Flagging - Before you Flag

Before you Flag Some tips to remember when flagging reviews as merchant

Before you flag a review….

Flagging reviews is a critical feature designed to maintain the integrity and trustworthiness of customer feedback on our platform. However, it's imperative that this tool is not abused, as it can undermine the very foundation it seeks to protect.

Abusing the flagging process can lead to censorship of legitimate reviews, skewing the perception of a product or service, and can ultimately harm both consumers and businesses who rely on honest feedback to make informed decisions. It's also crucial to adhere to the specific terms set by us for flagging reviews to ensure that the process is fair, consistent, and transparent.

Moreover, it's essential to understand the flow of flagging; once a review is flagged and adjudicated by the transparency team, it is considered conclusively reviewed, meaning it cannot be flagged again. This finality ensures that once a decision is made, it is respected and adhered to, preventing an endless cycle of flagging that could further complicate or disrupt the trustworthiness of the review system.

A review can only be reflagged if it has been modified by the reviewer.

ResellerRatings is a passive aggregation of consumer opinion, and it is our mission to improve the consumer shopping experience by providing a safe, unbiased space for customers to share their experiences. Those experiences can help you learn how to improve your customer service, business processes, and other aspects of your organization to ultimately boost your reputation.

If you’re a merchant thinking about flagging a review solely because you do not agree with the reviewer or the events described within the review, we recommend that you refrain from doing so. Instead, ResellerRatings recommends that you utilize our direct message or public reply tools to work toward a resolution with the reviewer, offer some clarification, or at the very least, a polite response for the benefit of future shoppers.

Transparency Team

ResellerRatings Transparency Team are individuals on our team that manually review reported reviews for any violations. They decide if reviews that are flagged meet our terms of violations. They try to work within 48 business hours of a review being flagged.

So, why would you flag a review?

There are situations in which ResellerRatings does remove reviews to maintain content quality, protect privacy, or for other reasons we deem appropriate. These reasons are also known as our terms and guidelines, which we require all reviews to comply with.

Flagging a review is a great way to notify the ResellerRatings Reviews team that one has violated the ResellerRatings terms. If a reviewer clearly violates one or more terms, the review will eventually be removed. Note that reviewers can edit their reviews to no longer be in violation. If this happens, the review becomes public once again.

What is the difference between 'reporting' a review vs flagging.

Any users on a site can actually report a review under the review button. Reporting a review lets our transparency team review the review for a variety of issues including copyrighted material and more. Flagging a review is a specific platform ability for retailers / brands to use on platform that specifically puts it into a queue that is adjudicated based on violations of our flagging terms.

Why would anyone flag a positive review?

Flagging a positive review might seem counterintuitive at first, but there are several legitimate reasons why someone might do so:

Inauthentic Content: If there's suspicion that a review is not genuine, such as being written by someone affiliated with the company or by using fake accounts, it could be flagged for verification. This is crucial for maintaining the authenticity of reviews and the overall trust in the platform.
Conflict of Interest: Reviews that may have been posted by an individual with a personal or business relationship to the product or service could be considered biased and therefore flagged for further inspection.
Guideline Violations: Even positive reviews must adhere to the platform's guidelines. If a review contains inappropriate language, personal information, or spammy content, it may be flagged regardless of its positive tone.
Duplicate Content: If the same review appears multiple times or if it's copied from another source, it might be flagged to maintain the uniqueness and relevance of the feedback provided.
Manipulation Attempts: Companies might attempt to boost their ratings by posting or incentivizing positive reviews. Flagging can help identify and mitigate these attempts to manipulate the system.

Flagging, when done for valid reasons, plays a crucial role in keeping review platforms trustworthy and useful for everyone.

Benefits of flagging reviews

Reviews found to be in violation of our terms are placed in the “Inactive” status. Inactive reviews are not visible to the public, and they do not count toward your overall score.

Reasons for flagging a review

Each of the following flag reasons correlates to one of our terms.

Abusive Flagging Behavior

Abusive flagging is not tolerated on our system. Sometimes brands may try to repeatedly flag a review. This may trigger an audit of an account to further investigate and re-review flagged content going back a set period of time.

* repeated abuse of flags will be demarcated on your review page PROFILE

* we reserve the right to not work with anyone who continues to abuse our platform