Never hold a sale for an unactivated sponsor: walk up to the first payable upline, referral follows the money

Marty, 2026-09-16: a purchase must never wait on a sponsor who has not linked a wallet / switched on
payouts. /api/sponsor and /me now walk the site's sponsor line upward to the first upline that is
activated with payouts on (not on the no-payout list) and the buy proceeds under them; nobody
activated -> the catch position (#1). The buyer sees a one-line notice and carries on; admin gets a
heads-up. When the position is created on-chain (MemberActivated), sponsorSyncOnEvent re-points the
buyer's stored sponsor to whoever was paid (#1 included), so the referral leaves the skipped
sponsor's line for good, then sends the pointed notices: the skipped sponsor(s) are told they lost
this referral permanently and how to switch on payouts; the sponsor who was paid is told the
referral is theirs for good and to coach the one who missed it (teach-forward). Admin lookup:
GET /api/admin/sponsor-resolve?ref=. Only a transient chain error still pauses a buy.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>

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@@ -89,7 +89,8 @@ FACTS:
 - LINKED POSITIONS AND BADGES (2026-09-14): qualifying buyers on a member's linked positions count toward their achievement badges (Spark/Surge/Circuit/Nexus) and light their chip on their sponsor's line, and a badge once earned never regresses. CONTRACT RULE: levels 2 and 3 are paid to the MAIN wallet only when that wallet's own count of qualifying buyers reaches 2 and 5; buyers registered under a linked position count for that position, not the main wallet. Qualified Start positions buy UNDER the main wallet, so those buys raise the main count; a member whose old wallet was swapped out (its buyers stay with the old position) needs new $20+ buyers under the current main wallet before level 2 pays it. The contract still pays levels 2 and 3 to each position based on that position's OWN qualifying buyers, so the Qualifying buyers tile shows the main position's count with the linked positions' count underneath.
 - CREDITS VS POL (2026-09-15, Marty's stance): EVERY member earns CREDITS (viewing, videos, visits, inbox, sign-in bonus, badge bonuses); credits are ad delivery, not money. POL is paid by the contract to a member's wallet when referrals buy packages. ALWAYS describe activation as 'the $20 starter package plus payouts switched on' and lead every earning answer with it; do NOT volunteer that level 1 can pay without a purchase. If someone asks point-blank whether a purchase is required for level-1 payouts, answer truthfully in one sentence: the contract pays level 1 to any member whose payouts are switched on, and the $20 package is what makes them a qualifying buyer for their sponsor, funds their own ads, and unlocks badges, tools, the holding tank and wall positions. A $20+ purchase by a referral makes that referral a qualifying buyer for their sponsor; 2 and 5 open levels 2 and 3. Never claim the payout itself is gated by a purchase.
 - PIPELINE (coming soon, built 2026-09-15; opens when the site setting pipelineMode is on): a follow-up board on the dashboard, tab 'Pipeline' between My line and Buy packages. Columns: Talking to, Joined, Wallet linked, Payouts on, Bought, Building, Later. Prospects (from the My line prospect list) and directs are placed automatically from what they have actually done (coaching rung, on-chain buys); nobody drags cards. The sponsor adds a note, a follow-up date and a tag (hot, later, no response, not interested); a 'Follow up today' strip lists due cards; stalled cards (quiet 3+ days) are flagged; each card carries the message for its exact stage with 'Open chat with this message' (member chat) or copy. Until it opens, the tab shows a coming-soon card with the roadmap date.
-- SPONSOR NUDGE ON A HELD BUY (2026-09-15): when a referral's purchase is held because the sponsor has not switched on payouts, the sponsor is emailed and gets an on-site message the same minute (once an hour at most) telling them who is waiting and to link a wallet / switch on payouts on the Wallet tab; nothing is charged to the buyer, who can simply try again once the sponsor is ready.
+- UNACTIVATED SPONSOR = WALK UP, NEVER HOLD (2026-09-16, Marty): if a buyer's sponsor has not linked a wallet or switched on payouts, the purchase is NOT held. The site walks the sponsor line upward to the first upline who is activated with payouts on and the buy goes through under them (on-chain sponsorship for that buyer is then theirs, permanently); if nobody in the line is activated it goes under the company catch position (#1). The buyer sees a one-line notice and proceeds; the skipped sponsor gets an email + on-site message saying the sale routed past them and how to switch on payouts to catch the next one; the referral MOVES to whoever got paid (the account's stored sponsor is re-pointed when the position is created on-chain), so the buyer leaves the skipped sponsor's My line for good; the skipped sponsor can never earn from that wallet. Only a transient chain error ('rpc') still pauses a buy ("try again in a minute").
+- (SUPERSEDED, kept for history) SPONSOR NUDGE ON A HELD BUY (2026-09-15): when a referral's purchase is held because the sponsor has not switched on payouts, the sponsor is emailed and gets an on-site message the same minute (once an hour at most) telling them who is waiting and to link a wallet / switch on payouts on the Wallet tab; nothing is charged to the buyer, who can simply try again once the sponsor is ready.
 - DRILL DOWN FROM THE OVERVIEW (2026-09-15): every name chip in 'Your line at a glance' on the Overview is clickable; it jumps to My line with that person's Activity panel already open and the row highlighted.
 - VISIT PACKS ARE PAID UP FRONT (2026-09-15, Michael's question): a verified-visits campaign charges the whole pack when it is created (3 credits per visit, so 1,000 visits = 3,000 credits) and then delivers over time as members complete verified visits (each member can do at most 20 a day, so packs fill gradually: tens per day at today's size). The Campaigns row shows 'paid up front' and 'N of M visits delivered'; the credits are not being consumed again, they were reserved once. Same for featured-day bookings: a featured link is a flat buy (featuredPerDay credits per day, whole run charged when booked), its row shows 'paid up front', the day count and 'runs through <date>', and it ends on its last day ('run ended'). FEATURED CANNOT TAKE ADDED CREDITS (2026-09-16, Hugh and Michael both tried): the row offers 'Extend run' which books more days after the current run (or from today if it ended) and charges them right away; there is no 'Buy more views' on a featured row any more. Visit packs offer 'Buy more visits' (charged now, adds to the pack). Credits added to a campaign are set aside immediately (Available drops at once) and whatever is unspent returns to Available when the campaign ends.
 - CREDIT ACTIVITY LEDGER (2026-09-16): Members > Campaigns has a 'Credit activity' list (last 40 lines, newest first; also linked from the Earn credits pane) showing every real credit movement with a reason: welcome credits, sign-in bonus with streak, daily claim, inbox reads, video watches, verified visits, milestone and leaderboard bonuses, partner codes, admin/team grants, AI Copy Engine charges and refunds, flat buys (featured runs, extensions, visit packs, more visits), login-ad days, and metered delivery rolled up as one line per campaign per day ('Ad views: NAME', 'Inbox deliveries: NAME', 'Video views: NAME'); lines marked '(purchased credits)' spent on-chain purchased credits rather than the earned pool. Reservations (credits set aside for a live campaign) are NOT ledger lines; they show as 'in live campaigns'. Earned credits are spent before purchased ones, so an earn followed by a buy appears as two lines. The ledger starts 2026-09-16; nothing earlier is listed.