FAQ for Members and Guests
This is a FAQ for members and guests. Use Control+F (PC) to search for a key word you are looking for on this page.
Updated 2/15/16 by @Anomalia
Getting Started
Welcome! We're glad you're here. :) This will help you learn a bit more about the site and where you can find the various resources you're looking for!
How can I get the required support?
You can connect to a listener in 4 possible ways.
1. Connect to the First Available Listener
Click on ‘Connect to a listener now and you will be automatically connected to the first available listener.
2. Select a Specific Listener
Want to search for a listener who shares your background, experiences, or who is affiliated with a certain organization?
Click on ‘Browse Listeners and you connect to our listener community to find someone with whom you feel comfortable chatting.
If you are looking for an experienced listener look at the number of cheers and badges earned.
3. Support Forum
Use this link here to access the community of listeners by sharing your story with us on the forum. We have a forum team of listeners and helpful members who will reach out to you as soon as possible.Read more about it here.
4. Group Support Rooms
In your conversation lists there will be two options; '1 to1' and 'group support'. Choose the group you wish to participate in and join the chat.
Read more here
We have many support rooms on various topics, including a Community Room for more lighthearted chatting, a Mindfulness Room to practice exercises in mindfulness, Support Rooms for Anxiety, Depression, Disability, Family Issues, Healthy Living, LGBTQ+, People of Color, Relationships, and Teen Issues, and a couple more general rooms - the Compassion Corner and Share Your Story.
How can I choose a listener that suits me?
Listeners are graded based on number of chats taken, ratings and feedback received from the members.Read more here. You may also go through profiles and choose based on category. The Browse Listeners feature allows you to search on various criteria to find the right person for you, or you can read through forums or use group support to find a listener you feel comfortable with and reach out directly.
What help can I get without talking to a listener?
You can also use this site in a number of ways without interacting, if you aren't ready to reach out to a listener yet. You can read through this forum, you can check out the Q&As to see if your questions have been answered already, you can work through your growth path, you can practice mindfulness exercises, or you can try out one of our self-help guides on and issue you are working through.
What are Community Guidelines & Protocol?
You may go through Rules of Engagement and some information about what a listener can do for you.
How can I become a member ?
Go to this link to become a member.
How do I become a listener?
Go to this link to become a listener.
What is the dashboard?
The dashboard/member' portal is where you can see your latest chats with listeners, latest forum posts, important links, as well as your growth path to track your own progress through this site, etc.
What is the My Conversations page?
The conversations page will show your one-on-one conversations with listeners and group support rooms.
What is the support forum page ?
The forum page will lead you to the public support forum. You can sort by using the popular, new, hot, and needs support sort buttons at the top of the forum. You can make posts or upvote them after you become a member. The forums are a great place to seek support, to connect with others and the community as a whole, to offer feedback, and to support others.
What is the Settings page?
The settings page is where you can change a variety of things like your password, e-mail associated with your account etc.
This page is also where you can deactivate your account. If you choose to deactivate your account, logging in will automatically reactivate it again.
What are Growth points?
Members can earn Growth Points, Badges and Compassion Hearts to help quantify their growth and community. Read more here
We have also introduced a Member Compassion Course
What are notes ?
This notes feature is located in the menu bar on the far right of your member dashboard, identified with a pencil mark. Read more here.
How can I upload pictures on my member profile?
Go into settings, it tells you the sizes and requirements next to the space where you are able to upload.Please go through the guidelines before you upload your profile picture.
What is a Referral link?
Referral clicks are when someone visits the 7 Cups of Tea homepage via your unique referral link, which you can find on your dashboard below the Account summary. This link will credit you with the referral, but will not link someone who clicks on it to your profile page.
Other questions? Feel free to post in this thread to ask or search around to find out!
@Apple74
Thanks for this, I have been looking for this for while :)
@Apple74
Very helpful. Thanks for posting. Have a fantastic day!
@Apple74 hiya, how do earn the wise one badge?
I wanna know how many heats it takes
@Apple74
how do i post something on my page..?
@Apple74
Good job! This is very helpful to many people who are new to 7 Cups.:)
If anyone needs more help here is a great 7 cups F.A.Q video.
