Fake Reviews

that's why booking dot com is so helpful - to review you must have stayed there.

I no longer give any credence to tripadvisor or airbnb reviews.

I believe that to review an Airbnb one must have stayed there, though I suppose a host could manipulate the system to plant fake reviews.

the problem I have with Airbnb is their pulling of marginal or negative reviews, or even those with feint praise. I've experienced having reviews pulled.

Ever wonder why they are all 5 stars?

I've always been comfortable with my decisions after reading reviews. I tend to check multiple reviews on multiple sites looking for comments on issues that would be important to me. I think I get fooled more by photos on hotel websites more than anything. Maybe it's wishful thinking on my part, but I always want to believe my room will be as spacious as the photo depicts, and with that incredible view.

I take all reviews with a grain of salt and pretty much discount the best and worst ones. I then look at what a person liked or disliked. If something was disliked I try to determine if it was legitimate or somebody being overly picky. So far we’ve been happy with our choices.

Agree 100% with (both of) Nigel's posts above.

I put a lot more faith in reviews on booking.com, not much on AirBnB (it's very clear that AirBnB "hosts" can remove negative or even mixed reviews). No trust whatsoever for reviews on "tripadvisor" (a magnet for scammers and spammers).

If booking via AirBnB (which I still do sometimes), I always look to find the same place reviewed elsewhere. AirBnB works very hard to make this as difficult as possible (gee, I wonder why they hide the specific location until you have committed to a booking?). It's almost always possible with enough sleuthing (though it can take many hours of virtually "driving around" on Google street view, peeking at address numbers). Most places are listed on several different online systems, it just takes some detective work. Comparing the reviews across platforms can be very interesting. I've come to be very reluctant to book anything on AirBnB without first reading reviews of the place on booking.com and other platforms.

Right. We just stayed in another accommodation - one of quite a number - booked on booking.com, and per usual they sent me a review link after our stay. I've never been offered a bribe or other reward for submitting a review on that site, and would never contribute if offered one.

To be honest, I've seen a number of fake recommendations right here on the RS forum. While they may not always be fakes, I personally view glowing recommendations from first-time, one-time posters to be highly suspect and would never book a guide or accommodation based on any of them. As well, this, copied from one of the comments to the Times article, tends to be a pretty good footprint for a fake as well:

"Years ago, when I was shopping for a flat screen TV, I was surprised by the many identical ad-speak phrases of high praise appearing verbatim in multiple reviews."

Yep, I've a background in advertising/copywriting and have seen those ad-speak phrases too many times. If a bunch of reviews are written in the same 'voice' (people generally have very different 'voices') or use the same ad-speak phrases, they're not to be trusted. There are other indicators as well but no sense giving away ALL of those, eh?

AirBnb "apparent" manipulation of reviews was an issue about 5 years ago.

Yes, they were trying to protect their customers from unscruplious reviewers and it appears they went too far.

Recently the claim at times has gone a bit in the other direction; that is if the review is too glowing the AirBnb staff will do a quick social media check and if there is an apparent relationship between their customer and the reviewer they have been known to pull pull the review.

In other words they have been trying to keep the reviews reliable and honest, but anytime you begin vetting social media you are looking for trouble.

The rule with Airbnb is that both parties get to write a review and after that is done they both get posted; in the even that only one party makes a review it gets posted after 14 days.

On cross platform properties the Airbnb ratings do tend to be 15% higer but some of that may be due to the fact that the owner gets to review you which makes people a little less likely to unfairly trash a place (or to put it nicer; causes people to be a bit more objective ... or could be just fear).

Yup, what Kathy said.

In addition to the obvious, repeated, copy-and-pasted text, don't forget that places tend to use the same photos in their multiple listings. You can often find alternate listings for a place by using a tool to search for the photos they are using.

Here is a tool for that: TinEye Reverse Image Search

David, I've used tineye too as well as google images many, many times for source searches. Interesting what you can find, eh?

I agree with Nigel; I use Booking.com to look at reviews. I will go into TripAdvisor, but that is to look at “traveler photos” which give a more realistic look at what the rooms might be in size and the good/bad qualities.

If it’s a new city for me, I will do some Google map walks to check out the nearby streets.

