# How to PM staff when PM is disabled
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [November 16, 2017, 5:59pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201 "2017-11-16T17:59:45Z")
**Posts on this page:** 15
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@slspencer](https://meta.discourse.org/u/slspencer)
#### Post date: [November 16, 2017, 5:59pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/1 "2017-11-16T17:59:45Z")
Hey fantastic Discourse people,
I disabled pm’s but now users say they can’t send pm’s to Staff.
There isn’t a PM button on the topics pages, and no PM button on user pages.
And I’m not seeing the method for me to send pm’s to users, even when I go into the Admin/User area and select a user. I don’t seem to be able to send a private message to anyone, and they don’t know how to send a private message to me.
Any suggestions as to how users can pm Staff, and how Staff can pm users?
This is probably obvious, but none of us are seeing it (yet).
Any help is appreciated! tks.
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### Author:  [@dax](https://meta.discourse.org/u/dax)
#### Post date: [November 16, 2017, 6:17pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/2 "2017-11-16T18:17:57Z")
If you disable PM on your profile, users will not be able to send you any messages, but you, as a staff member, will be able to send it to your users (even if they have disabled PMs).
You do not need to visit the user profile, just click on username or avatar to see the Message button
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### Author:  [@slspencer](https://meta.discourse.org/u/slspencer)
#### Post date: [November 16, 2017, 7:55pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/3 "2017-11-16T19:55:23Z")
Hi @Trash, thanks for the helpful info!
So if the forum’s PM feature is disabled, users can’t pm staff, correct?
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### Author:  [@dax](https://meta.discourse.org/u/dax)
#### Post date: [November 16, 2017, 8:16pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/4 "2017-11-16T20:16:26Z")
If the forum’s PM (by site setting) is disabled, users can not send PM, staff members (admins and mods) can always send PM to all users.
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2017, 5:51am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/5 "2017-11-17T05:51:59Z")
Additionally any user who receives a pm can always reply to it no matter what.
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### Author:  [@slspencer](https://meta.discourse.org/u/slspencer)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2017, 11:44pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/6 "2017-11-17T23:44:19Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> receives a pm can always reply to it no matter what.
Yeah so it doesn’t really solve our problem of our previous developer who is pm’ing people. i’m receiving complaints. If he’s already pm’d people, he can continue to send on those pm threads
So…users trolled on forum, WHAT DO??? 🙂
Thanks for the replies, we’ll figure it out…
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### Author:  [@purldator](https://meta.discourse.org/u/purldator)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2017, 12:16am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/7 "2017-11-18T00:16:03Z")
Have you considered confronting this person directly to stop their behavior? Technology is always a good first-go without having to broach things directly with a group of people or an individual.
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### Author:  [@slspencer](https://meta.discourse.org/u/slspencer)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2017, 12:36am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/8 "2017-11-18T00:36:43Z")
He decided he didn’t like the user community, so he left the project.
Users get excited when they first join the forum. The tech guys are learning how to make their own jeans, the tailors are learning how to scale their business. They get so excited it’s like they’re eating ice cream for the first time! And their imaginations kick into high gear, and they make a ton of suggestions. I just listen and say ‘cool idea!’. But the developer takes it to heart, and so he took his marbles and went home. He made his own fork, then deleted the original repo! Atlassian actually provided us support (amazing) and restored our code to us. And now he wants the users back. I’ll answer questions from anyone, the forum users can use his fork if they want to. So he’s not happy about that either. But he refuses to post publicly, even though we all know he’s lurking about. And he likes to play word games so engaging him in a discussion isn’t productive anymore, he spews a stream of crazy talk.
Hopefully he’ll eventually get tired and go do his own thing.
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### Author:  [@purldator](https://meta.discourse.org/u/purldator)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2017, 12:44am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/9 "2017-11-18T00:44:46Z")
Not to snark him, but errh…sounds as if he did not carefully plan out his departure strategy.
If he’s threatening the well-being of the community by backdooring his activities for getting users to grok his fork then I do suggest confronting him about it. He may get tired in the long run but overall one should consider how other members are dealing with it and their own feelings on the subject which can hurt everyone in that longer run. Possibly a bump in the road or something greater. At most, you can tag him for spamming, if he’s getting people to jump ship, or make that attempt.
From your edits, he sounds like an intellectual bully. [I wrote some pieces on here I plan to blog in the coming weeks from someone else’s account of dealing with this kinda thing.](https://meta.discourse.org/t/handling-an-intellectual-bully/28313) Good luck.
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### Author:  [@slspencer](https://meta.discourse.org/u/slspencer)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2017, 1:45am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/10 "2017-11-18T01:45:34Z")
> [@purldator](#):
>
> sounds as if he did not carefully plan out his departure strategy.
lol, you’re so right!
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### Author:  [@pfaffman](https://meta.discourse.org/u/pfaffman)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2017, 1:48am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/11 "2017-11-18T01:48:24Z")
> [@slspencer](#):
>
> If he’s already pm’d people, he can continue to send on those pm threads
>
> So…users trolled on forum, WHAT DO??
You disable his account. And perhaps move to a new server that he had never logged in to.
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### Author:  [@system](https://meta.discourse.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [January 10, 2020, 11:31am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/12 "2020-01-10T11:31:45Z")
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### Author:  [@Remah](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Remah)
#### Post date: [January 10, 2020, 11:43am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/13 "2020-01-10T11:43:14Z")
> [@slspencer](#):
>
> If he’s already pm’d people, he can continue to send on those pm threads
I’ve never had to close PMs myself but they can be closed to remove that option or temptation.
> [@Question about Locking Users at New User level, and PMs](https://meta.discourse.org/t/question-about-locking-users-at-new-user-level-and-pms/49407/9):
>
> Then simply close the specific PM. Users can always reply to a PM someone has sent them, regardless of their trust level. So, if you have users PM’ing a new TL0 user, that new user will be able to reply to those PMs.
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### Author:  [@system](https://meta.discourse.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [November 9, 2023, 6:32am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/14 "2023-11-09T06:32:01Z")
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [November 9, 2023, 6:43am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-pm-staff-when-pm-is-disabled/74201/15 "2023-11-09T06:43:04Z")