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A couple of times, I've had askers comment on my answer saying that it was right, but they don't take the extra step to mark the question as answered. I'd like to have something in the FAQ I can point them to.

The text might be:

When someone answers your question with a correct and/or useful answer, your next step should be to accept the answer that helped you the most, by clicking on the checkmark to the left of the answer.

This is important for several reasons:

  1. It lets other users know that the question has been answered.

  2. It moves the accepted answer to the top of the list of answers, so that when a user finds the question in a search, they can find the answer quickly.

  3. Finally, it gives the user who answered the question additional reputation points. This rewards the user who answered the question, allowing them to gain additional privileges on the site.

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2 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

You can always point people towards How does accepting an answer work?... It has a nice authoritative tag, and a score of 410.

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Its already in the meta-faq (referenced in the SO faq). You can point users there if you like, but I think the fact that it is not already a frequently asked question should be indication enough that it's not a question new users ask, either because they don't care, or because its obvious to them.

The FAQ already goes into depth about reputation, so if they read that, they know you gain rep if they accept your answer. If they don't understand how reputation works then they probably didn't read the FAQ in the first place.

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