People shared their most disastrous vacation experiences to warn others against the ever-reliable reviews.

In 2020, over two million reviews were rejected or removed from Tripadvisor in 2020 for reasons including fraud, bias, and violation of Community Standards.

Now that vacation-hungry people are trying to book vacations in droves, it’s more important than ever to be able to trust a review amidst the hustle and bustle.

In conjunction with a new app called Triend, which pays users to share unedited videos of locations during their trips to improve trust in reviews, rejected holidaymakers have shared experiences of when they were rejected.

“The hotel looked like an abandoned building” – Zach Blenkinsopp

Scouring reviews to find the perfect hotel, Zach Blenkinsopp, co-owner of Digital Roofing Innovations, thought he had done just that…until he got there.

He explains: “When I arrived at the hotel, there was no sign of opening. The place looked like an abandoned building with broken glass on the ground outside and no lights inside. The hall door had also been kicked in with a crowbar!

“When I went to my room to check if everything was ok, I found that there was no carpet on the floor and my room looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in a very long time.

“There were stains everywhere, including on the sheets and pillowcases. There were also holes in the wall where there should have been pictures hanging.”

Zach had shelled out over £160 for the night.

When he asked for another room, he was told that none were available. Feeling uncomfortable staying in such a filthy place, he asked for a refund, but was told he couldn’t get his money back or exchange hotels.

“I drank the same cocktail all day at a well-known beach bar – but each one tasted completely different” – Ashley Chubin

FlyHi COO Ashley Chubin visited a number of restaurants and bars while vacationing in Cancun after being inspired by their rave reviews on Tripadvisor…

“Most of the places I visited did not meet any of my expectations. I couldn’t be the only person to have a completely different experience visiting these establishments, and that’s when I realized that many of the places I visited had a lot of fake reviews.

“For example, I made a list of beach bars I wanted to visit based on reviews before I left. My first stop was a highly rated beach club that was said to be excellent.

“However, the service and drinks left a lot to be desired. Although the drinks were good, they were very spotty.

“We decided to drink the same Moscow Mule all afternoon, but every time they brought us a drink it tasted completely different.

“The waiter didn’t even clean our table, which was clearly full of crumbs. We had to ask him to do it before he brought our first set of drinks.

Ashley found himself going through a similar experience in many other places he visited.

“The details just didn’t match the number of positive reviews they had,” he continued.

“I never felt like I was outright ripped off or anything, but I felt like I was being lied to about how real these places were.”

His experiences left him “very suspicious when a place doesn’t have a single review below four stars!”

“I wasted an entire day looking for places that didn’t even exist” – Shawn Richards

It was again the result of fake reviews that led Ultimate Kilimanjaro Expedition Coordinator Shawn Richards to spend an entire day of his vacation looking for places that didn’t actually exist.

He explains: “Traveling to Medellin in Colombia, I wasted an entire day looking for recommended places and reviews on Tripadvisor.”

Turns out the review website had done a poor job of updating information about places that closed during the pandemic.

Shawn ended up dealing with disappointment after disappointment as he wandered around town looking for restaurants and cafes that weren’t there anymore.

“I found out pretty quickly that talking with locals and getting recommendations was the best way to go about it, but wasting an entire day left a sour taste in my mouth.”

“The hotel looked so different from the pictures that I thought it was the wrong place” – Mario Cacciottolo

The rave reviews convinced Mario that he had booked the perfect hotel for his vacation, but on arrival he found the accommodation bore so little resemblance to that of the reviews that he was convinced it was not. the right place!

SBO’s PR manager said, “The photos looked good, the reviews looked good, and everything looked positive overall. I immediately booked my room and was excited to enjoy my vacation.”

Rave reviews gushed about the spacious rooms and tidy, well-made beds – he thought he was onto a winner.

However, he found that blankets and pillows had been thrown on the bed, room service had been rushed, and the room was not only cramped, but the smallest he had “ever had.” summer”.

“Reviews and photos indicated there would be plenty of space to store snacks and food in the cupboard – my room didn’t even have enough room for a cupboard to fit snacks and the fridge didn’t work,” he said.

“Reviews also said the views were stunning; they even had pictures to show it off! I don’t know if anything drastically changed before I arrived, but the view wasn’t as nice as I expected.

Luckily Mario was able to cancel after one night and change hotels.

“I jumped on a plane, rented a car and drove for four hours to find the town almost deserted” – Will Hatton

Will Hatton, founder of The Broke Backpacker, was encouraged to visit Ocean Isle after seeing Tripadvisor photos of the place bustling with tourists, with plans to interview them for an article.

Hopping on a flight, renting a car and embarking on a four-hour drive, he arrived to find the city almost deserted due to low season.

Whilst the reviews are not misleading in themselves, they have completely omitted the very important detail that many hotels, restaurants, cafes and bars close during this particular time of year.

This, unfortunately, prevented Will from being able to fill out the reason for the trip and cost him dearly in the process.

“Zante’s most recommended restaurant didn’t know the difference between hummus and tarama” – Kirsty Devine

Visiting Zante’s then highest rated restaurant on Tripadvisor, Kirsty thought she was in for a treat. Reviewers raved about the reasonable prices, amazing food, and friendly staff.

Unfortunately, she was left disappointed.

It was definitely not the fine dining experience she expected: the staff rushed her to finish her meal and make room for new customers, were rude and served hummus instead of tarama.

Kirsty explains, “I actually found myself apologizing for their mistake as the waiter rolled his eyes at me. When the right condiment finally arrived it was thrown on the table in a rude way, tasted very bland and came with cold pitas.

“That was probably the most disappointed we’ve ever been and we’ve been careful with Tripadvisor ever since. I hardly use it now.”

Triend attempts to address some of the issues that may arise based on written reviews.

It encourages users to film themselves sharing their opinions about places around the world or find ones that others have posted – and uses a “help to win” model by paying users for reviews.

The app also uses geolocation technology to check if the location of the review matches the location the user claims to be talking about.

Videotaped reviews put a face to the reviewer’s name, holding them accountable for what they say.

A Tripadvisor spokesperson said: “Tripadvisor takes the issue of fake reviews very seriously and over the past 22 years we have used the best of technology and human moderation practices to identify and remove misleading content from our platform.

“Our recent 2021 Review Transparency Report details Tripadvisor’s approach to ensuring the integrity of its content.

“The report shows that in 2020, we took action against over one million fraudulent reviews submitted on the site, 67.1% of which never even made it to the platform.

“Of those that were posted, 85% community-flagged were assessed by our moderation team within four hours of submission, and 43% of all community-flagged reviews were removed as a result of that assessment. The full report is available here.”

They added that “hundreds of millions of travelers around the world” use and trust Tripadvisor every month.

“That said, our fight against fake reviews never stops, it’s a race to perfection and we’re constantly evolving our tactics to stay one step ahead of scammers,” they continued.

“Our advice to all travelers is simple; if they see a review that they believe is misleading, malicious or violates any of our guidelines, they should report it to us.

“Our team will then investigate and take all necessary steps to protect people who turn to Tripadvisor for advice to help them make decisions about where to go and what to do.”