What is the policy with regard banned members i.e. if they are banned then (other than the orange tag) do they become limited in some respect with regards posting and creating threads. Are there different levels of ban? My curiosity has been peaked after seeing three threads created by a banned member (subsequently addressed by a moderator).
As far as I'm aware, attempting to login when banned just gives a message like "You are no longer a member of this community". It should lock the member out of all functionality, unless they're unbanned.
We have the ability to require moderator approval before someone adds content, though I've not seen that one in use. There is also a way to suspend a member for a number of days.
We also have the ability to flag members as spammers, which removes all their recent content and bans them.
My curiosity has been peaked after seeing three threads created by a banned member
Those threads were created *before* the members in question were banned. Banned members definitely do not have the ability to continue posting or creating threads.