@Apple74 thanks for this :) very informative
@Apple74 help me I cant see where I posted anything in the past. I cant find anything I posted since I joined. I dont knwo where to click to find my posts on dashboard. I got a message that someone tagged me and then it disappeared. I dont know what it means to be tagged and how to find out who tagged me and why.
Im completely confused. this place is so hard to figure out.
@Apple74 How do I clear the notifications bell. I looked at all of mine, but it stil says I have some.
@Apple74
Very Helpful post, Thank you so much 
@Apple74 I am a listener, How am I able to see what someones topic in the general requests when they are waiting?
Chats
How do I start a chat?
Click on ?Connect to a listener now? and you will be automatically connected to the first available listener or you can choose a specific listener and send them an online/offline message.
What are all the buttons in the chats?
Underneath send, there are the following options
Eraser: This will clear the chat in both the member and listener window.
Block/Ban: This gives you the option to block and/or ban the listener.
Leave a review: You can review and rate your listener.
How do I review a listener?
After 30 messages have been exchanged between you and a listener you can review them and leave your feedback. A yellow colour star appear under the send tab. Click on it to send your review.
What is the purpose of reviews?
7 Cots is about insuring quality work and we give importance to our members. Your feedback is important to us; please leave your review for our listeners after a chat and our self help guides.Read more about reviews here.
I can?t see my old conversations. What should I do?
Normally after a chat sessions only last 10 messages are saved by the system and rest are deleted. You can see your chats under the ?my conversation list?.
What does blockinga listener do?
Blocking a listener keeps them from contacting you. A message will show up notifying the individual that the conversation is not accessible. You can block them if they are being rude/disrespectful!
For guidelines on when to ban a member, please refer to Glen?s thread here.
What is the meaning of green/orange/transparent lines under the listener name?
This shows chat availability
? Green means they are available and can receive personal requests.
? Orange means they are busy and cannot receive personal requests, but are online.
? Red means they are offline and cannot receive personal requests.
Can a Listener advice me?
We don?t give advice because we don?t know the member or their full situation. Anyadvice we give can be wrong or/and harmful. We believe in helping them to them find their own way out. However we offer emotional support to them.
What is a PM? How can I PM someone?
PM stands for a personal message. Right now members can PM a listener to start a conversation. In a chatroom click on the picture of the listener and then send an offline/online message to the listener to have a 1-1 chat.
A listener cannot PM a member to start a conversation nor can members PM each other.
Can I talk to more than one listener at a time?
Yes. You may. We encourage you to talk to more people to get better perspective about the situation.
My listener is being rude to me. However we have not exchanged 30+ messages . What should I do ?
You can either mail community@7cups.com or block them. When you are blocking the listener You can leave your feedback in the dialog box that appears.
@Apple74
This is great news thank you for this info. It was much needed
Group Support Room
What are the rules, and where can I find them?
The chat room rules are
Do not share the username of any listener or member you are working with 1-on-1.
Please refrain from participating if you are unable to be kind, supportive and respectful to one another.
Moderators are experienced listeners who are labeled under current participants.
Please show them respect and kindness at all times. Moderators are busy attending to the group and may not be able to offer a 1-1 chat at this time.
7 Cups of Tea is not a crisis resource. Please click on the refer button if anyone appears to be suicidal or in crisis.
Please refrain from using any abusive, graphic or inappropriate language.
Please remember that this a group support chat room, if you need 1-on-1 support, please connect to a listener individually.
For your own safety, NEVER ask for or give out your personal details or social media handles to any member or listener.
To help keep this place safe, please mute any participant who you find bothersome or is disrupting the group as a whole. (Muting is anonymous and can be undone at any time.)
Do not give advice to others or share names of any drugs or medications as this can be harmful.
What is the purpose of Group Support?
We have created these rooms as a space to go where you can connect with others going through similar experiences and to lean on one another. Theyre also a great place to go if youre feeling lonely and in need of some company. This is a great opportunity for you to grow and learn from one another.
What do we talk about in the chat room?
Each chatroom has a slightly different topic or purpose, but in general, these rooms are for seeking and giving support, for making connections, and often, for having guided discussions on a particular topic.
Who are Group Mods?
They are experienced listeners who will help you, support you and will be creating and maintaining a supportive and positive community culture. They help each member grow and learn together in a group setting.
