What is a legit derailment?

Our first answer is that if you want the brightest possible bright line, you can opt in to No-Excuses Mode! In that case, the answer is that every derailment is legit.

Otherwise, the theoretical ideal is that we only charge you when you could have met the goal and didn't. For example, you saw our reminders, you decided that you really don't feel like going to the gym tonight, so your goal derailed, and then we charge you for it. If you actually did go to the gym yesterday, but you forgot to update your gym goal in time with the data, that's (probably) not a legitimate reason to have to pay up! (Unless you decide that entering data is a part of your goal, which some users do to keep the bright red line nice and bright.) If that happens to you, you can choose to reply to the legitimacy check email to let us know, and we can undo the derailment and stop the charge.

Likewise, if you've contracted a highly infectious disease and are not allowed to leave the house, you probably shouldn't go to the gym, so that's also generally considered not to be a legit derailment. Reply to the legitimacy check email to let us know. And so on.

It is generally up to you what qualifies as "not legit". We'll probably inquire about what happened, if you haven't given us much detail in your original email, or check in with you if it sounds like it might undermine your use of Beeminder in the future. The important thing, we would say, is to be consistent: no "just this once it's okay to stay home because it's raining, but I don't want that to be an excuse in future". It should always be legit or non-legit if the same circumstances come up again in future. In the end, it's up to you and we'll believe the reasons you give us.

One thing to keep in mind is that you're probably not going to get a lot of value out of Beeminder if you're frequently derailing on goals and sending us weaselly excuses about it to avoid paying up. Calling not legit a lot means the real sting is totally diluted by all the times you decided not to get stung. That's okay, though — we're not the only game in town, and there might be an app out there that suits you better!

We have some more thoughts on the philosophy and utility of it all which you might find useful when deciding where to draw the lines:

Keywords: legitimacy check, legit check, derailment notification, sick, ill, illness, can't do goal, what counts as legit