please leave a review!

A constant chorus in modern life. You need to review the restaurants you eat at, the cabs you take, the plumber you've hired, the delivery driver, the locksmith, etc etc etc

I mostly never do this: I think the worldview where you're constantly evaluating everyone who's doing their job is fundamentally ugly, have no interest in making someone's living harder just because they happened to be on an off day when I needed their services, don't like this whole idea of outsourcing quality control to the client. When using cab or delivery apps I do a default five star for every driver, usually refuse to rate the restaurant.

Otoh I know smaller businesses are kinda reliant on this shit and wonder whether I should be more open to just sprinkling five star reviews around.

How do you feel about this aspect of the everyday?

I will organically leave a five star review every few years when something is totally and unexpectedly great.

I will leave five star reviews when something is good and I am explicitly asked to do so as it is kind of embarrassing to refuse.

I will leave five star Uber ratings by default unless the cab driver is listening to LBC, and then I just won’t do anything.

Despite never leaving negative reviews, these are always the ones I will read first when checking something out.

SV otm.

I have written so many 2, 3 or 4 star reviews in my head, and they have stayed in my head

basically same

I find the constant unsolicited emails from bigger companies about it very irritating, it feels like being asked to do work for free

also the answer to "how did your courier do" is nearly always "it was on my doorstep" or "I don't remember, who gives a shit"

unless the cab driver is listening to LBC, and then I just won’t do anything.

fwiw one time I asked the cabbie to change the station, the apologetic reply was LBC has the best traffic reports (driver wasn't white). no idea if this is true or an excuse.

Yeah I give five stars sometimes when stuff is independent and good, like especially things that take effort to find, tailors or leather luggage strap repair are two such examples. Occasionally give a restaurant five stars if I really like it.

Seldom give bad reviews but I went somewhere a summer or two ago in Madrid and idk what happened but this one person was just insanely rude to me, like just deeply mean and hateful from the beginning, then taking the piss out of me with her colleague in Spanish which I could understand. Felt quite bad as I had only ordered a glass of wine and wasn't sure what I could be doing to incur this. It was a touristy place as well tho maybe that's part of the reason I was the worst human that has ever lived.

I swiftly left but gave a scathing review. The next few days I noticed loads of reviews saying a person's name and how tremendous the service was etc so I guess they got all their friends to do this. This probably sums up how pointless and weird the whole thing is. I also gave a new burger place in Hackney a one recently because they brought our food and said "I need the table in ten minutes" despite us having been there for about ten minutes.

As regards places asking for reviews, I absolutely hate it and think it cheapens them, but maybe they need to do it. Had a really good meal with great service on Saturday in Málaga and they asked for a review at the end and even gave me a little card with a QR code. Just felt they are better than that, but their location isn't amazing and it was quiet, idk.

To an extent, I find that restaurants that have a 4.8 or similarly high are most likely going to be worse or less interesting than lower scores, prob cos they are farming reviews or catering to every tourist trend or whatever all at once.

Some of my favourite places have relatively low marks. There's definitely some kind of essential qualities about whether a restaurant acknowledges online user interaction or doesn't, or responds to it. I think generally the places that have the confidence to ignore it are always going to be better, though fine if they want to share nice photos on Instagram just don't let the hordes dictate what you do.

Taxis 5 stars only, I arrived didn’t I

Never really review anything else. I can barely find the time and energy for posting, why am I logging on to write up my experience at the café

Sometimes I’m trying to use an app and it will interrupt with a popup asking me to rate it, when this happens I give one star for the annoying popup

Oh I used to occasionally do those surveys you get at shops in the hope of winning a £100 voucher, there would always be a question “how likely are you to recommend this Tesco express to friends or family” — I’d obv answer very unlikely & in the comments put “what kind of fucking psycho goes around recommending a Tesco express to ppl lol”, have to imagine this is the only answer they ever get

My bank app does a popup that demands a review and stops you using the app. For my sins, possibly because I work in user experience, every single time I give it one star and then when it prompts a comment say "you doing this is no different to me walking to a cash machine and you employing someone to stop me and ask me questions"

And yeah same on the recommend to friends thing. "Nobody ever does this, people have lives beyond discussing the boring shit your company provides, lose the high opinion of yourselves"

You you used be able to get a good sense about many restaurants from food forums/blogs, which are completely lost to time. Now we get mostly meaningless starred reviews and 30 second social media posts with zero content mostly going to a place because another influencer went there. It's such a bummer to me.

