Our Honesty Policy

Introduction

The integrity of our content is our utmost concern. We want visitors across the South Downs Way to have impartial, correct information so they can make informed decisions about their trip. To that end, our Honesty Policy governs all the content across our site (including information provided by our Local Business Partners).

This article outlines the high standards that all information must reach to remain on our site. If you think a page contains inappropriate, misleading or incorrect information you can report it for us to review.

Reporting Breaches

We ask that community members and visitors always report pages they think are misleading, inaccurate or that they suspect are being manipulated. You can do so by getting in touch with us.

It's important to hear both sides of a story. If a page for a business you own has been reported we'll investigate. If we think something is wrong, we'll try to get in touch with you before we take any action but this may not always be possible.

False or Misleading Information

Content on the site must be, at the time of upload, accurate. Content should provide a fair and even-handed view. Never skew or fudge the information to be more favorable. For example, when advertising restaurant awards the award must be officially recognized and actually won.

Attempts to obfuscate the truth by not including relevant information is recognized as a deliberate attempt to mislead visitors. For example, when advertising accommodation room prices listing a cheap room that visitors cannot typically book in order to make the venue seem cheaper is a misleading act. Purposefully not including the maximum room prices may also be a misleading act. Misleading information can be highly contextual and left to the judgment of individual moderators.

Targeting Rival Businesses

Businesses should never attempt to upload content related to rival businesses. For example, two hotels in near proximity would be considered competing businesses and should not try to upload information about one another.

Failing to Update Information

When businesses make changes they should aim to update their listing in a timely manner. We understand this may not always be possible and that you may simply forget. However, in some cases it may be judged that businesses are purposefully failing to update information in an attempt to mislead/hide things from our visitors. For example, increasing menu prices and keeping the lower prices on the listing.

Failure to update is highly contextual and left to the judgment of individual moderators.

Review Manipulation

We never give anyone the ability to alter the star count of a review or the message other than the reviewer themself. We may sometimes adjust reviews by starring out inappropriate language. Our moderation team may sometimes delete reviews that breach our Community Guidelines but we never delete reviews for businesses simply on the basis that they are negative.

Every attempt is made to ensure reviews are coming from real people and we regularly improve our spam and fraud detection services. Leaving inflammatory or fake reviews on a business breaches our guidelines and will be subject to removal. Users should also only ever leave one review for an establishment (amendments can be made later by contacting us). Businesses should never leave reviews for their competitors.

Businesses may respond to reviews and are encouraged to try and reach out to unhappy customers to resolve the issue. We never give out the contact information of reviewers. We allow users who leave a review to contact us directly if they want to make an amendment. Harassing reviewers to alter their reviews is a major breach of our Honesty Policy.

Editor's Reviews

Our editorial team will often leave reviews on listings, indicated by a label next to them. These are shown to you first for two reasons:

  • We hold our editorial team to a high standard and our in-house reviews are generally more informative, balanced, and of a greater standard than user-submitted reviews.
  • We know that reviews from our Editors are always written by people who've visited the establishment. Reducing review fraud is one of our main goals and we always know that our Editor's Reviews are verified.

We never take money to alter reviews, including Editor's Reviews. Businesses may pay for us to write a review but they can never pay for a positive review. Editors are free to express their true and honest opinion on an establishment, positive or negative. Our Editorial team is made up of keen visitors with a deep knowledge of the South Downs Way.