Q: I just set up an alert, and got an e-mail with more than one thread in it within 5 minutes.
A: If you are the first person to create an alert for a certain keyword, in a certain forum, with a certain rating, your first email may contain all threads matching this alert within 24 hours. People who add an identical alert after you, will not receive the same email, and will only be notified about future threads. This will become increasingly rare as more alerts are added.

Q: Are Deal Alerts CaSe SenSITive?
A: No. "LapToP" is the same as "laptop"

Q: I want to be notified via PM. Can I do it now?
A: Yes, you may choose Email, Private Message or Both as notification types. In case of PM, please remember, that you are responsible for cleaning up the Inbox, otherwise the alerts will be discarded.

Q: Can I choose any other type of notification rather than instant?
A: You can choose instant, daily or both type of notification. Instant alert is dispatched within minutes of thread posting. Daily aler is dispatched at midnight Pacific Time and contains a summary message for all threads that matched your alerts for the day.

Q: Do I have to maintain my PM Inbox if I want to get alerts as PMs?
A: Yes and no. Our system automatically cleans up PMs sent to you via Deal Alerts system when they reach 4 days of age. But if you fill your Inbox before the cleanup, you will not receive alerts.

Q: Can I edit an existing alert?
A: Yes, click the "edit" link to the left of the alert name in My Deal Alerts

Q: I added an alert, but didn't get any notifications yet... Why is that?
A: Check Forum Search for an identical search phrase in the same forum.

• If you didn't get any results, then you won't get an alert, since there is nothing to alert you about.
• If you did get results, check the following:
  • Thread start date (not last post date) must be within 24 hours from now
  • Thread original post or title must contain the exact keyword you are searching for. Subsequent posts by the same user and/or other users do not count

Remember, that if someone had an identical alert setup before you and thread has already been processed and alerts sent out, you will not get a notification about that thread for your alert. But you will for all threads in the future.

If you are absolutely certain you didn't get an alert about something you should have, let us know by posting a new thread here, stating your keyword, rating level and forum.

Q: Can I set an alert up for a "parent forum" such as "The Deals"?
A: At this time, only forums which may contain posts directly and to which you have access to can be used for deal alerts.

Q: I made a thread with a keyword matching a Deal Alert I have set up. I didn't get notified about it.... Why is that?
A: You will not get alerts about threads to which you are the author. Why would you?

Q: Can I set up alerts looking for keywords in title only?
A: Yes, you need to use a special title only indicator in your alert. For example, you are looking for digital camera only in titles, you would add this alert:
@title "digital camera"

Q: I am looking for "cup" or "cups" should I add one or both?
A: You may use | (vertical separator, also known as "pipe") to search for items like this. So you would add an alert "cup | cups" (without quotes). On most keyboards, the pipe character shares the key with "\" (backslash)

Q: Can I use complex logical statements?
A: Sure. You have already seen the example with "cup | cups" above, let's try something else. For example, you are looking for threads with "laptop" which is not "dell". You would add an alert "laptop -dell"

N.B. A few important things to remember with complex logical alerts:
Double quotes " " effectively mean logical AND (search for this AND that). Take a look at the different results:
"notebook | laptop" will be looking for both notebook AND laptop
"notebook" | "laptop" however will be looking for either notebook OR laptop
It's recommended to enclose complex individual alerts which use pipe | with double quotes " ". It is required if individual alerts contain punctuation, such as space, comma, dot, dash, etc. For example:
flash drive | hard drive will fail and not send you any alerts
"flash drive" | "hard drive" on the other had will notify you about threads with flash drive OR hard drive in them
To combine title only search with multiple keywords, using the flash drive/hard drive example above, you would add the following alert:
@title "flash drive" | @title "hard drive"
If you are not sure you will be happy with the results of a complex logical alert, try it first with Forum Search. It will return all the threads which match your logical criteria. Also, remember, Forum Search does look through the whole thread rather than just first post + title which is what Deal Alerts does, so the actual alerts may be not identical to the Forum Search results.

Q: Can I get alerts via cell phone text message (SMS)?
A: Yes, but at this time you have to set your cell phone email (usually phonenumber@wirelesscarrier.website) as your main SlickDeals.net email address. Which means you will get any forum-related notices there as well. Also, most carriers limit SMS size to 160 characters, including subject, email address, etc... Which means you would barely be able to receive "Dear username" and nothing on the alert itself.