One year I wanted to rent a small apartment in Frigiliana, Spain for four nights. Some of them only had a few reviews which always makes me hesitate to book them. It was interesting that in reviewing all of the options on the various VRBO type sites, I found that the owners of several of them must have been friends reviewing each others’ because the names of owners would show up on each other’s for a “wonderful place to stay” glowing review.

For restaurants, again, I look at people’s photos on TripAdvisor for at least a visual indication of what to expect. What are the best sites for honest restaurant reviews? It seems like our favorite option of walking around checking out outdoor tables’ plates of food is being less preferable because of needing reservations more often now.

Interesting what you can find, eh?

Indeed. It's amazing how much info is available if you're really willing to poke around long enough.

My most recent discovery: Panoramic 360° aerial drone photos posted on google. Seriously.
Here's an example, take a look!

How in the world would this be useful? I was looking for a place to stay in an old neighborhood near Malta's capital city, Valetta. I found a listing on AirBnB and it looked great (though the neighborhood looks a bit funky in places). I wanted to be sure about its location. "Driving around" in google street view I thought I had the street identified, but I wasn't sure. I eventually came across some aerial photos of the neighborhood (taken by a drone and uploaded to google) which offered an alternate view -- from above, at an altitude of roughly 100 meters - that shows a different perspective, and I was able to spot some key details (in this case, a rooftop terrace). Using those clues, I was able to pinpoint the location, and then was able to find a listing for the same place on booking.com (I noted that the reviews on booking.com did have some negative reviews pointing to occasional "industrial noise" from a nearby shipyard; there was no mention whatsoever about that on the AirBnB listing for the same place). I weighed the potential impact of that noise, and went ahead with the booking. I was also able to confirm the gushing reviews (which I found on both sites) about the views from that rooftop terrace (I am hoping to surprise my wife, I've only told her "Honey, I booked a place with a view.")

Yes, with some extra sleuthing, you can find out a lot about places (including things that may be intentionally hidden on some sites). A good use of technology.

I will go into TripAdvisor, but that is to look at “traveler photos”
which give a more realistic look at what the rooms might be in size
and the good/bad qualities.

Yup, Jean, candid photos are what I primarily use TA for too.

I always look at multiple sights and read the one star reviews. Many of the negative reviews are from people that want high-end service for a low price. A review I read for Motel One in Munich was dinged because the employees wouldn't take the family's luggage up to their room. You're paying 99euros and you want a bellhop? Or the Adina Aparthotel Berlin review that talked about how unsafe the surrounding area was and how they thought they would be robbed. Like what?

Everything is a gamble but we have it better than the people before. When I was a kid, you never knew quite how good/bad the hotel would be. Even the international chains could be hit or miss. However, I think people are more entitled today and like the airlines, think that they should have champagne accommodations at wine box prices.

We have a listing on Trip Advisor/Viator as well as on Google. If someone posts on TA and it is in the wrong place, we can get it removed. On Google? Forget it. We have a bad review that was written when we were not even allowed to be touring, during the Covid shut down. Says our tour in German left a lot to be desired. We don't have tours in German. Do you think we can get Google to remove it?
That said, we have 1004 reviews on TA/Viator, with a very few that are bad, but none of them are fake.
Restaurants seem to be the ones that get the fake reviews, overwhelmingly, though hotels suffer from this too. All in all, though fake reviews exist and they are a problem, most places do not have them.

There is a new business out there that may contact you if you write a scathing review. This is some sort of legal law firm that wants to see your receipts to prove you were actually there on the day you said you were. They are charging businesses around 120€ per bad review, to get them removed. I had read about this but didn't think much about it until we were contacted personally. (no, we did not pay to have our bad reviews deleted)
If you cannot prove you went to that hotel, or restaurant, etc. they are threatening to sue TA/Viator/Google/Yelp to get that bad review removed.

Of course there are both fake and honest reviews out there. Sadly, it's the fake reviewers that give the rest of us a bad name. I'm an avid Yelper and also write Google reviews. I try to provide helpful info and pictures whenever I can. I reviewed all the hotels we stayed in during my Loire Valley to South of France Tour last fall, but I didn't mention that I was on a Rick Steves tour, just that I was with a tour group. I also reviewed some restaurants I went to during the tour.

Very interesting real-life perspective from the business side, Ms. Jo.

