Negative reviews

[Raincliffe1]

We are all acutely aware how important user generated review sites are. I am increasingly finding myself in a dilemma - do I turn a blind eye to people ignoring hotel rules ONLY when it does not impact on the quality of stay of other guests or result in damage to our property. Do I do this in an effort to avoid confrontation and thus the possibility of a damaging negative review?

Some travel review sites give management an opportunity to respond, but the problem here is that when you go chapter and verse into a description of events (offering your side of the story) it starts to look a bit desperate.

The problem we had last weekend was a customer blatantly ignoring the rules and upsetting other guests and now obviously he has posted a negative review as we confronted him about it. I personally think, that if you as a hotelier can provide CCTV evidence or sworn statements from other guests pertaining to the conduct of the offending 'guest' then their reviews should be struck off as it is obvious they are looking for a method of 'getting even' with you just simply because they were 'found out'. Pathetic really.

Katherine

[Martin_Sach_CE_EASCO]

There is not much you can do about negative reviews. You can't prevent them. The best strategy is to try and encourage your happy customers to post positive reviews that outnumber the poor ones.

[joyful]

I have thought about this and in the hopefully unlikely event I get a bad review I will say "Sadly we can't please all the customers all the time". Meantime, hope you get a build up of NICE reviews and then the odd snarky one will just be read as that!

[Ridleyhale]

Take a note from the youngsters and get all of your friends and family to make up brilliant reviews! Under 30s will know how to do this.

[joyful]

Take a note from the youngsters and get all of your friends and family to make up brilliant reviews! Under 30s will know how to do this.
That's terrible advice Ridleyhale - that's just advising cheating. On the whole most trip advisor guests to do get it right about their visits - good or bag - I am sorry to say. It does however keep us on our toes 24/7 which is a bit of a pain - you can't dare have an off day or say anything "casual" as its sure to be reported. You can do a public response on trip advisor which makes you look proactive and if possble sort the problem so it doesn't keep happening. Much as I loathe public review sites I think they are here with us to stay.

[Sue: White Horse Walking Holidays]

I've been using Trip Advisor forums recently and it seems people are suspicious of places that only have positive reviews so I guess an occasional less-than-brilliant one with a good response shouldn't do much damage.

[imported_]

The difficulty with negative reviews online is that if the website organiser thinks, rightly or wrongly, the review should stay even if the hotelier thinks it should be removed then it more often than not stays even if it is untrue or reflects an incorrect opinion.

There is no valid process to get it removed that isnt costly, or time consuming or independently arbitrated. As a consequence there are currently thousands and thousands of reviews on review websites that just should never have been allowed to be published in the first place.

The problem is that Hoteliers can only fight on their own and as such they are at a big disadvantage when they try and get an incorrectly expressed review removed. Furthermore, its not so much the individual review that needs to be removed but its much more about the review process itself that is often handled by Linguists and intellectuals who have never managed a hotel and certainly never cleaned a hotel room in their lives before but seem to be very expert in arbitrating the review language of the customer and often getting the wrong end of the stick, licking their lips whenever a negative review gets published. The truth is people love reading smut, so every time a bad thing gets said about a hotel the web review site ranking goes up on the WWW hierarchy. In most review cases the language used is very different from the hotel reality. Typical responses from owners of website reviews will say "Sorry its only an opinion" however incorrect that opinion might be.In all cases the review website is cashing in on the publicity to the review website at the expense of the negative publicity to the individual hotel.

Its for this reason that its important that Hoteliers now mobilse a new force that has the power to fight back againts these disreputable organisations. In every website there are many many incorrect facts made and thus all review websites are breaking the law. It only takes one untrue fact to force the site to close. The only way to do this is to get hoteliers to join an online movement. We need to act as one force and attack the review website process itself, that is at fault, rather than focusing individual energy on the negative review.

Its time we all clubbed together financially and get these incorrectly published websites to get in line and have a review publishing process that, like traditional forms of Media such as TV and Newspapers, are subject to credible public censure.

[Der Alte Fritz]

Always post a reasoned rebuttal after their complaint on Trip Advisor - stick to the core of the complaint - people often go on and on with a great long list - at the heart there is one issue that really upset them - address that. The objective is to put your side of the story and to appear reasonable, in this way you make the complainer appear the crazed loon they really are!

[imported_]

Has anyone signed up for KwikChex who are leading the class action against TripAdvisor and who offer online reputation protection?

[franksegrave-daly]

Am new to the world of hoteliering and could do with some advice ref. Night Cover requirements at our 28 bedroom 3 star Hotel.

