Trust & safety

Verification, reports, blocking and moderation. Numbers on this page come straight from the app’s settings and update automatically.

Who can join

Sidequest is for students at participating schools. You sign up with your school email: Columbia University (@columbia.edu), New York University (@nyu.edu).
You need to verify your email before you can post, apply, buy, sell or claim. Until then you can browse.
One account per person.

With a verified school email you can post any quest worth up to $50.00 (pay × number of people).
To post larger quests, either finish payout setup (free — it’s the same Stripe setup you need to get paid) or complete optional ID verification.
ID verification is done by Stripe Identity: Stripe checks your ID and we only keep whether you passed. It adds an “ID verified” badge to your profile. Its price and refund rules are in the Fees & Refund Policy.

You can report any quest, item or profile. Reports go only to our moderators — the person you report never sees who reported them.
Blocking someone hides their quests and items from you (and yours from them), and neither of you can apply to, buy or claim the other’s listings. You can unblock anytime in Settings.
Blocking doesn’t close the chat on a deal that’s already in progress — money may be held and you may need to finish or report it.

A moderator can suspend an account that breaks the Terms or Community Guidelines. A first suspension lasts 30 days; a second is permanent.
3 no-shows within 90 days sends an account to a moderator for review.
Automated checks look for patterns like trading mostly with the same few people, paying each other back and forth, or unusually high pay. They only flag an account for a person to review — they never suspend anyone on their own.
Every suspension or ban has a recorded reason.

Trust & safety

Verification, reports, blocking and moderation. Numbers on this page come straight from the app’s settings and update automatically.

Sidequest is for students at participating schools. You sign up with your school email: Columbia University (@columbia.edu), New York University (@nyu.edu).
You need to verify your email before you can post, apply, buy, sell or claim. Until then you can browse.
One account per person.

With a verified school email you can post any quest worth up to $50.00 (pay × number of people).
To post larger quests, either finish payout setup (free — it’s the same Stripe setup you need to get paid) or complete optional ID verification.
ID verification is done by Stripe Identity: Stripe checks your ID and we only keep whether you passed. It adds an “ID verified” badge to your profile. Its price and refund rules are in the Fees & Refund Policy.

You can report any quest, item or profile. Reports go only to our moderators — the person you report never sees who reported them.
Blocking someone hides their quests and items from you (and yours from them), and neither of you can apply to, buy or claim the other’s listings. You can unblock anytime in Settings.
Blocking doesn’t close the chat on a deal that’s already in progress — money may be held and you may need to finish or report it.

A moderator can suspend an account that breaks the Terms or Community Guidelines. A first suspension lasts 30 days; a second is permanent.
3 no-shows within 90 days sends an account to a moderator for review.
Automated checks look for patterns like trading mostly with the same few people, paying each other back and forth, or unusually high pay. They only flag an account for a person to review — they never suspend anyone on their own.
Every suspension or ban has a recorded reason.