I agree, Kathy. I always take reviews, whether really good or really bad, with a grain of salt if they are by a first-time reviewer or someone who is new to the site (whichever site) and has only a couple of reviews posted. It's also usually easy to tell when a negative reviewer has an axe to grind.

I do key-word searches for my personal deal breakers. I look at both official and traveller photos. I read reviews at more than one site, if possible.

I've actually had good luck using Trip Advisor reviews, and I have posted quite a few reviews there, myself. My reviews are never influenced by fear of how I'll be reviewed, either, whether on Air B&B or VRBO. That said, I've had many excellent experiences, and so I've posted a number of glowing reviews, but I feel they're deserved. Mind you, I don't get upset by silly things, like the "king" bed consisting of two twin mattresses, having on-demand water-heaters that need to be switched on, washer/dryer combinations that just spin-dry the clothes, and the like. I know these are common in other countries, and I appreciate the differences. I've adopted a couple of technologies (e.g. on demand water heater, induction stove) for my own home. Sometimes I just laugh and shake my head at the things people complain about.

As someone else mentioned, for rentals, I usually "walk" around the area using Google Street View, and I'm usually successful at finding the exact place, too.

In the 20+ years I've been doing vacation rentals, in addition to hotel stays, I can honestly say that I've never had a really, really bad stay, so my strategies seem to be working for me.

It is not only fake reviews, but you are getting a rating from a person you know nothing about, their preferences, standards, and motives. I often will look at reviews AFTER I stay at a place. It is downright comical the things people say, or you are left wondering why someone with obviously 5 star tastes...insisted on going to a known 2 star place. Peoples views on what is good or bad is just all over the map, and expectations vary wildly.

The best one that comes to mind, is that I had researched a little restaurant in the Duoro valley, sort of a local hole in the wall, known for a particular dish. It was very good, but afterwards I was looking at 1 star reviews and a lady complained that the pasta in the dish was mushy and tasted "off". I so badly wanted a response button so I could inform her it was not pasta, but tripe, and as tripe dishes go, it was excellent.

Mardee, first, thanks for the gift of the article. Honestly, you are motivating me to just get the dang subscription to the NYT, lol.

@Paul....that made me laugh! Yikes.

I tend to use TA reviews as I am on that site even more than I'm on this one. I am most familiar with the lodging and dining options in Yellowstone and am saddened sometimes that people seem to have done no research and have no idea what to expect from lodging in a National Park. Soiled sheets, dirty shower, room that is not cleaned? Legit complaints and I'd have been to the front desk in a nanosecond to get it remedied. No WIFI, cell service, TV, odd restaurant hours? Do your research before you complain!

For other places, I tend to ignore one-time posters with either a negative or positive review. Yep, everyone has to start somewhere but if you don't add some more reviews after the 1st one it makes me very suspicious.

Recently someone posted a thread with a link to "BedBug Reports. As it happened, I'd stayed at 3 of the hotels in various cities with no issues. The complaints were linked to TA reviews but honestly on one of the hotels I could not even find the bedbug complaints and others were years and years old. BUT if I hadn't followed thru to see where/when the reports were from I'd just have marked those hotels as "off the list".

Thanks for starting the discussion, Mardee!

Mardee, first, thanks for the gift of the article. Honestly, you are motivating me to just get the dang subscription to the NYT, lol.

Pam, I’m sure that’s the intention of the NYT. 😊 I do love their articles, though and thought this one was particularly interesting. Glad you liked it!

Paul - that made me laugh! I wonder what she would have said had she known it was tripe? Not everyone’s preferred food option.

I’m one that does TA reviews to try and bring the legit content up. Most of our visits either booked through the hotel website or a tour, so I don’t think I can use Booking.com. I use TA’s forum poster photos and frequently am impressed at the difference between the hotel’s photos and poster’s. I tend to skip reviews that are submitted by someone with just a few posts. I do wish TA would allow a reviewer to back and submit a new review if significant time has elapsed or there are other changes. There was a restaurant in Paris that we really enjoyed on our first visit, but had declined on our next two visits. I would hate for someone to pick it on my review. Maybe there’s a button where I can delete it?

