Question 1

Reviews guidance and policy

Accepted Answer

Yell.com is committed to being the most trusted online destination for consumers to connect with businesses. Central to this trust is Yell Reviews, and we are dedicated to ensuring that consumers can trust existing, and post new, reviews.

This is all achieved through simple processes and clear policies as outlined below. We ask both reviewers and business owners to share our values and abide by these principles and guidelines and the Reviews Policy.

Reviews content guidelines

Posting a review

Our review service offers consumers the opportunity to rate and review their genuine, first hand, experiences with the businesses they use. Specifically:

A consumer can only review a business with whom they have had a direct, first hand, experience. Not based on what they heard from friends or relatives.
For clarity, our definition of an experience is where a business has been actively engaged as part of a buying process or delivery of the service. A consumer can only review a business to the extent of their direct experience, e.g. a consumer who obtained a quote from a business but did not accept the service can review their experience with obtaining the quote but cannot review the delivery or ongoing support for the service.
In addition, you may not write a review about a business:
1. That you or any family member have any financial interest in;
2. That you are employed by or otherwise work for;
3. That is a competitor to a business that you or any family member have any financial interest in, are employed by or otherwise work for;
4. In exchange for payment; or
5. Where your interaction occurred more than 12 months previous to submitting the review
Consumers are able to post a review across a range of different devices/channels – desktop, mobile and app.
As a minimum, consumers need to provide a rating (1-5 stars) of a business
Our advice for consumers is that if they have had a bad experience with a business they try to explain to them why in their review. Genuine negative feedback is fine, but constructive criticism is much more useful to the business and potential customers than an angry rant.
The personal details of users will never be shared with the subject of their review, or 3rd parties, without obtaining permission, unless we are required to share them related to a court or government order.
We encourage free speech and defend everyone’s right to express unpopular points of view. But, we do not permit abusive or offensive behaviour, towards businesses or other users. This includes (but is not limited to) the use of profanities; threats; prejudiced comments; hate speech; and/ or, sexually explicit language. All user generated content material posted on the Yell.com website, must comply with both the guidance in this Reviews Policy and the Yell.com Conditions of Use.
We respect our users’ privacy and do our utmost to protect it (see our Privacy Policy for more details). We expect users to join us in protecting people’s privacy and for reviews to be unbiased and objective. Mentioning the celebrity owner of a bar/restaurant is fine, but detailing personal information such as full names, email addresses, mailing addresses; phone numbers; as well as bank and card details for, individual members of staff, or any other individual, is strictly prohibited. If a review does contain this type of information it may be removed.
Anything posted should be a reviewer’s own, unique work. This includes not uploading images/ videos, or using content in videos to which someone else owns the copyright, such as music tracks, snippets of copyrighted programmes or videos made by other users and unattributed quotes. Content may be removed, without notice, if we receive a complaint from the copyright owner.
All reviewers should be aware that the content they submit becomes visible to anyone who visits the Yell.com website, so they need to check what they’re posting meets our Yell.com Conditions of Use.

Responding to a review

Businesses will proactively be informed whenever any new review is posted against their business, subject to having review notification functionality switched on.
Anyone, who has registered for a Yell.com account, can respond to a posted review on their business.
Businesses can do this via the ‘Received reviews’ page within their Yell.com account.
When the business owner responds to a review they will be highlighted as the business owner to consumers via the ‘Business Response’ flag.
Any comments should be constructive and written in a non-biased way. They also need to adhere to policies associated with ‘Posting a Review’, other than the need to provide a star rating.
All comments will be published in real-time and will be visible to all.

Reporting a review

We do not edit, pre-vet or review any third party material before it is published on the Yell.com website. We actively encourage any party to report any review, that they believe to contravene our policies by using the ‘report review’ link on the specific review.
In the event of a review being reported, we will assess the review against our policy. If the review is not in breach of the policy but is believed by the reporter to be posted by an individual who is not recognised as someone who has had an experience with the business, we will contact the reviewer within 2 working days, via email, and provide 3 working days for the provision of further information to support a decision being made around the veracity of the review. In the absence of a response, the review will be withdrawn as unsubstantiated.
Where a review is reported as defamatory the person reporting the review will be advised of the outcome within 10 working days of the email being sent to the reviewer.
If the veracity of a reported review is substantiated it will remain in place, irrespective of Yell’s relationship with the reviewed business. Substantiation will be based on Yell being ‘satisfied’ that the review meets our policies. The only exception to this is if the reviewed business decides to suppress the review functionality from their listing altogether. In this case, all review data both positive and negative is removed and the business can no longer receive any reviews.

