
My derelict pub still got TripAdvisor reviews - bauc
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-49725337
======
DoubleGlazing
Regarding the chap who had his reviews deleted, I had something very similar
happen to me. I booked and prepaid for a room in a decent hotel. Upon arrival
they asked for a £150 deposit. I offered them my Visa debit card, but they
said they only accepted Mastercard for deposits. This really set my alarm
bells ringing, but it was late and I had tired kids with me so I had go look
for an ATM to get cash to pay the deposit.

The rest of the stay was Okay, just this weird deposit thing that really
jarred me. So I mentioned that in my TripAdvisor review - the review
dissapeared and TripAdvisor wouldn't tell me why. Looking at other review
sites, plenty of other people had the same experience. It would appear that it
was easier for the hotel to get these negative reviews taken off TripAdvisor
than from other sites.

But why anyone takes TripAdvisor seriously after the whole "Shed at Dulwich"
debacle is beyond me.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
>It would appear that it was easier for the hotel to get these negative
reviews taken off TripAdvisor than from other sites.

Did you mention anything about the 150 pounds in your review?

IMHO, "complaining about price" in any arguable fashion seems to be reason
enough to get something removed.

If you would have said "I really disliked their checkin process", the review
would probably stand.

I have done consulting for an extreme micro-manager of a small business who
was on the phone to trip advisor with every single negative review she
received. The only time she was ever able to get a review removed was if it
mentioned her prices in some fashion.

~~~
DoubleGlazing
I posted a paragraph describing the hotel, room and restaurant as being nice
and clean and that the food was good.

THen another paragraph starting with "You should be aware of the strange
deposit requirement.." and then going into the detail of what happened and
ending with me saying that I found the experience soured my opinion of what
was otherwise a good stay.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
>THen another paragraph starting with "You should be aware of the strange
deposit requirement.." and then going into the detail of what happened and
ending with me saying that I found the experience soured my opinion of what
was otherwise a good stay.

Yes so again, in my experience, if the price of the "strange deposit" was
mentioned whatsoever anywhere in the comment, that seems to be all tripadvisor
needs to see to get a review deleted.

~~~
EpicEng
Your statement

>IMHO, "complaining about price" in any arguable fashion seems to be reason
enough to get something removed.

Comes off as a _defense_ of TA here. It seems like you didn't mean it to be,
only a statement of fact, but that's why you got the response you did.

------
Reason077
A less sinister explanation is that the reviewers were actually at another pub
with the same, or similar, name. And they reviewed the wrong one.

This happens all the time on TripAdvisor. I bet there are dozens of “Bridge
Inn”s in the UK.

~~~
Neil44
My friend manages the online presence of a dentists, and nearly all negative
reviews turn out to actually be about another dentist with a similar name
about 60 miles away. So this does happen all the time on TripAdvisor, and they
aren't doing anything about it! TripAdvisor makes zero attempt to verify that
you've even been to the places you're reviewing, when it would be trivial for
them to do so.

~~~
differentView
How do you verify?

~~~
riffraff
a simple "Please confirm this the place where you have been? <pictures>" while
posting would prevent many (most?) errors.

You could use a plethora of other information to show this intelligently and
not bother everyone (e.g. if you have been in the area, if you looked for the
place beforehand etc)

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ribalda
I went to "according to tripadvisor" the best activity in Tenerife, a zoo
called Loro Parque. I described the poor situation of the animals with photos
and my comment got censored by tripadvisior, probably due to the great amount
of money that they get from the park. From that day I stopped using
Tripadvisor after making 100s of reviews.

~~~
acollins1331
All zoos are like that and incredibly sad from the inside even if they look
fine to the guests. The only ones that have a moral leg to stand on are the
rehabilitation ones that use proceeds to help the animals, but it's still a
very wishy washy thing to be running an animal prison for profit.

~~~
nradov
Almost all zoos in the US are non-profit.

~~~
mcv
I wish they did the same for human prisons.

~~~
chaostheory
Only 8.4% of prisons in the US are private and for profit.

~~~
idoubtit
I suspect that figure is wrong, because the Bureau of Justice Statistics does
not publish the rate on _prisons_ but on _prisoners_.

"As of 2016, 8.5% of the prisoners are in private for-profit prisons. Since
2000, the number of people in private prisons has increased 47%, compared to
an overall rise in the prison population of 9%."

Source: [https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-
priso...](https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-
united-states/)

So, if the annual increase rate has not change since 2016, as of 2019 about
9.3% of the prisoners are in for-profit jails. [edit: computed the rate, it is
not "more than 10%"]

------
lhoff
This immediately reminded me of the article on vice in which the author made
his gazebo the best restaurant on Tripadvisor. Both the article and the video
are very entertaining.

[https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/434gqw/i-made-my-shed-
the...](https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/434gqw/i-made-my-shed-the-top-
rated-restaurant-on-tripadvisor)

~~~
grahamel
hn comments on that
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15861136](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15861136)

------
rmsaksida
I stopped using TripAdvisor because I found that it has a very strong tourist
bias. It seems most of the people who post reviews are tourists, and this ends
up being beneficial to places that aren't necessarily the best in their
categories, but offer the most tourist-friendly experiences. When I'm looking
for a restaurant abroad I'm not looking for the places that have English-
speaking service, translated menus, and memorable decoration. I'm looking for
the places that have the most genuine and best tasting food, places that
locals would like to visit. It's hard to find those places on TripAdvisor.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
You are correct about the "bias", but the site name is TripAdvisor, so I
disagree with calling it a bias. You just aren't the target customer.

If you want more sophisticated reviews you can always go with Rick Steves, who
usually does a good job of pointing out what are the most popular restaurants
for tourists and contrasting that with the most popular restaurants for
locals.

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egeozcan
There are also fake reviews purchased by competition to lower the score of
their competitors. I can't trust anything in form of a comment that I see on
the internet anymore (oh the irony).

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Irishsteve
Guessing it’s just users inserting the incorrect venue by mistake.

~~~
ntzm
Aye, there are loads of pubs called Bridge Inn

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herodotus
Here are the Tripadvisor reviews:
[https://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowUserReviews-g776617-d4090866-...](https://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowUserReviews-g776617-d4090866-r228644366-Bridge_inn-
Middleton_in_Teesdale_County_Durham_England.html)

