Review Sites - Commercial blogging becomes an offence

The end, it seems, could be nigh for those cheeky hoteliers, Travel Companies and Online Agents who pretend to be customers on review sites such as TripAdvisor and write themselves glowing reviews.

As of April 6, Brussels will be banning such underhand activities as the EU’s Unfair Commercial Practices Directive comes into force, making commercial blogging, or flogging as it’s known in the online travel industry, an offence.

The new law includes two categories of unfair commercial practise - misleading practices and aggressive practices. Whether a practise is deemed unfair will be judged in light of the effect it has on the average consumer’s consequent decision to purchase.

The law means companies, no matter how big or small (and that includes hoteliers, travel agents, sole traders, and online booking portals), will not be able to post online themselves or pay anyone else to post reviews or blogs about their own companies that are misleading.

The law comes into force at a time when the public are beginning to make their disapproval about flogging heard.

A recent Travel Technology Survey which was commissioned by Phocuswright revealed that for some time now, companies have adopted the practice of 'bigging themselves up' on trip review sites whilst 'dissing' competitors in an attempt to sway the consumers purchasing decision.

In the survey most customers said they would rather make their own minds up than follow the views of people they didn’t know (and therefore, by implication, could not trust).