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For keyholders and witnesses

What happens if I do nothing?

Updated September 2026

After seven days with no answer from you, the request approves itself. It is recorded as if they had no keyholder at all, so the wait that follows is fourteen days rather than the 72 hours an approval from you would start. Nothing about their phone changes during those seven days, and keeping the lock stays available for the whole of them. Not deciding is a decision, and it is the slower version of letting them out.

The rule, exactly

A request that has been open for seven days with no answer from you is approved by the server on its own. No button is pressed, and nobody is asked again.

The outcome is not the same as approving it yourself. An approval you give in person is recorded as your decision and starts a wait of at least 72 hours. A request that ran out of days is recorded as one where the keyholder could not be reached, which is treated as if there had been no keyholder, and the wait that follows is fourteen days. It is a slower exit than the one you could have granted, not a faster one.

Both waits are floors rather than fixed lengths. If the key changed hands recently, or a keyholder stepped away or was removed, the wait cannot end sooner than fourteen days after that moment, and neither route can go below it.

The road out of a term, when you have a keyholder You ask to leave early on the Shield tab. Your keyholder has seven days to decide, and can keep the lock or approve in person by scanning your pass. On an approval a wait of at least 72 hours starts from the moment they say yes. A second arm leaves the same decision: seven days of silence approves the request as if you had no keyholder, and the wait that follows is fourteen days, not 72 hours. Both arms end at the same place, where the server marks the release ready and the phone holds every shield until you take it, for up to seven days. The two sevens are different: seven days to decide, seven days for the release to wait for you. LEAVING EARLY You ask on the Shield tab Maria decides 7 days to decide Keep the lock APPROVED 72 h at least 72 hoursfrom the yes SILENCE, 7 DAYS 14 d fourteen daysnot 72 hours The release is ready the server says so Held 7 days for you every shield stays up Two sevens: 7 days to decide, 7 days to take it.
With a keyholder, an early exit runs: you ask, they have seven days to keep the lock or approve in person, then at least 72 hours count from that approval, then the release waits seven days for you to take it. Seven days of silence approves it instead, and the wait becomes fourteen days.

Why silence resolves rather than blocks

The role exists so that somebody is asked, not so that somebody can quietly avoid answering. A request that stayed open forever because a keyholder stopped reading email would make the arrangement a trap rather than a commitment, and it would make an unreachable keyholder the most powerful position in the system.

So the seven days are a valve, and the fourteen day wait is the cost. Being unsure, being busy, or wanting to talk to them first does not pause the clock, and there is no way to extend it.

If you want time to think without letting the clock run out, keeping the lock is the move. It is not final: they can ask again after 48 hours, and you can consider it again then, with a fresh seven days in front of you.

What the card shows while the clock runs

The pass carries the ask on its face for the whole seven days, with a Decide by date in the facts row, so the deadline is on the card rather than only in an email you may have archived. The code you would need for an in person approval sits under it, valid for the day it names and reissued each day the request stays open.

When the seven days run out, the ask leaves the card. The status word becomes Ending, which means an exit was approved and the wait before protection ends has started. Nothing more is needed from you at that point, and there is nothing on any surface that would let you undo it.

If the seven days already ran out

  1. Open the link anyway

    The page checks the request at the door. A request that has already been decided, including one decided by silence, says so before offering you anything, rather than failing after a Face ID check.

    The exit decision page reading "This is the moment they asked you to be here for," with a Confirm with Face ID button.

    The decision page

  2. Talk to them, because they still can stop it

    The fourteen day wait belongs to them, and only they can call it off. You cannot take back an approval you never gave, and support cannot shorten or extend the wait. The conversation is the only thing left that changes anything.

  3. Decide whether to keep holding the key

    If answering is not something you can do reliably, stepping away is better than holding a key and not answering. It is one confirmed act on your status page, their protection continues, and their early exit wait becomes fourteen days from then on.

What this does not do

Silence does not keep the lock on. It does not pause the term, hold the request open, or send anyone a reminder that fixes it later. It also does not end the arrangement: you are still their keyholder after a request resolves this way, and the next one starts a fresh seven days.

The seven days here are not the seven days elsewhere in Fold'em. This one is the answering window on an exit request. A release that has been granted is held seven days for the person to take, and a card that has ended keeps its final word for seven days before it stops answering. They are three different clocks that happen to be the same length.

Still stuck? Email support@foldem.app and we answer within two working days.