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What is the point of ANONYMOUS Reviews

I'm sure like the majority of accommodation providers using Booking.Com we take our reviews very seriously, My review score is 9.6 a rating which I have worked extremely hard to achieve, and am proud to have maintained for several years. If someone leaves an anonymous review with negative scoring, how on earth am I supposed to act on it and improve when I don't know who the person is. Personally I feel anonymous reviews are useless and its about time Booking.Com stopped allowing guests to leave anonymous reviews. They are pointless ! Does anyone else agree with me ?


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fluff 5 years ago

See the many threads here!

Yes it is useless from our perspective but also identity protection from BDC's POV.

I must admit that if one is so keen to protect one's identity then don't bother review, simples.

I have noticed that Pulse sometimes gives the game away by stating something about the guest e.g. "young couple from Russia". That can be enough for you to at least check, for your own sanity, if the score or statement has reason. Obviously you shouldn't answer personally (if written comment has been left) but at least you can refer to "things" in a more detached way and give an update/reason/new-implementation/thanks-for-pointing-that-out or WHY.

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Katerinka12 5 years ago

I totally agree with you. And where is the logic when we check name, address, passport copy and even the credit card and someone is then anonymous?

And those reviews are used by destructive people, who just love to bring to someone else pain and hit him behind his back.

Honest people do not hide their names and identity even if they express negative feedback and completely disappointed.

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fluff 4 years ago

Quite so!

Unfortunately we live in the world of the 'Keyboard Warrior' (read as nasty, sad insert your own expletive). People are free to write whatever they like about anyone or anything under anonymity.

If they physically printed the same they would be open to libel claims against them.

We have to treat it like something foul on the street we stepped in, clean it away from you and forget.

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Katerinka12 4 years ago

It's a very good point, fluff. I didn't think about libel claims. As for me, we will not be able to prosecute anyone and even if we will do so, there will be no implementation. As a person will just not come back to the country, not to mention the hassle and money involved.

That's why I am taking protective measures now, that we will not only accept ghosts with no identity, but the guests will be informed and it will be absolutely very clear to them that they are not anonymous for us and their actions are not out of our control.

My reviews are excellent now on Airbnb with 5 stars and long explanations how good I am :) I consulted with Airbnb and they told me about Clean as you go policy. Now I inform all my guests about it and low stars for cleanliness and everything else just stopped. They got that feeling that everything is on the record and that the host will take serious measures against any unfair review.

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Tony Powell 4 years ago

No one likes a bad review but if there is a problem then I would want to know about it and I would the be able to do something to fix the problem if I was given a chance but as you say fluff keyboard warriors hiding behind they right to privacy and that's fine if they would reply to you though the booking.com site and give you feedback to help you improve your service and make it better for visitors in the future. I got a bad review and I have tried on numerous occasions to get a comment on a very low rating on cleanliness, value and location  but I can't get any reply. I have a fair idea of who it is because I had 3 booking and 2 of those gave me 10/10 for everything and left a positive comment but one gave me a very low rating and NO COMMENT which is no use to me and doesn't help anyone. I have respected his right to Privacy but if I every have a need for his talents as a wedding photographer I might be inclined to give him a miss and advice others to do the same or just let karma do it's job in it's own time.

In the mean time maybe booking.com could look into only allowing anonymous comments if they give details of the issues to help the owner to improve or rectify the problems.

 

Tony