To date a very good live-in member of staff has covered calls from 11pm to 7am but now they are leaving I am not sure what all the options are:

1) Am I obliged to provide 24 hour cover ( legally and ethically)
2) If I can't get another live-in capable of covering what other alternatives are there?
External calls can be diverted to me ( off site 5 mins) but what about calls from rooms or emergency?:confused:

Hope this isn't too wide a topic .........

regards

Frank

[franksegrave-daly]

Am new to the world of hoteliering and could do with some advice ref. Night Cover requirements at our 28 bedroom 3 star Hotel.

To date a very good live-in member of staff has covered calls from 11pm to 7am but now they are leaving I am not sure what all the options are:

1) Am I obliged to provide 24 hour cover ( legally and ethically)
2) If I can't get another live-in capable of covering what other alternatives are there?
External calls can be diverted to me ( off site 5 mins) but what about calls from rooms or emergency?

Hope this isn't too wide a topic .........

regards

Frank

[Der Alte Fritz]

It depends on what you are!
If you are a hotel you are obliged to provide a night porter who must be on site.
A Country House Hotel escapes this requirement.
Guest Accommodation and Guest Houses do not have to have anyone on site either.

So the best answer would be to talk to your local AA/VB inspector to see what they think the requirement is.

As Guest Accommodation with 13 rooms we can get by with having an intercom system fitted in reception which will dial an internal phone or a mobile and can use this to help guests when we are off site. But as a hotel (and 3 star) this option may not be available to you.

[Martin Foston]

"Guest Accommodation and Guest Houses do not have to have anyone on site either."

Our Fire brigade told me we "HAVE" to be on site at night if we have any guests staying (Guest House), to comply with the fire safety regulations. If there is a fire and we are not there we have not complied and the likely hood would be prison if somebody died. You are the fire warden and are responsiable for the H&S of your guests.

[Longinthetooth]

Bad Reviews on Trip. I had a guest come in and wake me up late after a wedding. I was just lucky that all the other guests were deaf or asleep so it was only me he woke and I confronted him politely but with my best school Head voice! He had been a pain since arrival and wrote a snivelling TA review. I merely opened my reply up with "This young couple had been out celebrating all day a wedding and returned late at night as we had expected. However" and every reader since, guests who have come to stay and read my reply (they always do read proprietor replies by the way) ask "were they drunk" and that answered it all perfectly without me having to say much more! Short, polite, clever replies can do the trick I think in righting a wrong and might make potential trouble makers think twice about leaving a spiteful review.

[imported_]

"Guest Accommodation and Guest Houses do not have to have anyone on site either."

Our Fire brigade told me we "HAVE" to be on site at night if we have any guests staying (Guest House), to comply with the fire safety regulations. If there is a fire and we are not there we have not complied and the likely hood would be prison if somebody died. You are the fire warden and are responsiable for the H&S of your guests.

Martin
I am NOT and expert however I spoke to my fire offcier about this too.

This is not correct. There is no legal requirement for 24 hour on-call. However you do need to make a risk assessment to show you have not been negligent.

It is ok not to provide 24 hour-call provided you ask your guests whether they need any assistance in case of emergency when they checkin and register. This is something Visit Britain should tell you when they inspect your hotel and check your registration process.

[BandB]

I agree with short management replies to guests who leave poor incorrect comments on web sites, could do with help how to reply to someone who left a urine soaked bed and filthy toilet (presumably by their children!)

[Longinthetooth]

Trip Advisor: Unfortunately I have noted amongst discussions with my friends in the business and others that there are now guests who realise they can make your life misery and even get a discount or refund by posting an unpleasant review.

This is a form of blackmail. I had a guest no show. Tried to get hold of them. They finally got in touch at 11.30pm by text. I offered another date out of sheer kindness despite being kept up till 11.30pm.... They wanted full refund. I said not under our T&Cs etc., etc.. They started phoning, texting, e mailing. They said they'd put nasty review on. They did. I replied. I contacted Trip Advisor to take it down explaining the circs, they wouldn't remove it.

In the end I refunded the money as I was genuinely frightened that the guests would get their friends and family to join in and write other nasty reviews. Its cases like this that are happening more and more, cases of reviews from perhaps a disgruntled neighbour, relative, who knows, and Trip Advisor chooses not to assist the accommodation provider.

The net effect might be B&Bs closing their doors (one I know has already) as they don't want the stress of it all plus the possibility of more/any spiteful reviews.
Only B&Bs who have had a bad review (even a one off) know the personal pain this inflicts on the owners. Some of us agreed it can take a week to get over one!

Its time Visit Britain pulled its finger out and used its weight to meet with Trip Advisor and try and find a resolution to do something to help genuine cases of accommodation providers being terrorised and being sabotaged by vicious guests, nutters reviews and the such like. There were several on the TV and Radio recently (Jan 2012). Its almost impossible to get them to take a review down.

If B&Bs could choose to come OFF Trip Advisor then it would be fairer. If reviewers had to leave a booking reference number or name it would also give owners the chance to address any genuine problems properly.

Hey ho. Here's hoping.