Hotel Reviews

roddydogs

When booking a holiday now, obviously the thing to do is to check out the Hotel via the internet-good idea, but how can you judge when 1 person gives 1/10, and another 10/10 surely some of these reviews are written by someone who either wants to boost the hotel, or slag it off in some way?

Pollycat

I don't think the difference in reviews is necessarily because someone wants to boost or slag off a particular hotel.

The problem with reviews is that they are SUBJECTIVE rather than OBJECTIVE, and as such are based on an individual's expectations and experiences.

For example, some people pay 'peanuts' for Goa accommodation but still expect 5 star luxury standards, whereas we work on the expectation that the room will be clean - and kept clean.

I read one review of the hotel we stayed in in Goa with a 2/10 marking and reading through it, the reviewer only said that the hotel was basic but clean. The poor marking actually came from his dislike of the resort - which of course had nothing to do with the hotel.

I'd say that all you can do is read as many reviews you can and take note of what they're saying:
for example, did someone mark it low because it was too noisy at 11pm? If you're going to be out clubbing until 4am, this won't bother you.
etc etc

Swan_2

I agree with you it is tricky knowing which ones are real

I posted a genuine 3/10 review for a place (many other guests were complaining about the same problems) & it was immediately followed by a succession of gushing 10/10's all in suspiciously similar style :rolleyes:

Pollycat makes good points about expectations & also about what people are actually marking in their reviews, as she says it does pay to read them & not just look at the scoring

I saw one where a hotel with generally very good reviews was marked down because of flight delays

duchy

I use tripadvisor a LOT -for example I've booked 5 different hotels this week so have needed to check reviews. It IS subjective and you have to read between the lines. Some people do have huge expectations for very little money or mark hotels down for things like -the hotel didn't have a fridge and microwave-something I for one certainly don't expect to find in a hotel room.
If a hotel has a pile of good reviews and a couple of bad ones that are totally at odds with the others I generally ignore the bad unless all the bad ones were very recent and the good ones from longer ago.
Las Vegas reviews are the worst-if people have won they love everything about Vegas including the hotel-if they lost bigtime they hate everything !!

aurora_borealis_2

One man's meat ....

It depends what your own standards are. One person might consider a hotel room to be palatial, whike someone else wil be disppointed.

I don't trust them anymore after booking a hotel in Venice with rave reviews and at the top of the favourites. A hidden gem! ... To me it was mediocre at best.

Sam_Bee

Some hotels hire people purely to influence Trip Advisor, and to respond to each notification. It has such an important baring these days on a hotels success.

I can show you a number of major hatchet jobs on amazing hotels as Trip Advisor will not remove even very obvious examples.

And also it's no longer impartial to my eyes (since being taken over by expedia). If you need an example try praising a Tour Operator that is not expedia and see how long your review lasts. Then try the same with expedia That to me is not impartial!

hollydays

i use tripadviser a lot too.I tend to choose places that have a 4 and a half rating,and lots of reviews.I checkout that several good reviews are from people who have made lots of other reviews on other hotels,.and plenty of comments on the forum.It has also been good for me for tips from hotel reviewers on good restaurants nearby,the rooms/floors to avoid in big hotels, noisy locations or what extras to take.I am pretty thorough and will read through all. comments.Americans always complain about rooms being to small in europe,and lack of a massive power shower.I would also search the forum for comments about the hotel.
I had one occasion where the glowing reviews which made it number 2 favourite was suspect.The accomodation was pleasant enough but not as outstanding as all the reviews seemed to say.(most of these reviews were from people who had not contributed to the forum)

whu

I agree that it is subjective and that you really need to look behind the comments made on some review sites for the things that matter to you most eg size of room/noise etc - i dont think anywhere will be 100% unless you pay a fortune but as long as you get what you were expecting taking into account price/destination etc i think that is the best you can get - i tend to look at tripadvisor as a starting point and as long as a place meets my personal set of criteria i go with it

hollydays

aurora_borealis wrote: »

One man's meat ....

It depends what your own standards are. One person might consider a hotel room to be palatial, whike someone else wil be disppointed.

I don't trust them anymore after booking a hotel in Venice with rave reviews and at the top of the favourites. A hidden gem! ... To me it was mediocre at best.

I would think finding a hidden gem in Venice would be well nigh impossible.

notakid

I've never been let down by tripadvisor (yet) even the moany reviews have a point and in each of the hotels I've stayed at I can see the good and bad things that people have pointed out. It has helped me be prepared and not be ripped off paying silly money.

We are staying at a BB for a couple of days in Italy before travelling to Lake Como which was top of the list on TA, it will be interesting if its as good as they say! Its come to a point that I won't book accom if i can't find it listed on TA, that site has held my hand in finding good accommodation for 4 years now.
I always post reviews back as well to help others make their mind up and stay and point out good places to eat near by and directions from the airport.

The only time I've felt it could have let me down was when I was booking Blackpool a lot of the B&B had rave reviews in a similar style:rolleyes: and from peoples profile they only holidayed in Blackpool!

I'm sure it will become more corrupted as the sites power grows. People are always trying to bend the rules and get one over others.

luci

I am a moderator on www.holidaytruths.co.uk and we have a review site www.holiday-truth.com All of our reviews are independent and every one is read by Admin. We don't accept reviews that have an IP address of the same country the hotel is in.

Reviews that are suspected to be posted by someone with a vested interest are removed.

The site is 100% independent and, unlike some sites, all reviews good or bad are published, apart from the suspect ones of course.

Occasionally people will forget to mark the hotel by star rating leaving it at the default 1 star, but you can usually see that this is a mistake if the text of the review is praising the hotel.

What you need to look for is the age and size of the group - a middle-aged couple will have different expectations from a group of young people. Also check the time of year the review was made. We have been to a hotel in the Costa del Sol several times in December or January and loved it, but reading the reviews, I would hate it in high season.

I also check reviews on Trip Advisor, but they are a commercial operation and affliated with Expedia so I bear this in mind.