threads, offers, reviews, storefront pages and profile text.

Describe the thing as it is, including the parts that make it less attractive. A villa on a road that floods in January, a scooter with a replaced engine, a job that requires weekend work — say so. Buyers find out anyway, and finding out late is what turns a small problem into a dispute.

Photographs must be of the actual item or property, taken recently, and not edited to remove or add features. Stock photographs are allowed only for new, unopened goods sold in their original packaging, and must be labelled as such.

• Prices must be the price you will actually accept, in rupiah, without hidden additions revealed later.
• If a listing is already under offer or sold, mark it. Leaving sold listings live to collect enquiries is a rule breach.
• Where a fact rests on a document — a certificate, a permit, a registration — describe it exactly as the document reads.

Descriptions may explain what a document or a tenure is. They must not assert who is legally entitled to hold it. Point buyers to a licensed Indonesian notary or PPAT for that question, and let them take their own advice.

A reply within a day is the standard we hold sellers to. Your response rate and typical reply time are shown publicly, because a listing nobody answers wastes everybody’s afternoon.

If you do not know the answer to a question, say that rather than guessing. If the answer is no — no pets, no long lease, not available until March — say it early. Nobody is offended by a clear no; people are offended by a wasted trip to Ubud.

Bali is a place where many nationalities, religions and first languages do business together. Comments about a person’s ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender, sexuality, disability or age have no place in a listing, a message or a review, and neither does a listing that discriminates in who may apply, rent or buy.

Harassment, threats, sexual content, and repeated contact after someone has asked you to stop are all grounds for immediate suspension. If someone treats you this way, block them and report the account rather than replying in kind.

Negotiating in the thread creates a record. If a dispute arises, that record is the only thing either of us can point to — it is why buyer protection depends on the conversation staying here.

Moving a conversation to WhatsApp before terms are agreed is discouraged; being asked to pay through a personal transfer, a crypto wallet or a gift card is a scam signal and should be reported immediately, whatever explanation accompanies it.

No genuine seller needs a deposit paid to a personal account before you have seen the item or the property. Requests framed as urgent, or as a favour, or as the only way to hold the price, are the most common form of fraud on any marketplace.

Review only transactions you actually took part in, and review the transaction rather than the person. Describing a late handover, an inaccurate description or a smooth, well-organised sale is useful; speculating about someone’s character is not.

Offering a discount, a refund or anything else in exchange for a positive review is prohibited, as is writing reviews for your own listings from a second account. Both remove the point of the system and both cost the account.

Turn up when you said you would, or cancel in the thread with enough notice for the other person to use the slot. Repeated no-shows are recorded and eventually restrict your ability to book.

Sellers should allow a reasonable inspection: a proper look at the paperwork, a short test ride, a walk around the boundary. Buyers should not treat a viewing as a chance to negotiate a price they never intended to pay, or bring more people than they mentioned.

Do not publish someone else’s phone number, address, identity document, bank details or photograph without their permission — not in a listing, not in a review, not to prove a point in a dispute.

If a property is tenanted, get the occupant’s agreement before photographing the interior, and blur anything identifying in the images. The same applies to staff who appear in photographs of a business for sale.

Second accounts used to evade a restriction, to inflate a rating or to relist removed content are closed along with the original. Businesses should add colleagues as team members rather than creating parallel accounts.

Impersonating another seller, an agency, a developer or Pasaran itself is treated as fraud, not as a rule breach, and is reported onward where there is evidence of an attempt to take money.

Every listing and every profile carries a report control. Choose the closest reason, describe what you saw and attach screenshots if you have them. Reports are confidential — the reported account is never told who filed it.

Reports involving suspected fraud, prohibited items, impersonation or threats are escalated immediately rather than queued. You will be told that your report was reviewed and whether action was taken, though we cannot share details about another member’s account.

Most breaches are honest mistakes and are dealt with by asking for an edit. Repeated or deliberate breaches escalate: a listing comes down, then listing is paused, then the account is restricted, then closed.

Serious cases — fraud, threats, prohibited items, anything involving a minor — skip the ladder entirely and result in immediate closure, with a report to the authorities where the law requires it.

Every decision can be appealed, and an appeal is read by someone who did not make the original call. Where we got it wrong, we say so and restore what was removed.