This page sets out North Wales Fire and Rescue Service’s social media acceptable use policy across all its social media platforms (X (formerly know as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube).
Our social media channels are not monitored 24 hours a day and should not be used to report emergencies. In an emergency, always dial 999.
Our social media platforms are here to provide information and advice to the communities of North Wales. We welcome constructive feedback, engagement and differing views; however, all interactions must remain respectful.
Online hate, abuse, digital harassment and cyber-bullying will not be tolerated on our social media platforms.
Unacceptable content
We will take immediate action if any content (including comments, videos, images, GIFs, attachments, links, emojis) is:
- Defamatory, slanderous, misleading or false
- Abusive or threatening - this includes swearing, adapted spellings with the same meaning, etc
- Intimidatory towards our staff, councillors or other platform users
- Contains personal data relating to staff or members of the public
- Inciting hate crime or hate crime words
- Obscene, profane or sexually oriented
- Discriminatory in any way
- Promoting illegal activity
- Promoting individual products or services
- Irrelevant to the original post or purpose of the page
- The same message posted multiple times, otherwise known as 'spamming'
- Deliberately provocative or disruptive behaviour (commonly known as ‘trolling’)
Content moderation
If your content relates to any of the list above, it may be hidden or deleted. We may publicly respond to your content and/or direct message you to ask you to remove it immediately. We may also block your access to our social media accounts. We will tell you that we're doing this.
Depending on the content, we will also screenshot the posts and consider legal action or sending them on to the police for investigation. If we think that the content you post is explicit, we will take immediate action to delete the post and block your access to our accounts.
Hate crime
Hate crime is defined as any incident that's seen by the victim (or any other person) as being motivated by prejudice or hate towards their actual or perceived social identity. Social identities include:
- Disability
- Gender identity
- Race, ethnicity or nationality
- Religion, faith or belief
- Sexual orientation.
Hate and harassment can take the form of criminal or non-criminal behaviour and can include offensive comments or images on social media or text messages.
Safeguarding allegations or disclosures
If you make any safeguarding allegations or disclosures on our social media, these will be passed onto the relevant organisations as part of our duty of care. It is better to raise these concerns directly through the correct channels.
Complaints
We are committed to providing high quality services, putting our customers at the heart of everything we do. We do our best to make sure your contact with us is professional, courteous and goes beyond your expectations.
However, we do accept that sometimes things can go wrong and at these times we need to listen to your views and put things back on the right track. The Service’s complaints procedure gives more information on what is considered a complaint and how you can raise a complaint.
Our correspondence with you
If you have a comment to make about a letter or email we have sent you, we would ask that you don't include the name of the officer who has sent it to you in a public message. If you want to raise it with us, please send it to us privately so we can resolve any issues you have. You can also email enquiries@northwalesfire.gov.wales