Policy

Social media use policy

Publication date
11 June 2025

We use social media to share news, updates and service information. We also use it to listen to your views. These are public platforms and we aim to keep them respectful, inclusive and helpful.

Messages to our social media accounts are not monitored. If you have an emergency and need assistance, contact our services using the emergency contact numbers listed on our website.

Where you can find us

We currently use:

Each platform has its own rules, which we follow. We also have house rules to help you engage with us in a safe and respectful way.

What our House rules are

We want our social media pages to be fair, safe and welcoming. We care about getting things right and we want to help and work with you to improve our services and create a better Renfrewshire for everyone.

We understand you may be frustrated or upset when you contact us. Please still treat our staff and other users with respect. We will not tolerate abusive, discriminatory or harmful behaviour towards our staff or other users. 

Please:

  • Be civil, tasteful and relevant
  • Only post what you’re happy to share publicly
  • Respect different views
  • Let our staff help – they are doing their best
  • Don't swear or use offensive language
  • Don't post anything unlawful, libelous, harassing, defamatory, abusive, threatening, harmful, obscene, profane, sexually oriented or racially offensive
  • Don't incite, condone or encourage anything that could result in a criminal offence, civil liability or breaches any laws regarding competition
  • Don't post inappropriate images or threatening, abusive, harassing, blackmailing or bullying messages online
  • Don't post misinformed or misleading information, comments, replies or links
  • Don't be rude and/or aggressive to members of our team, they are doing everything they can to help you
  • Don't post links or direct others to sites containing viruses, corrupted files or anything that could damage or interfere with computer hardware or software, or to material which is offensive, or which may breach the terms of use of the relevant social media account
  • Don't post content copied from elsewhere which you don't own the copyright for
  • Don't post the same message, or very similar messages, more than once, also called "spamming"
  • Don't publicise your, or anyone else's, personal information, such as contact details
  • Don't advertise products or businesses
  • Don't impersonate someone else.

If you don’t follow these house rules, we reserve the right to:

  • remove any content that breaks these rules
  • block users who repeatedly or seriously breach them
  • report unlawful posts to the relevant authorities.

Endorsements and third-party content

  • If we ‘like’ or ‘follow’ other accounts, it doesn’t mean we endorse them.
  • Views expressed by others on our pages do not represent Renfrewshire Council.
  • We are not responsible for content linked to or shared by others.

AI use on social media

We do not use artificial intelligence to create or respond to social media content. Everything we post is written by a member of our team. When you contact us, you’re speaking to a real person.

When we monitor and respond

The messages to our social media accounts are not monitored. If you message us on social media, you may receive an automatic reply.

During emergencies or significant disruptions, we may post updates outside of normal hours.

Formal complaints

We understand that people may be upset or frustrated when they contact us. 

Social media is not the place to raise official complaints.

If you want to make a formal complaint, use our complaints process.

Keeping information up to date

We aim to share accurate and timely information, but we cannot guarantee that all content on our social media pages will always be complete or up to date. For the most reliable information, check our website.