Draft to be reviewed by a lawyer — do not publish as is.

This English version is provided for convenience; the French version prevails in case of discrepancy.

Transparency: how ranking, matching and our revenue work

This page is published under Article L111-7 of the French Consumer Code and its implementing provisions (Articles D111-7 and D111-8). On the website it is also called "How ranking works".

1. Our role

SkinFlip is a platform connecting private individuals for the barter of Counter-Strike 2 virtual items. We are not a party to any trade, hold no items, use no bots and are not involved in any flow of money between users. Trades take place on Steam.

SkinFlip is not affiliated with Valve Corporation. Steam and Counter-Strike are trademarks of Valve Corporation.

2. Listing and delisting

• Who can publish: any adult member signed in through Steam, whose inventory is public, who has provided a valid trade offer link and is not subject to a trade ban ("economy ban"). Up to 5 active listings for free, 50 with Premium.
• Content: each listing is linked to specific items in the inventory (identifier and exact attributes).
• Automatic delisting: a listing is withdrawn automatically if an item leaves the inventory or becomes untradable; it expires after 30 days unless renewed.
• Delisting by moderation: in case of breach of the Terms of use, through a reasoned decision open to appeal.
• Items with "attributes not verified" cannot be offered above €100 of indicative value, nor in Active Trading.

3. Ranking of listings (browse and search)

• Only listings matching the selected filters (weapon, knife or gloves, wear, float, StatTrak, stickers, value, reputation…) are shown.
• Default order: relevance to your search, then freshness of the listing, then the member's reputation. You can choose another sort (date, value, reputation).
• Sponsored listings: boosted listings appear, for 24 hours, in separate slots labelled "Sponsored" [TO COMPLETE: maximum number of sponsored slots per page]. They must also match your filters.

4. Matching

A direct 1:1 match exists when A offers an item wanted by B and B offers an item wanted by A, respecting all search criteria (wear, float, pattern, phase, StatTrak, stickers, value…).

Match score = fit with the search criteria + value balance between both sides + participants' reputation (computed only from trades definitive at D+8) + freshness of the listings.

Never proposed: a match with oneself, the same item used twice, an item that is untradable or under Steam trade protection.

Value balance: the indicative value of each side is displayed. A warning appears above a 10 % gap (5 % when one of the accounts is recent).

5. Three-way loops

Reserved for Premium members in manual mode only, and for accounts meeting the trust thresholds: at least 10 definitive trades, a Steam Account older than one year, no confirmed report, no trade ban. Cycles of at most three participants are searched for and then sorted by score. The most trusted participant sends first. A loop is carried out through three simultaneous one-way offers, which are not atomic: this risk is displayed before any acceptance.

6. Effect of paid boosts

• A boost (€0.99 for 24 h) places the listing in the "Sponsored" slots of listing pages, always labelled as such.
• In match computation, a boost only provides a small tie-breaking bonus: it can never rank a less suitable match above a match that better fits your criteria.
• Boosts have no effect on the Active Trading planner, nor on reputation.

7. Premium

The Premium subscription gives access to more listings, listing bump, instant alerts, advanced filters, three-way loops and included credits. It has no effect on reputation or on the Active Trading planner. The "Premium" badge is not a trust signal and does not certify any verification.

8. Logic of the Active Trading planner

The planner is a deterministic function which, from a snapshot of the system state (rules, inventories, open offers, prices), computes the offers to propose to each sender. At launch, no offer is sent without the sender clicking on that offer in the extension (assisted mode) and then confirming it in Steam Mobile; the automatic sending mode is not offered (see Article 3 of the Active Trading terms). A candidate offer must meet all of the following constraints:

1. global and individual kill switches off, account not suspended, prerequisites met;
2. items given taken only from the sender's whitelist;
3. items received match the sender's wants and items given match the recipient's wants;
4. the recipient has agreed to receive Active Trading offers, has a trade offer link, meets the minimum reputation and account age, has no trade ban and no confirmed report;
5. the recipient's daily quota of offers received (10 by default);
6. Steam limits respected with a margin: at most 4 active offers per recipient and 25 in total;
7. a new batch only when none of the sender's offers is still awaiting mobile confirmation; limited batch size (5 by default);
8. an item in at most one active offer (by default);
9. overpay no higher than the chosen maximum (5 % by default); daily cap on value given (€1,000 by default);
10. the sender's active hours;
11. no sending if the reference price is older than 24 hours;
12. the same offer (same pair, same items) is not re-sent less than 14 days after a refusal;
13. available credits and daily budget: one credit reserved per offer;
14. above €500 of value given, enhanced validation (second confirmation) by the sender in the extension before sending.

The remaining candidates are ranked by score (fit with criteria, value balance, reputation), in a stable and reproducible order. Neither boosts, Premium nor affiliate links play any part in this ranking. See the Active Trading terms.

9. Reference prices

Displayed values are indicative prices provided by [TO COMPLETE: reference price provider], cached. A price older than 24 hours is not used by Active Trading. We do not scrape websites that prohibit it.

10. Reputation and badges

• Reputation (a score from 0 to 100) is computed automatically, never entered by hand, from: the number of trades definitive at D+8, their cumulative value, the age of the Steam account and of the membership; cancellations, abusive reversals and confirmed reports count negatively. No free-text reviews are taken into account. [TO COMPLETE: published weightings.]
• Warning badges shown on profiles: Steam account less than 30 days old, private profile, Steam level 0, trade ban, VAC ban, community ban, no definitive trades, confirmed reports.

11. Affiliate links

For users who wish to sell for money, we may display links to partner marketplaces (referral programmes, for example Skinport or CSFloat) [TO COMPLETE: actual partners]. These links are always labelled "affiliate link", earn us a commission paid by the partner, and never influence our rankings or Active Trading.

12. Our revenue sources

We take no commission on trades, pass no money between users, sell no data and show no advertising for gambling or case-opening sites.

13. Links with third parties

SkinFlip has no contractual or capital link with Valve Corporation. Apart from the affiliate programmes mentioned in section 11, SkinFlip has no contractual or capital link with marketplaces or trading sites [TO COMPLETE: to be confirmed].

14. Status of users and civil and tax obligations

• Trades take place between private individuals. Consumer-protection rules (right of withdrawal, legal guarantee) do not apply to trades between private individuals; they do apply to the services SkinFlip sells you (see the Terms of sale).
• A user acting in a professional capacity must say so and comply with the related obligations [TO COMPLETE: status and identification of professional users].
• Each user is solely responsible for their own tax and social-security situation regarding the trades they make. Useful information: [TO COMPLETE: links to impots.gouv.fr and urssaf.fr; the lawyer will confirm whether Article 242 bis of the French General Tax Code and the DAC7 directive apply to the barter of virtual items without any flow of money].

15. Moderation

Moderation rules, the notice mechanism, statements of reasons and redress are described in Article 14 of the Terms of use.