{"id":440,"date":"2019-06-06T10:43:50","date_gmt":"2019-06-06T09:43:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hamuch.com\/blog\/?p=440"},"modified":"2019-06-06T10:45:35","modified_gmt":"2019-06-06T09:45:35","slug":"lets-ditch-reviews-for-builders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/2019\/06\/06\/lets-ditch-reviews-for-builders\/","title":{"rendered":"Let\u2019s ditch reviews for builders"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Reviews\nand stars tell customers little about actual quality or reliability<\/strong><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hamuch.com\/\"><strong>HaMuch.com<\/strong><\/a><strong> to start\ndeleting stars and reviews for tradesmen<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Tradesmen\ngame reviews by offering cash discount for positive feedback<\/strong><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hamuch.com\/\"><strong>HaMuch.com<\/strong><\/a><strong> boss says<\/strong> <strong>review sites may suffer same fake\nreviews as TripAdvisor<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>We have all become used to reading online reviews of\ntradesmen and tradeswomen before hiring them. But these reviews have now become\nworthless and should be done away with, says controversial builder-pricing\nwebsite owner Tarquin Purdie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Purdie\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hamuch.com\/\">HaMuch.com<\/a> site shows details of how much tradesmen charge in your\nlocal area and had previously accepted reviews and stars out of five. These\nwill now be deleted from the website. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many popular websites who charge\nbuilders for job leads offer feedback and a marks system. But Purdie believes\nthat customers can end up being fobbed off with poor tradesmen who game the\nsystem. He also believes that good builders who stick to the rules can be\npunished by unscrupulous homeowners. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe review system has become a sort of two-way\nintimidation,\u201d says Purdie. \u201cBuilders pressure customers to leave a good review\nand even offer cash discounts as a part of this. Customers ask tradesmen to\ninclude extras, endlessly snag or offer heavy discounts before agreeing to\nleave good feedback. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cA good tradesman can be ruined by one bad review, but a\npoor one can just bribe their way to positive feedback. It has become a bad joke.\nAnd one that many of these companies profit from. It\u2019s time for homeowners and\ntradesmen to leave them behind.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Websites such as TripAdvisor and Yell.com have recently been\nrocked by claims of fake and paid-for reviews and Purdie believes that the same\nproblems may dog some of the tradesmen review sites. He is now calling for the\nindustry and customers to re-think how they work together in an honest way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe review system has become entirely worthless,\u201d says\nPurdie. \u201cAlthough tradesmen and women are paying a lot to be a part of it. The\nproblem is that there is no real way of checking that the work has been done,\nif it is any good and whether bad reviews have been removed at the request of\ntradesmen, who are the paying customer for review companies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cTo be effective, the system requires a regulator, although\nI\u2019m not sure these companies would be willing to stump up for that. False\nreviews are like fake news, but no one is taking any action to either regulate\nor clean up the sizeable builder review industry. We only welcome builders,\nplumbers or electricians who are clear and open on price and who are willing to\nshow customers prior work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hamuch.com\/\"><strong>HaMuch.com<\/strong><\/a><strong> guide to finding a good builder without review sites<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Work out your budget and choose a\ntradesman who can meet it<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Ask to see previous work, preferably in\nyour own neighbourhood<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Get a quote from two or three different\nbusinesses<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Read the small print and check what is\nincluded in the price<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Ask what guarantees are included and for\ndetails of membership of professional bodies<\/strong><\/li><\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reviews and stars tell customers little about actual quality or reliability HaMuch.com to start deleting stars and reviews for tradesmen Tradesmen game reviews by offering cash discount for positive feedback HaMuch.com boss says review sites may suffer same fake reviews as TripAdvisor We have all become used to reading online reviews of tradesmen and tradeswomen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":441,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[26,27,28],"class_list":["post-440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-builder","tag-builder","tag-feedback","tag-tradesmen"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/positive-feedback.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":442,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440\/revisions\/442"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hamuch.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}