Collator Off-boarding FAQ

Disclaimer: Energy Web is not responsible for individual staking decisions, including staking, unstaking, or taking no action, in relation to collator onboarding, offboarding, or growth events.

1. Will delegators receive rewards from a collator they are delegating to, if said collator is deregistered before a growth event?

No. If a collator is deregistered before the growth snapshot, neither the collator nor its delegators will receive rewards for that growth period, even if the collator had already accrued points earlier in the period. Reward eligibility is determined at the growth snapshot, and collators must still be active at that point to be included.

Delegators wishing to maximise rewards should ensure they re-delegate their stake to an active collator prior to a growth snapshot. Alternatively, they can stake through liquid staking and have the pallet manage reallocations automatically (see Q3 below).

2. What happens if I don’t unstake before a collator I’m delegating to is deregistered?

You do not need to take any action. Once the collator is deregistered, all delegations to that collator are automatically unlocked in the accounts of the delegators.

3. What happens to liquid staking when a collator is deregistered?

Any stake delegated by the Liquid Staking pallet to a deregistered collator is automatically reallocated.

During the next restake phase, those tokens are restaked to another collator in the WhitelistedCollators set, specifically the collator with the lowest total stake, ensuring balanced distribution. Liquid staking users do not need to take any action.

4. How will I know if a collator has been deregistered?

Collator status changes are reflected by querying chain-state via Polkadot.JS, listening to on-chain events, and are displayed in collator dashboards on SubScan and various community run sites.

Furthermore, Energy Web aims to communicate any deregistration events in advance to the community so appropriate action can be taken.

5. What if my collator goes offline but is not yet deregistered?

The aim is to have all collators who wish to deregister, deregistered prior to going offline.

An offline collator that remains registered would be eligible for rewards if they are registered and have accrued points at the time of the growth snapshot. Note that inactivity and poor performance would reduce points and therefore rewards.

Delegators who prefer not to wait can re-delegate at any time. If the collator is later deregistered, the process described in above answers applies.

6. Can a deregistered collator rejoin the network later?

Yes. A collator that has been deregistered may reapply and be onboarded again in the future, subject to seat availability and the collator onboarding and governance process. The collator would onboard with a new Collator address. Previous delegations are not automatically restored.