A new deleted/hidden reviews record

[Brian - TGL]

I have seen another day of reviews being deleted/hidden as reported by Local Viking all within about the last 30 minutes, but instead of being single reviews many are multiple reviews, with the highest being 76 deleted reviews for a restaurant location . . . all over the last 4 years, and a mix of mostly 5 star but also 1, 2, 3 and 4 star reviews.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Dang. How many locations are you seeing this on?

 

[Brian - TGL]

Dang. How many locations are you seeing this on?

I had some deleted Sunday also, but with multiple removals I have 7 locations, two locations with multiple removals on each day. The restaurant has about 1,000 reviews and most of them were previous to the last 6 months so it won't have much of an affect for the location, but a couple of the locations had ~50 reviews and lost 5 or 6. Coincidentally 10% of the reviews in most cases.

 

[keyserholiday]

I have seen another day of reviews being deleted/hidden as reported by Local Viking all within about the last 30 minutes, but instead of being single reviews many are multiple reviews, with the highest being 76 deleted reviews for a restaurant location . . . all over the last 4 years, and a mix of mostly 5 star but also 1, 2, 3 and 4 star reviews.

Are the reviews deleted or is this the API not fetching the data?

 

[Brian - TGL]

I am looking at a location that in the LV interface shows 27 live reviews and 7 deleted (34 total):

The actual GBP on maps shows there are 34 reviews:

When I count the visible reviews on the GBP there are 27 and the names in the deleted list are not included in the 27 visible reviews.

 

[keyserholiday]

It does take Google a while to reflect the updated count when reviews get removed.

 

[fisicx]

Is it possible that 'Connie S' has been flagged elsewhere for fake or iffy reviews and this has cascaded across multiple profiles? Or perhaps some filter is flagging short unauthentic sounding reviews (this one doesn't look very real)?

I know someone local here in the UK was getting all sorts of reviews from people in weird locations - none of whom had ever been near his business.

 

[keyserholiday]

I had some deleted Sunday also, but with multiple removals I have 7 locations, two locations with multiple removals on each day. The restaurant has about 1,000 reviews and most of them were previous to the last 6 months so it won't have much of an affect for the location, but a couple of the locations had ~50 reviews and lost 5 or 6. Coincidentally 10% of the reviews in most cases.

Are they all in the restaurant space or in other categories?

 

[Brian - TGL]

Are they all in the restaurant space or in other categories?

Primary categories are restaurant, equipment rental, electrician, diesel fuel supplier, wedding photographer, bathroom remodeler, barber, mechanic, house painter, auto detailing, locksmith &. accountant.

 

[Brian - TGL]

Is it possible that 'Connie S' has been flagged elsewhere for fake or iffy reviews and this has cascaded across multiple profiles? Or perhaps some filter is flagging short unauthentic sounding reviews (this one doesn't look very real)?

I know someone local here in the UK was getting all sorts of reviews from people in weird locations - none of whom had ever been near his business.

There are varying degrees of effort in the removed reviews, some were replied to by the location owner, some were not:

LV doesn't auto create a link to the Local Guide profile so I have no way to see what area they have left other reviews (I did submit that as a feature request though, it would be handy).

 

[rustybrick]

Is this widespread?

 

[keyserholiday]

Is this widespread?

So far this is the only mention. I am asking to see if others are seeing the same thing.

 

[keyserholiday]

@rustybrick Joy has chimed in to state she has seen a dozen posts on the help forum.

 

[rgblocal]

Seeing same issue. Real reviews, not spam junk.

According to their team, they report this whenever a review is removed, although it can make its way back. When checking manually, most of these removals are sticking.

 

[rustybrick]

@rustybrick Joy has chimed in to state she has seen a dozen posts on the help forum.

hmm, i scanned through, most are weird but there are some legit ones. I dont keep track of the volume of these complaints in the forums, but I'll keep an eye on it...

 

[Brian - TGL]

Just got notified of another round of removals including another 12 for the same restaurant location at the start of this thread (plus I noticed there were 3 removed on Sunday) for a total of 91 removals in the last 3 days for that location.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Another person on X is seeing this:

 

[keyserholiday]

Something happened. I am getting conflicting signals. Some people are claiming it’s an API issue, whereas other are claiming that Google removed reviews. Nobody is giving concrete data and examples.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Here are just some of the forum threads about it:

• https://support.google.com/business/thread/410592353
• https://support.google.com/business/thread/410645294
• https://support.google.com/business/thread/410161436
• https://support.google.com/business/thread/410740396
• https://support.google.com/business/thread/410737810

 

[keyserholiday]

It seems that there are several issues at play here.
I keep hearing about the 5-day review bug issue. It appears that Google is removing reviews five days after they have been posted. The last link you posted stated they recieved 260 reviews last week and Google removed 100 of them. Here is one Reddit thread about it:


The third example states that they lost reviews after being suspended and then reinstated.

These cases and examples are all over the board. Here is a Reddit post claiming it's an API issue:


Sadly, there isn't enough concrete information for me to determine the issue. Is it one issue, or multiple issues? I keep asking clarifying questions, but I am not getting the answers I need to ascetain what the issue is.