To an extent, I find that restaurants that have a 4.8 or similarly high are most likely going to be worse or less interesting than lower scores, prob cos they are farming reviews or catering to every tourist trend or whatever all at once.

Absolutely. My favourite places here tend to have ~4.5 star reviews. If you’re pleasing absolutely everyone, chances are you’re nothing special.

As much as I understand that, and understand that most reviews are exaggerated, inane, or dubious, I keep putting blind faith in google maps ratings, maybe because it’s just the easiest way to find new places, especially when travelling. I wish businesses were able to opt out of reviews, but I imagine it’s a necessity for most.

I never leave reviews, and I don’t read them when deciding whether or not to make a purchase/eat somewhere because I think the kind of person who makes time for posting customer reviews online (ESPECIALLY low reviews) is an insane crank whose opinions should not be heeded. I mean, that time should obviously be spent shitposting on ILX or Bluesky.

Every time I look at a one star Amazon review of a product it’s either the item arrived broken and therefore unusable, or the person fundamentally misunderstood the thing they’d bought, and I always think, Fine, but how does that help me?

I feel you can apply your filter to the reviews, same as anything else you read? So I do find them p useful. Like idk many reviews are easy to discount or you can tell the person is an idiot.

One thing I never ever do is post photos on reviews, but those too are really useful.

I've found some great places using Google Maps but sometimes more the surprising low key place.

I do recommend typing "sandwich" into maps in a big city tho.

When we were in Lisbon years ago and looking for places to eat, our Airbnb host gave us some good advice. "There are 1,000 restaurants in Lisbon, so if you pick any one with a score above 50, you're going to get a really good meal. And if you avoid 1 - 20, you won't have to queue or book." And he was right. I also tend to read long negative reviews because sometimes they are entertaining and sometimes they are really informative. I usually only leave a negative review if I have complained to the business directly and they have done nothing to try to rectify the issue. I'm far less likely to complain about a place or service that is supremely awful than I am about one that could be amazing if they just fixed this one annoying thing. I don't bother leaving five-star reviews on places that have millions of them, but if they only have a few reviews, I will add mine to boost their visibility.

i do the default 5 stars if i think not doing it would actively make somebody's job/life worse. other than that stop asking me to rate things ffs i hate it

Oh I used to occasionally do those surveys you get at shops in the hope of winning a £100 voucher, there would always be a question “how likely are you to recommend this Tesco express to friends or family” — I’d obv answer very unlikely & in the comments put “what kind of fucking psycho goes around recommending a Tesco express to ppl lol”, have to imagine this is the only answer they ever get

And yeah same on the recommend to friends thing. "Nobody ever does this, people have lives beyond discussing the boring shit your company provides, lose the high opinion of yourselves"

Ok but have you guys been to the Stoke Newington High Street Sainsbury's Local? You simply must!

> how likely are you to recommend this Tesco express to friends or family

i had the same thing asked of me when i last had a blood test. Hammersmith hospital phlebotomy department. it was 3 stars at best.

People asking me to leave a review doesn't bother me. I quite enjoy it. It passes the time. Like others, I usually only give 5-star reviews (occasionally, I've given lower ratings, usually 3- or 4-star, but only to large companies). I would never give a 1-star review. What kind of person ONLY gives 1-star reviews? There are some people who do that.

