De'Leioun Jackson runs a Scottsdale business that helps creators grow on Facebook. His clients' pages kept getting flagged, and he could not get anyone at Meta to look at it. In September 2025 he took Meta to small claims court. Four months later a judge sided with him and ordered Meta to pay $5,000, the most the court could award, Arizona's Family reported. Asked whether the flagging still happens, he said he is still dealing with it.
In New Zealand, RNZ found owners going to similar lengths: a nutrition coach locked out of her accounts since February after multiple formal appeals and paid verification, and another owner who paid $72 for a subscription just to reach a human at Meta, was blocked after raising the issue five times, then filed with the Small Claims Tribunal.
I like that they fought back. I would still not want my business to depend on winning a court case.
The lesson
If most of your customers find you through one platform, you are renting your shop floor from a landlord who can change the locks without calling. That is fine until the day it happens.
Why it matters more now
Platforms review pages with software first and people second, if at all. A flag can come from a pattern the system does not like, and the appeal goes through the same system. At the same time, more customers ask an assistant on their phone for a recommendation instead of scrolling a feed. Being easy to find in those answers depends on your own website and your own listings, which nobody can switch off overnight.
Do this this week
- Add a second trusted admin to every business page, so one locked account does not lock the business.
- Write down where your logins and recovery codes live, and check that the recovery email and phone are yours and current.
- Start collecting customer emails or phone numbers with permission, in a spreadsheet if nothing else, so you can reach people if a page disappears.
- Make sure your own website says what you do and where, in plain words. Run the free AI visibility check to see whether an assistant can find and describe you without Facebook.