Help, an emergency came up and I can't do my goal!

Don't worry! When you're unable to complete your goal, unless you've enabled No Excuses Mode, you can just contact the support team by replying to the legitimacy check email and let them know why the derailment is non-legit (we always ask for an explanation, for accountability purposes). We don't want to charge you if it isn't fair!

That said, it's always worth taking a moment to think about whether you really can't do the goal... or whether you just don't want to, under the circumstances. We usually suggest having a rule of thumb: would you want to call this charge non-legit every time? Or are you thinking in terms of "just this once"? Are you thinking "next time, I should be tougher because I do really need to complete this goal... I just need a day off right now"?

We strongly recommend drawing a firm line: it is always legit, or always non-legit, in these circumstances. "Just this once" can be quite a slippery slope.

Ultimately, the decision is up to you, but the support team may prompt you to think about it before we go ahead and cancel charges if it's not clear to us that you definitely couldn't do the goal. In those cases, we're not saying no to cancelling the charge, we're just asking to make sure we don't accidentally undermine Beeminder for you and ruin everything forever and ever by being soft on you when you needed us to help you stick to the commitment.

We don't actually like saying no. In the end, we want to do whatever feels most fair, so keep talking to us if it doesn't feel right!

More on this in another help doc: What is a legit derailment?

How can I let you know something went wrong?

The best way to let us know an emergency has come up is by replying to the legitimacy check email after the derailment and explaining what happened; replying to that email makes things a lot easier because it gives the support team all the info we need. If you're going to need a few days off the goal, then let us know that as well, so we don't put you back on track too quickly.

If you can't wait to let us know after the derailment has already happened (e.g. you won't have internet access), then getting in touch beforehand is best. In that case, please give us all the gory details: what's going wrong, which goals are affected, what are the dates of any breaks you need, etc. We'll do our best to ensure you won't be charged!

Keywords: family emergency, force majeure, hospital, sick, unexpected circumstances