<i>And yeah same on the recommend to friends thing.</i>

I do some rewarded opinion surveys, just to pass the time really, though it's quite nice to build it up to £100 worth. When asked if I am likely or unlikely to recommend something, I always say VERY UNLIKELY. Asked to expand on that, I simply say (and it's more or less true) that I don't give out recommendations. I also really hate the stupid questions where it asks how 'close' you feel to a company, with a slider to drag from left to right. Ridiculous question with large corporations, potentially less so, I suppose, with small ones, but they are never small ones in these surveys. It's always 'How close do you feel to' Apple/Microsoft/Facebook/Google? What?

Any time I am searching or shopping for anything online I always sort to see the lowest ratings first, because they are inevitably insane and/or hilarious.

"I wanted to try Ralph's Steaks, but when I showed up with my lizard and a rifle and no reservation they wouldn't let me in. Nowhere did it say I couldn't bring my lizard or a gun. This place is supposed to be one of the best steak places in the city, but I'm never going here ever again. Also, I don't eat meat, and the menu at Ralph's Steaks is so limited I don't know what I even would have ordered. If I was going to eat meat, I would just get McDonald's. One star."

It's always 'How close do you feel to' Apple/Microsoft/Facebook/Google? What?

In the 00's you did actually have people identify as "google people" or "apple people" in a way that would now be categorised as parasocial. Long gone, hopefully never coming back.

In the 00's you did actually have people identify as "google people" or "apple people"

I think you still get it, certainly with Apple, and to a lesser extent Google. But yes, it's probably much less prevalent.

Ok but have you guys been to the Stoke Newington High Street Sainsbury's Local? You simply must!

I had a read of the reviews of that. Then I checked those for a number of other Tesco Express and Sainsbury's Local stores in London, and every single one so far has huge numbers of 1-star reviews and people claiming it's the worst one they have been in.

gotta visit them all to check!

Like NV, I fill them out if I get the sense someone’s job depends on it, like when I get a survey after interacting with a customer service person on the phone.

My borough sends out surveys with £10 shopping vouchers for taking part, so I do those.

I leave negative reviews on discogs if someone is a weasely shit and i’ll leave bad facebook/google reviews for local contractors that are lying crooks. Otherwise I don’t bother and I resent the pressure to do any sort of paperwork.

I do leave good reviews for drivers.

I would definitely give ILX five stars though, most of the time

This thread reminds me that I sometimes review incredibly insignificant things, the smaller the better. Like there's a tiny island in the lake in Victoria Park and I wrote a long review of that. You can't even access it which obviously makes it better. Gave it five stars and said it was for proper island fans only.

I thought I couldn't surpass this but then I found there's an absolutely miniscule bridge over a canal near my flat, like about five metres long. Gave that a bad review and said it wasn't as good as it used to be and was too full of clueless newbies.

It's important we Have Our Say.

Do people in the UK get asked to take a survey every time you go to the doctor, or is that just a US thing

I think the only online reviews I've ever done are a handful of 5 star reviews for small-ish ebay sellers who I thought would benefit from my review (this was 10+ years ago) and once I gave a 1 star review to an amazon reseller because it was the only way I found to get my defective product replaced.

This thread reminded me of someone I know who is a parent of somebody who has played on the same baseball team as my son. Once, when looking up on google maps the baseball park where my son going to play was I noticed that the first review for the park was from this guy. I guess I got curious because I checked out what else he had reviewed and he had thousands of google reviews for seemingly every park he ever visited, every restaurant, every store, every shopping mall, hiking trail, etc. They were 95% 5 star reviews, usually just a single sentence like "nice place to watch a ball game" or "good service, good meal". Kind of weird to me, but honestly probably a better use of time than most social media.

Do people in the UK get asked to take a survey every time you go to the doctor, or is that just a US thing

Text message after the session for me. Never fill it out but, again, wonder if I'm fucking the gp over by not doing so.

