For Consumers FAQ

Commonly asked questions by consumers

Adam Smith avatar
Written by Adam Smith
Updated today

REVIEWS.io is recognised by millions of consumers worldwide as the source of genuine reviews you can trust. We are independent, impartial and honest. Our mission is to be the world’s best review platform for consumers and businesses.

We understand that online reviews, while essential to businesses and useful to consumers, are only valued if they can be trusted, and so trust is at the core of everything we do.

Businesses can use our platform to request reviews from their genuine customers, and consumers can easily access and read these reviews via public-facing review pages.

We work closely with Google, and are licensed as a Google Review Partner. This means that we must adhere to strict standards for review collection and our clients (the businesses that you make purchases from) also must adhere to these standards.

We have created this FAQ to answer any questions you may have about the reviews listed on our website. If there are further questions that you think should be added to this list which may be beneficial to other consumers, please send an email to support@reviews.io

Note: Looking for a specific question/answer? Check out the table of contents on the right hand side! 👉


FAQ

How are reviews collected?

Businesses use REVIEWS.io to request reviews from customers who have recently transacted with them. If you purchase a product or service through a REVIEWS.io client, then you will soon afterwards receive an invitation to write a review.

Customers may also write a review directly on a company profile on REVIEWS.io, by clicking on the star rating next to Write A Review. If this option is not available on the page, the setting may need to be enabled by the business in the Publishing Settings of the dashboard.

How it works 👇

  1. You purchase a product or service from a business

  2. Some time later, you receive an email from REVIEWS.io asking for your review

  3. You click the link in the email and write your review

  4. Your review appears on the company profile page and on their website

You are able to write your review anonymously by choosing that option during the review writing process!


What is a Verified Review/Verified Buyer?

Genuine customers are invited to write a review via email or SMS invitation by a business after a transaction, and any review written as a result of this invitation will appear on our website showing the “Verified Buyer” banner.

Some businesses allow reviews to be written directly on their REVIEWS.io page without an invitation. Reviews written in this way are initially unverified, but all reviewers are asked for proof of purchase by email upon review submission. Once proof of purchase is received, the review becomes marked as verified.


I want to write a review but haven’t received an invitation!

If you are a genuine customer of any business listed on REVIEWS.io, you may write a review.

If the business page does not have the option to write a review, and you have not received your invitation directly from the company, then you may request an invitation directly from REVIEWS.io by sending a copy of your proof of purchase to support@reviews.io.

Your review invitation will then be sent to you and you'll be able to use it to write your review. Once written, your review will automatically appear as “verified” after you have submitted it.


Do I need to create an account with REVIEWS.io to write a review?

Unlike other review platforms, you don’t need to create an account to write your review.

If you have been sent a review invitation from us on behalf of the company you recently purchased from, your review will be automatically verified without you needing to go through unnecessary sign-up steps on our website.

This makes the process a lot quicker and easier for everybody, meaning you can get on with your day after offering your valued feedback.


What is REVIEWS.io’s relationship with its business clients?

Businesses choose REVIEWS.io’s platform to manage and collect reviews from their customers. Some businesses pay REVIEWS.io a monthly fee for the use of our platform and features.

As an impartial review platform, whether a business chooses to actively collect reviews or not has no bearing on the trust and transparency we place in the reviews on our platform.

As outlined in our Mission Statement, our platform was built with consumers and businesses in mind, and we fight review fraud at every step. We understand that online reviews, while essential to businesses and useful to consumers, are only valued if they can be trusted, and so trust is at the core of everything we do.


Do businesses choose which reviews to display on their REVIEWS.io profile page?

Absolutely not. The basis for the REVIEWS.io platform is transparency, trust and honesty, and our policy with regards to review removal is, and always has been, that no genuine, verified and factually-correct review will ever be deleted from a company page, regardless of its star rating.

To protect consumers and businesses, we of course have review content and moderation policies in place, which prevent spam, defamatory or factually incorrect reviews from being displayed. However, the existence of such policies in no way affect the impartiality of our platform.

As long as your review follows the following general guidelines then it will always remain visible on REVIEWS.io 👇

  • You are a verified customer of a business with proof of purchase

  • Your review does not contain profanity or other objectionable content

  • Your review does not contain the names of individuals of a particular business

  • Your review is factually correct

If you have any concerns about the validity of any review visible on REVIEWS.io then email our moderation team at support@reviews.io and we will conduct a full and impartial investigation.


Do businesses only send review requests to customer they know are happy?

The automated nature of our system means that businesses must send a review invitation to every customer who has a transaction with that business. In short, businesses may not pick and choose who reviews are sent to.

If you have purchased from a business using REVIEWS.io and for some reason you have not received your review invitation, please follow the instructions in the “I want to write a review but haven’t received an invitation” section.


I’ve written a review but I am not listed as a “Verified Buyer”. Why is this?

If you write a review directly on a company page and not as a result of a specific email or SMS review invitation sent to you by that company, your review will be Unverified.

On submission of your review, you will receive an email automatically from REVIEWS.io requesting your proof of purchase. Just reply to that email with your invoice or other sales receipt, and your review will be set to Verified once checked.


How do I write an anonymous review?

During the review writing process, you may choose whether to publish your name or anonymously write your review. Just select the appropriate option during review submission (after you click on the link in your invitation email).


Why do I need to supply my email address to write a review?

We require a name, email address and an order identification number in order to verify your review. You email address is never used for anything other than that purpose, nor is it published anywhere on our site. For further details on data processing and retention, please visit our privacy policy.


My review has been deleted. Why?

If your review has been moderated and you have followed our review policy outlined in our Reviews and Moderation article, send an email to support@reviews.io with details of your transaction, the email address you supplied when you wrote the review, and the name of the company you reviewed.

As a reminder of our review policy, in general your review must follow the guidelines below 👇

  • You are a verified customer of a business with proof of purchase

  • Your review does not contain profanity or other objectionable content

  • Your review does not contain the names of individuals of a particular business

  • Your review is factually correct

As stated above, genuine verified reviews that follow these guidelines will never be removed. Unverified reviews may under certain circumstances be removed. If you have had an unverified review removed, please forward the details and your proof of purchase to support@reviews.io and it will be reinstated provided it follows our guidelines.


How does REVIEWS.io deal with fake reviews?

Our policy is and always has been that we will never tolerate any business abusing our system through collection or publishing of fake reviews. We have robust systems in place to identify and combat fake reviews.

Sadly, from time to time we do identify businesses that try to abuse our system. Our policy is always to terminate our business arrangement with those companies and remove any fraudulent reviews.

If you have any concerns about the validity of any review visible on REVIEWS.io then email our moderation team at support@reviews.io and we will conduct a full and impartial investigation.


How do I change a review I have written?

If you've written a review for a company on our platform then you have a number of options for amending it.

If you were invited to leave a review by email by the company, you can click on the original link within that email and write a new review. The new review will replace the original review.

If you wrote a review on a company page without an invitation, then please send an email to support@reviews.io from the email address you left when you wrote the review, including the name of the company, when you wrote the review, and your name. We'll send you an updated email link and you'll be able to use that to amend your review.

If neither of these options applies to your situation, send an email to support@reviews.io and give us all the relevant information you can and we will assist you.


How do I stop receiving review invitations from you?

Just email support@reviews.io and ask us to unsubscribe your email address. You’ll no longer receive any review invitation emails from any business using REVIEWS.io’s services.

Alternatively, you can click the Unsubscribe link at the bottom of any review-related email invitations from us and we'll unsubscribe you automatically.


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