Requesting a review

We actively encourage all businesses to proactively manage their online reputation. This includes the ability to request reviews from their own customers (not friends or family). This can be done online via the ‘Request a Review' functionality available to all businesses.
Offline requests can also be made, with consumers needing to be directed to: Yell.com/reviews.
Merchants can find additional support for managing reviews by logging into Yell.com and visiting the ‘promote your reviews’ link.

How reviews are accessed and reflected in a business’s listing

We will ascribe an overall reviews star rating for a business, using an algorithm that looks at volumes of reviews by star rating.
Star ratings will feature against a business’s listing, and within their business profile
Specific reviews will be accessible via a business’s profile page.
In some cases Yell reviews are also published in 3rd party search results e.g. Google.

Getting in touch

If you need help with a Yell.com Listing or information on any of our services please visit our Help and Support Centre.
Alternatively, if you are a Yell customer you can contact Customer Care for free on 0800 555 444 (Mon -Thur: 9am – 5pm & Friday: 9am – 4:30pm).

We reserve the right to remove a review at any time for any reason. The reviews posted on Yell.com are individual and highly subjective opinions. The opinions expressed in reviews are user opinions and not that of Yell Limited.

We do not endorse any of the opinions expressed by reviewers and we are not affiliated with any establishment listed or reviewed on this website.

Reviews policy

Notice and Take-Down System – We do not monitor, censor or moderate reviews. We provide a passive conduit only for users to post reviews about businesses featured on our website.
Reviewers may not write a review that:
1. They have been paid to write by the business or a competitor of the business;
2. Does not describe their personal and direct interaction with the business;
3. Is not factually correct;
4. Violates laws regarding defamation, harassment, discrimination, racial vilification, sedition, blasphemy, bullying or contempt;
5. Is abusive, offensive, indecent, pornographic or obscene;
6. Advocates illegal activity or discusses illegal activities with the intent to commit them;
7. Is intentionally or unintentionally false, misleading, deceptive, inaccurate, incorrect or unreliable;
8. Infringes intellectual property rights including copyright of any third party;
9. Is inappropriate, off topic, repetitive or vexatious; or
10. Compromises the privacy or data protection rights of any person.
For Business Owners – Business owners may not do any of the following which could damage your online reputation or be interpreted as misleading consumers:
1. Pay for reviews of your own or a competitor’s business;
2. Provide incentives including, but not limited to, discounts, monetary rewards, free products, loyalty points, gifts, coupons, and referral bonuses when asking for reviews;
3. Review your own or a competitor’s business; or
4. Try to have negative reviews removed leaving only the positive reviews (astroturfing).

Question 2

How do I write a review on Yell.com?

Accepted Answer

Go to Yell.com and search for the company you would like to review. Click the Write a Review button at the bottom of the page. Give your review a short title, select the number of stars and write your review. Finally, click Submit Review.

You will be asked to login to publish your review. If you don’t have an account with Yell, you can create one or choose to login with your Facebook or Google profiles.

Look at Yell’s Reviews Policy for more guidelines on how to write a review on Yell.com.

Question 3

Do I need to create a Yell account to post my review?

Accepted Answer

No. You can submit a review on Yell by creating an account, or by reviewing as a guest. To create a Yell account, simply register here. Creating a Yell account means you will be able to keep track of all your reviews, update your profile picture and customise your user name.

To review a business as a guest, we will ask you to provide your first name, last name and email address during the review process. We will send you an email link to click on to verify your email address. We only use these details to authenticate your review. Your personal details will not be published live with the review. Simply search for a business and write your review to get started.

Yell value your privacy so we will keep your personal information secure and will never send you any irrelevant emails. Find out more in our Privacy Policy.