I leave reviews for Uber/Lyft drivers because my understanding is that it's important to them being able to keep doing it. When I've had the occasional bad drive I don't leave a bad review, I just won't leave one at all. I also leave reviews for Airbnbs, because the hosts won't give you a review unless you give them a review, and it's good to have good reviews from hosts. Also I rely on reviews when I'm choosing Airbnbs, so I think there's value in having them out there. Again generally leave good reviews, but sometimes I'll make a note like, "This was great for my needs, but if you have more than two people it's going to be very small."

Other than those two cases I mostly ignore pleas for reviews.

I once wrote a review for a guest house that got rejected by booking.com. Ironically the owner of the guest house had done nothing but bitch about booking.com from the moment we arrived - quite literally.

5 stars for gig workers if i'm directly prompted to, otherwise i don't rate/review things

I leave bad reviews for bad rideshare drivers. Sorry, if your driving recklessly, scrolling on your phone, or running stop lights and stop signs, you're getting a poor rating with a comment as to exactly why.

you're*

I am not a ride share power user admittedly, but I’ve never had an experience that bad

I have left a singular one-star review for a rideshare driver. This person couldn’t find my house (missed the turn onto my street five times, from both directions) so I had to walk down to the intersection and wave them down. Then they proceeded to miss multiple other turns on the route, including at least one instance where we ended up going the wrong way down a one-way street. By the time we got on the highway to the destination I was thinking “today might be the day.” Why? Why were they so bad at their job? They were watching a sermon on their phone using picture-in-picture, constantly tapping the screen to move the video out of the way of the GPS display. They did this the entire ride. I’m sorry, that is a DQ. Red card. Watch out pedestrians.

low reviews tell me if a white t-shirt is see-through, or if a jumper bobbles the first time you wash it, or if tights fall down, or if they've changed the design/ formula of a mascara, so I'll often read them.

generally if I'm asked to review a grocery delivery driver I will do 5 stars whatever, because that must be a tedious job. but yeah every single service I ever use does not need a review.

Occasionally I’ll experience a service person doing a real bang-up job and they’ll ask me to leave them a positive review on some email/text survey that I should receive shortly. Any time I think “yes, this person is awesome and I will rate them” I never receive a survey.

I give five stars to every gig worker, yeah, unless they’re endangering themselves and others as above.

HR at work has a phone survey after you call them, I do not do it. I know it doesn’t impact the individual CSRs and I was calling biweekly to try to get them to stop fucking up my health insurance so I didn’t really feel like leaving a glowing recommendation.

I get annoyed by basically every call to action - ending videos with a “leave a comment telling me about a time you experienced this” just makes me hide your account/channel, I’m not telling you how I feel about your stupid app, etc..

When I worked for [popular global UK-based high street brand retailer] these surveys were the absolute bane of my life. Our company spent a lot of money on obtaining the resource to solicit feedback and had to justify it, which I get - there is no point in ploughing thousands of pounds into a system to find out what customers think of the product and service only to get very minimal data from it. What this meant was that every transaction had to be completed with a direction to go online and complete the survey rating their "experience."

This is nonsense because buying clothes and shoes is not an "experience" it is just buying clothes and shoes.

So, every branch in the UK was given a target of how many surveys could be completed. It's been a while but from memory I think it was 10% of receipts generated were expected to generate a response. If your branch was consistently under this target then questions were asked and performance plans brought in. You were facing work challenges for not being able to control customer behaviour after they left your shop.

If you go out to a shopping centre, buy five things in five different shops - are you really going to sit down and spend 30 mins logging into web portals to say "the service was fine I guess?" Of course not. You're only going to get the moaners and the complainers, unless your staff are laying it on thick and making it seem like their desperate for these reviews to be completed. Even as someone who has been on the other side of the desk, I rarely bother. It's just too much hassle, and you worry you'll say the wrong thing in your comments that might seem complimentary but actually goes against company policy or whatever. As noted upthread, I'm certainly not going online to say "I would recommend being served by boxedjoy at [their store]" because I'm not recommending staff members in high street shops to pals.