How can I leave positive/negative feedback for group mods?
You can leave a feedback for a Group mod by using this form.
What is the meaning of (L), (M), (G), against the user names?
The word ‘L means the user is a listener, ‘M is a member and ‘G is a guest on the site.
I have been assigned a user name as a guest. Can I change it? Is it permanent?
User names given to guests are random and temporary. You can change it when you sign up to be a member or when you restart your browser again.
I have a complaint against a listener/guest/member in the chatroom. What should I do?
You can PM a Group Mod about it, they will help you resolve the issue. You can also send a mail to community@7cups.com.
What are Compassion hearts? How do I earn or give them?
Compassion hearts are way of showing your appreciation and compassion in a chatroom.If someone says something kind and compassionate to you, show them your appreciation by clicking on the red heart beside their name and awarding them a Compassion heart!
How many hearts can I give in a day?
We don't want this to be gamed, so we are limiting the amount of compassion you can give to one person to 10 compassion hearts to one user in a day.
What are community discussions in the chatroom?
Community Discussions are guided discussions based on certain topics. You will be informed beforehand about these discussions and you can participate in them as and when you like.
I want to share my story but I am scared it may trigger someone. What should I do?
Try using trigger free sentences. You can also make use of asterisks to hide words. Please don't be overly descriptive while talking about your issue if you are concerned it might be triggering, and you can always feel free to reach out to a listener for 1-1 support if you feel that you need to be able to discuss details that might not be appropriate in the group support room.
@Apple74
Hello I went into a group chat today and I noticed that some of the members had an additional name next to their name such as wise one or friendly face can you tell me what those mean and how they get them and I also wanted to know how to actually exit the chat I hit the back key before but then when I go back in I'm not quite sure if I'm completely exited out of the room. I also meant to attend a depression schedule meeting this evening and someone was kind enough to let me know that I needed to get a 5 chat room bad first can you please tell me how to find out what badges are available and how to get them I'm using my phone and having a little trouble navigating through everything and I'm sorry I guess one more question 2 sorry if I download the app from the play store is that easier to maneuver through the website or is it just the same as logging in for my browser sorry guess that was a lot of questions I've looked for the help section and if they choose but could not find answers to these. Thanks again and thank you 7 cups for helping me so much.
Thank you.
@helpfulVase1202 The badges that appear in the group chat rooms are related to the number of chats and hearts that members have recieved. There's info about them here: http://www.7cups.com/forum/GroupSupportChatRooms_140/InformationUpdates_822/ShinyNewMemberBadges_36271/1/
To get into depression support 1 you do need to have the group chimer badge which requires 5 group chats. A group chat requires a certain number of messages to be sent in the group chat rooms, I think it's 25.
Personally, I don't use the app, I use the website. There have been quite a few updates to the app. At one point, certain things could only be done from the website but the app may have since caught up.
You can read about the app updates by looking through the section here: http://www.7cups.com/forum/SiteUpdatesInformationFortheCommunity_100/
Krink's studio is a good place to ask questions about site tech stuff.
@Apple74 Thank you for this :)
Miscellaneous
How can I change my user name/my issue/my personal information?
You can send a mail to community@7cups.com
How to nominate a listener for a badge?
Please send an email to badges@7cups.com
or
Please go to the deserving listener?s Profile (It should look like this https://www.7cups.com/ListenerDetails/Listener Name/), and Scroll down, until you found a yellow bar saying that ?Nominate ListenerName for a New Badge ?
How to deactivate my account?
Go to settings and choose 'deactivate account'
What is the Growth Path ?
It signifies your progress as a member. Read more here.
How can I know why my "Listener's Account" login option not working, while I now login it straightaway login me into my member account.
This seems like such a silly question, but on my dashboard I meant to skip to a new Q&A question but instead closed the box that comes up under my progress path and now I have no questions there to answer. How do I bring that box back?
This seems like a silly question, but is 7cupsoftea solely for discussing problems with users? Say a user comes to me and just wants to chat, am allowed to talk with them or should i politely decline and move onto somebody who genuinely needs to talk to somebody?
@TwinkleToast
Its definately okay to want to chat without wanting to talk about any issues in particular, as long as both parties are alright with that and they don't go into any topics that go against our guidelines :)
@lara, thanks!
*bump*