Our social media channels are here to share updates, information and advice on our services and those of our partners across Bath & North East Somerset. This page explains how we help keep our channels safe and respectful for everyone to enjoy.
Our active hours
Our social media channels are monitored between 9am and 5pm, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
We may post content outside of these hours, but we will only respond to queries during our monitoring hours.
In most cases, Council Connect is the best way to get in touch. You can also report issues in the Report it section of our website.
Creating a positive space
We welcome comments and engagement on our posts and want to provide a space where residents can share views, ask questions and discuss ideas. We recognise different posts may prompt different opinions and we want to ensure our social media community is a positive and safe place.
We do not tolerate any online hate, abuse, or bullying. We monitor our channels regularly but if you notice any inappropriate comments on our pages, please send us a private message to let us know.
Our expectations of our audience
When using our channels, we ask that you:
- be polite and respectful to others
- keep comments relevant to the post
- share feedback constructively
- avoid sharing personal or sensitive information publicly
If we feel that a comment oversteps the mark, we may remove comments or take further action where content includes:
- abuse, harassment, defamation, or threatening behaviour
- hate speech or discriminatory language
- bullying, intimidation or name-calling directed at staff, members, or other platform users
- promotion of illegal activity
- misinformation or deliberately misleading comments
- spam, advertising, or repeated posts
- impersonation or false allegations about staff or members
- off topic or disruptive comments
- content that violation of any law or regulation
- party political messages or campaign content
In serious cases, we may keep records (such as screenshots) and consider further action including reporting to the relevant authorities.
We use automated profanity filters to moderate specific inflammatory or derogatory language. Anything in breach of this will be automatically hidden. As standard, we want to encourage dialogue on our posts however, at our discretion we may disable comments where necessary to protect the public and our employees.
Safeguarding allegation
We have a duty of care to our residents. If serious safeguarding concerns or allegations are raised on our social media page, these will be passed on to the relevant department/services. Any issues raised about service operations may not be passed onto teams. Find out how to report these on our website.