Travel website in trouble with UK regulator
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK, the country’s advertising watchdog, has censured the world’s largest travel website, TripAdvisor, and warned that it must not claim that all of its user-generated reviews are from real travellers. Noting that the website carries statements such as ‘more than 50 million honest travel reviews and opinions from real travellers around the world’ and ‘reviews that you can trust’, the ASA upheld complaints that the company behind TripAdvisor did not verify the reviews to the extent that it could guarantee they were all genuine. In fact the watchdog said that claims that all reviews on the site were from actual travellers were ‘misleading.’
The ASA has directed TripAdvisor ‘not to claim or imply that all the reviews that appeared on the website were from real travellers, or were honest, real or trusted.’
For its part, TripAdvisor said its fraud detection systems were ‘advanced and highly effective’ but that it was ‘not practical’ for them to screen all reviews manually and that there was no practical way for it to verify identities owing to its independence from operators. TripAdvisor said reviewers were asked to sign a declaration that their review was genuine and honest. The ASA concluded that this did not prevent non-genuine reviews from being posted.
A key complaint was made last year by an online reputation management company called KwikChex.com, which said it had spoken to thousands of hotels claiming to be affected by malicious reviews.
The British Hospitality Association responded positively to the ruling, saying that ‘we agree with the [ASA] – the industry has had issues with a number of aspects of TripAdvisor.’ It added: ‘Some hoteliers feel some of the reviews leave something to be desired in terms of accuracy and content, and have found it very hard to find redress.’
See: World Digital Economy – Mass Adoption of E-Commerce and M-Commerce Channels
Tagged in: Regulations & Policies, United Kingdom
