I am NOT going to be quiet about this.
This was asked for back in 2018…
WE NEED A WAY TO DELETE PATRONS THAT DOESN"T SEND A NASTY MESSAGE!!!
Is this really that difficult of a fix? Because it is a royal pain to not be able to update a patron list that resembles reality. Why has nothing has been done to address this rather small fix for 3 years? So many people have asked for it!
I’m still waiting for this too. It would save me so much annoyance and worry to have a couple former patrons deleted and it would not be cool for them to get an email from me saying I’d blocked them.
Patreon does NOT have our interests in mind. The reason they won’t fix this is that they use patron numbers to get more VC money, which they appear to spend on everything EXCEPT creator support and creator requests. Allowing us to silently remove a declined patron would tank those numbers. At least a dozen in my case.
This is a tough one for me, too. I have a handful of people whose credit card info has expired, and may repeated soft nudges haven’t responded. Ideally I would purge them from my list, perhaps with a gentle, “thanks for all of your past support…feel free to join us in the future if your situation changes”–but I don’t want to scold them!
Exactly. The vast majority of inactive patrons don’t need scolding, they need thanks, and a gentle goodbye.
I agree with everyones thoughts around this and the sad thing is is that we used to have a delete option but it was replaced with blocking - my colleagues and I were not happy about this at the time and still aren’t.
That said, the good news is that I’ve recently heard of possible solutions for this that we are currently entertaining. I’m unsure as to when they will be implemented, but this is something we are considering!
Lovely to know Patreon is still ‘considering’ it. Still unsure why is is only being considered after so many years of repeated requests, so much needless alienation of past patrons, so little real accuracy of true patron counts… Truly, it is mind-boggling, and frustrating as hell.
I completely agree and understand how frustrating it can be to surface something without seeing any changes being made. I have been trying to influence our product team to change this for years and will continue to push for it in hopes that something will be done about it soon!
Nice to feel heard, but that doesn’t change things. I feel like you are saying, yes, I hear you and I’m on your side! Well, that’s lovely, but again, the problem is still here, and has been for YEARS, and really shouldn’t be that difficult of a request to satisfy.
As you can see, the tendency amongst creators is to assume/suspect that Patreon is intentionally preventing us from easily deleting patrons (or at least inactivating them somehow off the main list that creates our stats) to artificially inflate the numbers shown to potential investors. Can you speak to this? Can you speak to why this seems to be such a difficult request to attend to? Can you speak to any challenges we may not be aware of that prevent them from attending to it? Or can you confirm it’s all about investors and numbers…?
I’ve heard of this, but I’ve yet to hear of a justification as to why.
“Possible solutions”?? Why can’t y’all just revert it to what it was before? What is there to discuss?
I completely understand both of your concerns and will be happy to address them.
First and foremost, this is not intended to make us look good. The only number that would make us look good would be funds collected on a monthly basis - not number of users. We are actively working to change this as well so hopefully we can see changes soon.
For as long as I have been at Patreon (~5 years) it has always been difficult to surface feedback like this due to internal structures and limited resources. To be frank, the internal systems have just been slow and difficult to raise concerns. I finally feel this changing and am optimistic for more changes in line with what the community is asking for.
I also don’t understand why we don’t just go back to what we had before, but do not know why that was never considered.
With that said, I really do want y’all to know that we are trying to raise this and get it in front of the right teams to make sure this is taken seriously and acted on.
There is not much else I can say on this and if you have other feedback on the platform I implore you to continue raising it here until it becomes a reality.
So, we have to keep coming back every month and post “It’s still a problem!” until it gets solved?
Would this approach work for any issue, like deciding for ourselves which three tiers appear on our “Select a membership level” page, or getting a gallery page for displaying our posts (like Tumblr had)?
Maybe you could ask…?
Much like the simple additions of an image Gallery to our pages, or even simpler being able to attach a file or images in personal messages… these wishes go ignored for years. It’s actually quite disapointing to see the lack of interaction of staff here too. I understand they just had to let 30 employees go, but I feel they will probably have to let more go if they don’t start listening to the community.
I would be fine with blocking if need be. Just untick whatever programming is set to sending the email. The nasty-gram is the main issue. What other platform informs people they’ve been blocked? I’m not aware of any. And not sending the email seems like an easy solution.
it’s also been brought up before in a different thread that telling someone you’ve blocked them via automated email is potentially dangerous. there are a myriad of reasons to actually blocking someone including fraud or even potentially stalking. why would i want the platform i’m blocking a stalker on to get an email about it? it’s such a terrible “feature”.
So, I copied this entire conversation and sent it to Patreon support. Having dealt with support before, I am used to their autoreply assuring you that they have received the ticket and will attend to it. This one had a distinctly different feel to it. Kind of like - please try and figure this out yourself because we are busy.
Hey there,
Patreon Support here.Our business hours are Monday through Friday from 5am - 5pm PST. Our busiest times are during the 1st of each month as we run the payment cycle so expect a delay during that week.
If you’re eager to find an answer, we might have you covered in our Help Center.
Hey there -
I wanted to say a general thanks for bringing this topic back up to the surface. @Evan and I will see if there’s someone internally who is working on this or considering this who can share additional insight - will let you know if so and/or loop them in.
I’m also seeing the copy from the support email. Looks like there’s a general theme in this thread around voice, tone, & vibe in Patreon communications to creators and other members of our community (e.g., patrons). That’s a big topic given the many touch points and teams involved, and a topic I’m really interested and invested in (we should be kind, clear, & consistent!). I’ll also share that big picture theme with my colleagues on teams like brand marketing, product marketing, and support.
Thanks again!
Thanks for responding - appreciate your efforts. And might you have an estimate of when we will hear back? What would be a reasonable expectation of time to expect a response? Otherwise things go away, are forgotten and don’t get attended to, answered, or fixed.
Fair questions 
I’ll reach out to my colleagues about the inactive patron email question today.
I can’t be certain how quickly I’ll hear back or how much internal conversation we’ll have before I’ve got something worth sharing with you, but I promise to keep you in the loop as I go. The inactive patron email topic is pretty specific and concrete, so I’m hoping to have an update on that soon.
As for the broader tone/voice convo, I probably won’t report back on that here since it’s such a general topic - I’ll share this post with my colleagues as an FYI and inspiration for continuing convos we’re already having about this theme.