Patty -- TripAdvisor does allow reviews to be submitted for a new recent experience at a restaurant, hotel, & ect., that you have already visited and written a previous review --
==>"To ensure enough time between visits, additional reviews of new experiences will be accepted after three months for an accommodation, attraction or tour, and after one month for restaurants/eateries. An exception is for airline reviews, where there is no limit on how many reviews that can be submitted within a given time frame."<==
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Trust-lvBd3L1aU38Y-Review_posting_guidelines.html

I'm going to agree with Allan and that I've always been pleased with my decisions after reading reviews as well. I tend to read things with a skeptical eye and believe that I can sus out reality reading all levels of reviews back for months. I don't rely on a single review, I'm looking for patterns of complaints or praise over multiple reviews and if they're based in reality or reasonable expectations.

What I'm entertained by though are the reviews from those that expected champagne and caviar service at beer prices. Or write savage reviews about the architecture or structure of a hotel bult into a historic structure. I mean of course there's a slight tilt, it's a surviving 14th century structure. What did they expect?

One thing I like to do when hotel hunting is go to photo sections on Google, or Tripadvisor or wherever, then only show photos added by visitors. Then sort by most recent. They will often provide a much more realistic impression of the state of the property without the filters and professional staging.

This may be one of my favourite reviews ever on Trip Advisor. There's a lot of scary reviews and yet it has a 4-star rating on TA. If you read until the end, you'll at least know you're in for good pizza across the street.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g32655-d508182-r35669789-The_Hotel_Hollywood-Los_Angeles_California.html

My favorite reviews are for Schrute Farm.
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g52842-d730099-Reviews-Schrute_Farms-Honesdale_Pocono_Mountains_Region_Pennsylvania.html

Hahaha, Aimee. You forgot "The Rangers didn't put out the bears for us to see".

Laughing at the others as well.

Remember all the fake reviews for the Pizza Express in Woking that Prince Andrew used for an Alibi?

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10362565/pizza-express-woking-flooded-fake-reviews-prince-andrew/

The Shed is mentioned in the article Mardee linked and I remember reading the reviews when it was first revealed to be a fake.

"Mr. Butler, the London writer, said his experience writing false posts made him “obsessed” with Tripadvisor’s review system and the power it seemed to hold over the public and restaurant owners.
Mr. Butler took his deceit to new heights in 2017, when he made up a restaurant and began writing fake reviews about it. He called it the Shed at Dulwich, a name inspired by the run-down backyard behind an apartment he rented for £800 a month.
He described it as a unique dining experience that was open by appointment only and served entrees named after moods like “empathetic,” “lust” and “contemplation.” He and his friends wrote enough five-star reviews that after a few months, the Shed rose to become the top rated restaurant in London on Tripadvisor.
Mr. Butler opened the restaurant for one night, never charging the guests for packaged lasagnas and macaroni and cheese he and his friends served them."

I have never bothered looking at reviews.
I am not a needy/fussy person so I am not concerned if the hotel/bnb/cabin/campsite isn't that great. I have yet to find a real shocker (by my standards).
Location and cost are always the factor.

Any place the reviews are all stars and also only 1 Star: Nothing in the middle with a thought of explanation. No one has even been there. Its just bots fighting eachother.... :)

Actually, booking.com removed a review of mine! The hotel had no record of my reservation, but the desk clerk at the hotel found me a better room for less money! I did mention that in my review.

And on this forum - I have started to believe that most of the "Gaetano" reviews are either fake and/or submitted by the business.

With the rapid acceleration of AI we won't know what's real and what is not. I was watching The Today Show (or whatever) this morning while on the treadmill, and AI has the ability to show people having fake sex and just about anything else you can think of. It can be a form of revenge or humiliation and nobody knows what to do about it.

Anyway, I read reviews and it has made a significant difference on occasion.

I have learned that when picking a hotel to study many reviews if there are many below 3 star.

I remember finding a hotel near the airport in Miami. It offered free parking if you stayed one night. We were taking a transatlantic cruise and leaving our car there, to return in 5 weeks. The hotel rates were low, location was great and with free parking it was super.

However, there were many one and two star reviews. I read many of the reviews and realized that the vast majority of poor reviews were not as recent as the newer reviews. From the hotel website and reviews it was evident that the hotel had started a massive renovation of its rooms some months ago and that people that gave good reviews had stayed in renovated rooms.

We booked the hotel and had a newly renovated room that was great. The hotel restaurant was super and our car was undamaged and still there after five weeks.