Question 4

How do I delete a review I have written?

Accepted Answer

If you already have a Yell account, here is how you can delete your review:

Log in to your Yell account at https://service.yell.com
Click the trash icon next to the review you want to delete

If you have published a review as a guest, you will need to create a free yell account to delete the content.

Simply visit https://service.yell.com and click the Create an account button to sign up and ensure you enter the email address you used to validate your review.

Question 5

Can I edit or change my review after it’s posted?

Accepted Answer

If you already have a Yell account, here is how you can edit your review:

Your amended review will be published instantly.

If you have published a review as a guest, you would need to create a free Yell account to edit the content.

Simply visit https://service.yell.com and click the Create an account button to sign up and ensure you enter the email address you used to validate your review.

Question 6

How do I close my Yell Reviews account?

Accepted Answer

We are sorry to hear you’re thinking of leaving Yell Reviews. Deleting your account will mean any reviews you have published on Yell.com will also be removed and cannot be restored. If you still wish to close your Yell Reviews account, please contact our Customer Care team:

Live message – Click the Send Message Now button at https://yell.com/contactus to message our Customer Care team Mon-Fri 8am-5pm.

Call us – Speak to a member of our team on 0800 555 444, Mon-Thu 9am-5pm, Fri 9am-4.30pm 

Question 7

Where is my review?

Accepted Answer

If you can’t see your review on Yell.com, it could be for a few reasons:

Your review may still be pending – If you haven’t verified your email address, your review will stay as pending and won’t be visible on Yell.com. When this happens, you will see a Pending Review notification next to the review on your Yell account page.
To verify your account and get your reviews published, you will need to click on the link emailed to you to confirm your email address. If you haven’t received this email, press the Verify your Profile button above your reviews to resend it. You can ensure that your email address is up to date by changing your details on your Account Settings tab.

The business may have turned off reviews – In some situations, a business may choose to turn off the reviews feature on their listing. If that happens, all existing reviews will stop showing on their Yell.com profile page. You will still be able to see your review on your Yell account page. If the business turns the reviews back on, your feedback will be visible again.

We may have deleted your review – We will delete a review from our site if it breaches our Reviews Policy and Conditions of Use. This includes, but is not limited to, the use of profanities, threats, prejudiced comments or hate speech. We will notify you by email if your review has been removed from Yell.com.

Sometimes we might contact you to verify your full details if your review is reported, in accordance with the Defamation Act. If this happens, our support team will email you and ask you to respond to within 3 working days. If we do not receive a response within this time, your review will be removed.

To make sure you can receive our email notifications, please confirm your registered email address is correct in the My Settings tab of your Yell account page.

Question 8

How do I report an inappropriate review?

Accepted Answer

If you believe a review or comment on Yell.com is inappropriate, offensive or violates Yell’s Reviews Policy, click on the Report review link next to it. Our support team will evaluate the content against our guidelines and email you with a notification of the outcome. We’ll also notify the reviewer if their content is removed.

Read Yell’s Conditions of Use to find out when we may decide to remove a review.

Question 9

Can I get in trouble for writing a negative review on Yell.com?

Accepted Answer

Yell encourages all personal reviews from genuine experiences, both positive and negative, to help our users make informed choices. Negative reviews give businesses great opportunities to improve, and we encourage all business owners listed on Yell.com to listen and respond to negative reviews using the comment feature. So no, you won’t get into trouble for sharing your bad experience with our community.

However, reviews may be removed if they breach our Reviews Policy or the Yell.com Conditions of Use, or if we’re unable to verify your feedback with you. Sometimes we might contact you to verify your full details in case your review is reported, in accordance with the Defamation Act.

Question 10

How can I change my Yell display name?

Accepted Answer

You can personalise your Yell Reviews account by adding a profile picture that will be displayed next to your reviews on Yell.com. To change your picture, go to the Settings tab of your Yell account and click Change on the circular profile image.

Here you can upload a picture, or take a new photo with your device’s camera. If you are logged in using Facebook or Google, you can also choose to import your social media profile photo.

Please make sure you have the rights to use the picture you are uploading and that it doesn’t breach our Conditions of Use.

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