Q: How can I access it without using a direct link?
A: You can find it in User Control Panel (left hand side navigation block)

Q: If the thread author misspelled something, who should I blame for not getting an alert?
A: The thread author

Q: How does expiration work? Will my alerts just vanish after they expire?
A: Here is the breakdown on how it works:
Once your alert reaches an expiration date, it will go into grace period (7 days).
At that point, every PM or Email you get with an alert (not necessarily the one that's expiring) will contain a short line of text, notifying you about it,
You will also receive a daily warning about the expiration via both PM and Email.
If after grace period you still don't Renew the alert(s), it will be removed, and you will need to add it again.

Q: How can I renew an expiring alert?
A: There are 2 quick and simple ways to renew an alert:

• By checking the checkbox in My Deal Alerts, selecting "Renew" (default option), and clicking "Go"
• By editing a deal alert, and saving it.

Here are a few more additional details about Deal Alerts

Your Deal Alert is a combination of the following parameters:

• Target forum (where to look)
• Keyword phrase (what to look for)
• Thread rating (minimum rating before alert is sent out)
• Notification method for sending you an alert
  • Email (sent to address in your account)
  • Private Message
  • Email and Private Message
• Notification frequency
  • Instant (within minutes of thread creation)
  • Daily (summary of your daily Deal Alerts for the day at midnight, PST)
  • Both Instant and Daily
• Expiration. Alerts automatically expire after a certain number of days, and are deleted if not renewed within grace period (7 days)
  • To renew the alert, either edit and save it, or mark a checkbox next to it and use "Renew" option on the bottom right of your alerts list
  • When one or more of your alerts expire, you will receive a notification each day until it's renewed or removed by you or the system

Deal Alerts should conform to the following rules:

• Your maximum number of alerts is listed in the upper right corner. When you reach your maximum, you will need to remove existing alerts to add a new one
• A single alert can be in a single forum
• Ratings and alerts are tracked within 24 hours from thread creation time
• Keyword should be between 3 and 64 characters
• Keywords are case insensitive (LaPtop is considered the same as laptop)
• Keyword phrase may be left blank, if you also choose a Thread Rating not marked with an asterisk (*), effectily creating an alert which will notify you about any thread reaching your selected rating level within 24 hours.
• "Ignore rating" will alert you about any threads matching your criteria, and "Front page" will notify you about threads matching your criteria reaching the Front Page, with everything else in between

You will only receive an alert if all of the following are true:

• Your account is in good standing (not banned or otherwise restricted)
• A new thread with a first post matching all of your Deal Alert parameters is created after you added a Deal Alert
  • A keyword phrase has to be an exact match. For example, measuring cup will match plastic measuring cup but will not match measuring cups or plastic cup (see advanced options for more)
  • Thread rating should be at least equal to your selected rating within 24 hours from thread creation
  • Rating "Ignore rating" will match threads with any rating
  • Rating "Front Page" is considered the highest rating, and will match any rating levels set up in your Deal Alerts
• You can receive emails (for email notification)
• You can receive Private Messages (for Private Message notifications)
• Daily alerts are sent out at midnight, PST for the previous 24 hours, and are a summary for all alerts, for which you selected a Daily (or Both) notification frequency, sent to you in a single email and/or private message.
• If you get more than one match for all of your alerts in a short period of time, you will receive a single email or private message with all of the alerts inside

Advanced Deal Alerts options

You may create advanced logical alers, using the following capabilities:

• logical AND is achieved by using double quotes " "
  • Note, you must use double quotes for all advanced alerts which contain special characters, such as space, comma, hyphen, etc
• logical OR is set up using | ("pipe") character. Usually located on the same keyboard key as \ ("backwards slash")
  For example, if you are looking for measuring cup or measuring cups, set up your keyword as "measuring cup" | "measuring cups" (with quotes)
• logical NOT is achieved using the minus " - " sign
  For example, if you are looking for keyword free but not shipping, set up your alert as free -shipping
• If you are interested in searching thread titles only, use a special parameter @title when setting up your alert keyword
  For example, if you are looking for ddr memory in titles only, use @title ddr memory as your keyword
• If you are not sure what kinds of results your advanced alert will return, use Forum Search before adding it, it will return the same results when used as a search request
• You can also combine advanced logical options in your alerts setup, but make sure to test them using Forum Search to ensure that they will work

Why you may still not receive an alert

Certain things are beyond our control, and you may not receive an alert because of various reasons, including but not limited to:

• System failure
• Network connectivity issues
• Internet Service Provider issues
• Spam filters
• Operator errors
• Spelling errors

Even though we make every effort to achieve reliability, Deal Alert delivery is not guaranteed.