I find glowing reviews very hard to decipher so I ignore the 3-5 star. I also believe people overrate places because of vacation euphoria, especially when they talk about the owners, staff, etc. I figure if that turns out to be true, its all a plus.

I usually only read negative reviews because what vendor would encourage a negative review. For hotels I carefully read through them and look for common complaints such as AC didn't work, bathrooms were not clean, noise. I don't care about decor complaints, breakfast complaints or other things that are on my list of low level concerns. I look at dates and I am only interested in the past 12 months. I especially do this on Booking.com where I trust the reviews even more.

I'm another person who limits review checking to the past 12 months. Anything older, good or bad, is irrelevant for me. My initial search is always on Booking.com.

I'm also one who looks closely at photos for features that are not always possible to filter for. I may stray over to other platforms to do this, including a simple Google Search because sometimes apartment owners have their own websites for their rentals.

Not being a foodie, I rarely plan ahead to eat at any particular place or pay much attention to restaurant recommendations or reviews. There have been too many times when recommended or well reviewed restaurants have been a big disappointment. I prefer to look at menus on the street and the demographics of the people already eating there. A good mixture of singles, couples and families are positives. Dogs with any of them and I'm sold.

Having said that, after seeing the Tucci series, I'd go back to Milan just to eat at Osterio del Treno: https://www.osteriadeltreno.it/

I too look.at.recent reviews.and probably dismiss.some.as.petty. the WiFi was slow, the ice machine was only on the first floor, the coffee was luke warm. If several reviews claim.the rooms.were dirty, smelled.of smoke or mildew then I pay attention. We do post reviews with what we hope are informative good or bad. I do remember a recent review we gave of a chain hotel that was long, detailed and I must admit scathing. We also sent our report to their corporate office it was that bad. But all in all take reviews as someone opinion and observation.

When you read a lot of reviews the fake ones are easy to spot. The fake reviewer usually only has the one review, so you just skip that one, focus on the reviewers who have 5+ reviews. Read the most recent ones, use your common sense on who is being picky and who has a legitimate complaint that would be relevant to you. I really do not care if they do not provide baby cots. If I don't have a car having a restaurant on site might be important. I hate paying for parking and love a free breakfast, for others that might not be a big deal.

Recently this has gone the other way too, social media may present a bad filmed interaction and then the trolls will go onto that businesses yelp, trip advisor or other public websites listing their business and bombard the website with negative reviews resulting in a 1 star.

I have to just have to add another post on this subject. When checking on a review.of.a.hotel.in Edinburgh most.of.them.were very good.but someone just had to.post a.negative one. Why you ask? They were there December and there were no Christmas decorations so although they gave mostly good.comments they had to.add this and drop.down the review to.three stars. sometimes.you think you have seen or read something and this comes up!!!!

We don't follow restaurant reviews at all anymore, even those given in printed guides. I can't recall a single case, where by we read about a greatly reviewed place, then intentionally went, because of the review, and the review matched the experience. At least, lets say, as being any better than a completely non-tour guide, recommended restaurant. Chefs come and go. Our rule is find A family run restaurant, two streets over from the main drag. Where the locals eat. Hotels are all about location, location, location, and the logistics of your itinerary. If it has a private bath, and breakfast service, we're good. Its just a place for your stuff and a bed to crash on. Cheaper the better. It's amusing to read reviews of one and two star hotels. TV didn't work, no AC, WiFi was spotty, hot water ran out at 11 AM, the breakfast coffee was weak, ...... You've traveled 1/4 of the way around the world, Who spends any time at the hotel? :)

You have to read Airbnb reviews very carefully, like you're parsing poetry.

Reviewers of Airbnb's tend to be careful in their criticisms because future potential hosts can scan a potential guest's past reviews to see if they are picky, or critical, or give low stars. And then they can decide to not let them stay.

So people reviewing Airbnb's tend to be less critical than the otherwise would be, and often you see criticism sandwiched in praise or otherwise coded.

On Booking.com on the other hand, unsatisfied reviewers really give the places they weren't thrilled with both barrels. When I read booking.com reviews I try not to get spooked if all looks good except for a small minority who apparently barely survived the room.

a minority who apparently barely survived the room.

Heh, heh, heh. Accurate, and it gave me a good laugh.