I asked Apache Ignite Availability Issue w/Custom CacheStoreAdapter and issued a bounty for it.

I received a correct response before the bounty period was over, however I didn't check it again until after the weekend... I feel bad because the user answered correctly, and should have received the bounty, but because of me they get no bounty points.

Yes, I realize that there are other questions that explicitly say once a bounty expires its gone, however I'm asking if there is any method to correct for "user error". Like is it possible for a moderator to correct this?

If not, should there be? I realize building an automated system for every edge case isn't feasible, but bounties are meant to be an extra reward to incentivize people to answer questions. In that spirit, the ability to retroactively correct un-awarded bounties in certain cases would be nice.

  • By default, SO already sends a reminder email for a bounty about to expire... – ryanyuyu Aug 15 '16 at 15:29
  • I thought the system already gives you a little extra time to award it. – BSMP Aug 15 '16 at 15:30
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    @BSMP Yes, there is a grace period. And apparently there are emails sent when the bounty is about to expire and when the grace period starts. I really don't see a reason to have some additional mechanism to award bounties after the grace period is over. – Louis Aug 15 '16 at 15:36
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    I had way too much fun over the weekend, and would now like a time machine so I can go back and do some things differently. [feature-request] – Cody Gray Aug 15 '16 at 15:46
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    @CodyGray [status-completed] (they've figured it out already in the future, but agreed to not retroactively implement it) – ryanyuyu Aug 15 '16 at 15:58
  • So.... after they provide that FIRST "extra time" (or period where mods correct, whatever).... what will happen when someone ALSO misses that and requests for more? You knew from the get go when the bounty expired.... you failed it, now someone gets less rep because of that. Simple – Patrice Aug 15 '16 at 16:05
  • Not critics but you have also forget to vote up for poor guy that answered your question – maytham-ɯɐɥʇʎɐɯ Aug 15 '16 at 16:16
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    Let me rephrase the question a bit in order to be more clear: Regardless of the bounty or grace period, Is there some sort of manual intervention to correct for user error of not awarding a bounty. And if not should there be? – Carlos Bribiescas Aug 15 '16 at 16:34
  • @CarlosBribiescas in order: No there is no way (short of you offering another bounty). And then No, there shouldn't. With the automatic rules that can give 1/2 of the bounty for most of the cases where someone forgets, it's enough for 99,9% of the cases. – Patrice Aug 15 '16 at 16:38
  • There is already a grace period. What do you want, a 2nd grace period? What if someone misses it, and proposes a 3rd grace period? There must be a limit somewhere. – Oriol Aug 15 '16 at 16:56

There is no formal mechanism to manually award bounties if the person who started the bounty does not do so within the awarding period.

There's a automatic system whereby an answer posted after the bounty started and that manages a net score of 2 or more will get half the bounty awarded to it.

I do not think that it would be a good thing to have a system in place for moderators to manually award bounties that bounty givers forgot to award. Bart shared in another answer that:

  1. The system sends an email to the bounty giver near the end of the bounty period, before the bounty ends.

  2. The system sends another email to the bounty giver when the grace period starts.

There are already measures in place to remind you. If we add more measures, there are still people that won't act in time. What we have in place now is fine.

Opening the door to requests for awarding bounties manually after the fact would just unnecessarily add to the workload of moderators.

You can rectify your error yourself. Start a new bounty to reward an existing answer, and award the bounty to the answer you accepted. I've seen bounty givers who forgot to award the bounty the first time around do this. It does not require community intervention.

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    Regarding the fix, starting a new bounty would cost more than the initial bounty. – ryanyuyu Aug 15 '16 at 18:16
  • @ryanyuyu True, and yet I've seen people just put up the new bounty and take it as a lesson learned. – Louis Aug 15 '16 at 18:18

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