To combat this, I know many branches were simply faking reviews. They would print out a receipt for someone, then re-print the receipt and use the code to go online and say "boxedjoy served me and he was lovely and amazing and he walked across water to pick up the product he sold me, five stars" so stores were meeting the target of responses received but with utterly pointless data and information.

Everyone I've spoken to who is or has worked in retail for different companies will tell you this is not unique to the company I worked for.

The other major problem is that Customer Satisfaction was brought in as a target. And if your store rating was too low you lost out on incentives and bonus payments. So we were in this weird position where as a company, we wanted feedback to tell us what we weren't getting right and how we could fix it, but as stores we only wanted to be told how great we were. Which is nonsense - as a manager I would want to know who on my team was weak and why, and what could be done to fix it. But equally I wouldn't want customers leaving us bad reviews because then we'd all lose out.

Our target was 92% satisfaction. If you have nine people rate you 10/10 and one person rate you 1/10, then your score is 91% and it's goodbye bonus. This is where the unreasonability of customer behaviour could really ruin you. Customers will write things like "I'm only giving 9 instead of 10 because nobody is perfect!" Or you'll have nonsense like (this actually happened) "I was stung by a bee in your store." People would bring in items bought 20 years ago, clearly worn down and used, and we'd be told to give them the refund regardless because it was seen more important to get complimentary feedback than to not give out money from the till or encourage terrible customer behaviour. I honestly thing this emphasis on feedback and comments is a massively underconsidered factor in why the high street is dying - companies are simply too eager to devalue their product because they're afraid someone will go online and gain traction for a Facebook post slagging off the company. You can't reason with unreasonable people, and a lot of businesses would do well to acknowledge that.

Again, speaking to pals in other retail and hospitality roles, this is very common across the sector.

also my Uber rating is 4.91. I'm always outside before the car arrives, I close doors gently and I think I'm generally quite good at detecting if the driver wants to chat or wants to just listen to the radio or continue their hands-free phone conversation. But I consistently drop from 5-star ratings whenever I take a ride with my partner. My partner has mobility issues and uses a walking stick (sometimes two) and takes longer to get in and out of a car than a person without physical restrictions. We're not bad passengers at all I'm sure, but the inconvenience to other people of us daring to go out in public while facing physical restictions means we'll always contend with biases and discriminations.

There's a screenshot I've seen doing the rounds a few times where a man has left a pub a three-star review because his old friend was murdered in it. "He was hacked to death in front of his wife and people. Not really for me. RIP Stevie" what would it take for Terry to go down as low as a one-star review?

^ OMG

I rarely leave reviews. The only occasion I remember it being worthwhile was with an Android app where my review was something along the lines of "I've been using this app for years but <routine X> hasn't been loading properly for weeks -- I look forward to amending this *** rating to ***** if you fix it, cos it's generally very cool" or whatever, and it was fixed promptly.

I guess I do *look* at reviews occasionally. Mostly in the aggregate, vaguely comparing the bell-curves of distributions of ratings for competing products, etc. As noted, there are too many truly batshit reasons for low ratings to take any of it very seriously.

i never do this any more. i don't care if the place / service was amazing or horrible. i skip uber's rating requests. i do rely on others' reviews though and sometimes they can make for good reading.

i cringe when i remember that i thought this was fun 20 years ago. yelp. remember yelpers? i was a failed yelper, if you can imagine that. the only olde internet site that doesn't inspire nostalgia for me, it just conjures the feeling of a hangover.

there's a food truck / burgeoning resto around here that serves trinidadian food, until they could find a permanent locale they were setting up at different farmer's markets. i was really keen to try the food, so i followed them on instagram to know the schedule, the schedule that they were advertising mind you. i went to THREE different farmer's markets on three different weekends, they no-showed to all of them. even this couldn't get me to write a bad review but i did sort of fantasize about it