Hotels Complain TripAdvisor Is Against Them
TripAdvisor is something of a phenomenon. It has more than 35 million reviews from all over the world. In just a few short years, it’s become one of the most popular travel websites. No matter where we start looking, it’s the place we all end up checking before we make an official booking.
But it appears that hoteliers are unhappy that customers have the audacity to doubt the grainy photos and self-praise on their own website and want to keep TripAdvisor’s reviews in check. More than 400 businesses have lodged a complaint against them and approached KwikCheck to set up real legal action.
Unfortunately, in the world of the Internet, it’s impossible to tell who’s in the right – how can TripAdvisor check that a customer’s claim is valid, or equally that the hotel condemning the review is telling the truth?
BnB Edition think the hotels are assuming their customers are stupid. When a potential guest reads a review, common sense will let them work out whether negative complaints are realistic or simply personal and malicious. It might be especially bad for business if you’re a very small accommodation provider, but one really awful review isn’t going to sway readers completely when surrounded by positive comments.
Our advice to the hotels our there? Treat your customers well, don’t falsely advertise…. and you might not get any bad reviews to worry about.
Images: Thanks to Anthony Kelly on Flickr.com
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Category: Bed and Breakfast News
I quite agree, I am not a member of Trip Advisor but at the begining of the year someone just posted a nice comment on it, then a month later I had a family staying with me, they were fine at the time but they then left a terible comment on TA saying that I was mad and that there were no toiletries, toilet rolls, heating in the room,dispite the fact the all these things were there and there are 2 radiators in the room this did upset me and I was worried that it might deter people from coming but I how have quite a few good reveiws.
Exactly! We think that the truth will definitely be shown through honest reviews in the end and that one strange set of customers who lied will be easily forgotten. Sometimes when I have stayed somewhere good with an odd sounding review, I like to clarify in my review that I didn’t find any of those problems!
we had a couple that stayed with us last year for three nights. they seemed very nice people, were very pleased with the room at the time of there stay and also commented on the nice food and the friendly service.
Then after looking at there comments on trip advisor they had said the room was damp, there was no bed side lamp, the floor was slippery on the steps too the bathroom and the stairs were very narrow leading to the rooms bearing in mind the building is 200 yrs old. They also commented on the main road which is next too the hotel they said it was like a racetrack 247.
The room they booked was a twin room which has no damp, which does have a bed side lamp, the two wooden steps into the bathroom are painted but certainly not slippery, the stairs are fairly narrow leading to the rooms but like ive said previous the building is 200+ years old, the room is on the backside of the building where the only traffic you hear is from our car park, the main road can be busy throughout the day but quietens down after 6pm. Our website is a true visual description of the hotel.
These non constructive comments can have a massive effect on small buisnesses like myself and should not be published.
I think these people’s attitudes spoils it for everyone – travellers value reviews as, let’s face it, there are some scams out there. But how can we trust reviewers when there are blatant lies? Things like no bedside lamp, when there clearly is one, isn’t even an opinion… just an outright lie!
Have you replied on TripAdvisor? Luckily as the owner/manager you’re now able to express your own opinion and hopefully other guests will take on board both sides of the story.