Yelp.com

Hello Ms [redacted] ,Thank you for your response.Please be assured that we've evaluated the content of [redacted] *'s review and are allowing the user to stand behind it.Additionally, we stand behind our previous statements regarding the recommendation softwareYelp's recommendation software is an automated algorithm that attempts to weed out less reliable reviews while showcasing more reliable onesThis means that when reviews are posted to your listing, not all of them will make the cutWe acknowledge that even some legitimate reviews will not be recommended, but we still believe that the software as a whole makes our site more trustworthy and useful to consumers.As indicated in our prior response, the recommendation software is automated to help avoid the potential for human bias inherent in individual decision-making: we cannot reverse the software’s decisions, either to suppress an active review or to restore one that isn’t recommendedBut once again, the system is not static -- reviews may come and go as the recommendation software picks up new information.We understand the recommendation software can be frustrating at times, and we appreciate your feedbackWhen it comes down to it, all review sites face the same challenge: how to identify fake reviews among the many millions of legitimate reviewsIt's no easy task, and there is always room for improvementWe hope to be able to continually improve on this issue.We also want to reiterate that we don't remove business listing informationYelp is allowed to publish business names and publicly available information about businesses under the well-established fair use doctrine, as well as First Amendment principlesGenerally speaking, this means that we can display business names and trademarks "for purposes of comparison, criticism, point of reference, or any other such purpose." See [redacted] Regards,***Yelp Inc

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] .We appreciate your feedback, and are sorry to hear you have been running into trouble receiving the checksIt looks like you were in touch with my colleague [redacted] prior to filing this Revdex.com complaint, and, as you may recall from the email she sent you on November 2, our Finance team has processed this reissued payment, so you should be receiving it soonPlease allow up to more business days from today, November 16, for the payment to arrive in the mailPlease note that we are unable to provide tracking information for this payment.If you don't receive the check within the above timeframe, please email [redacted] so that they can assist you furtherWe appreciate your patience in the meantime.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/12/22) */ Hi ***, Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business pages You asked that the name on your business pages be updated to [redacted] Our moderators need to be able to independently verify each name change that comes in, and we want Yelp business pages to be simple, accurate, and generally reflective of the way consumers recognize a businessNot all updates are valid or fit our style guidelines, so we have to carefully evaluate each one and look for independent confirmation before we can approve the changeIn this case, we have updated the business name on your Yelp pages to " [redacted] " so that the name falls within our current standards Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Hi [redacted] Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] .We first want to make sure you know that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit [redacted] ***As you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp.It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsYou wrote that you want "the positive reviews to be recommended and factored in our overall rating," but please understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static -- reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors.To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: [redacted] You also expressed concern with a negative reviewIt looks like you are referring to the review by [redacted] *., as it appears this review was recently reported by you or one of your colleaguesWe have taken a second look at this review but, after careful consideration, we reached the same conclusion as before and are unable to remove the reviewIf a review appears to reflect the reviewer’s personal experiences and opinions, it is our policy to let the user stand behind his or her review.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: this is NOT "primarily" an online businessWe are NOT like A Place For Mom that IS A CALL CENTEROur business model is "boots on the ground@ meeting clients and families personally and taking them for tours of various living options available for the ElderlyI'm quite surprised at your lack of research into what we represent to our clients and the whole senior community before making any judgementsI want to point out that there was no acknowledgement for the behaviour of your rude sales rep IThe response from Yelp and I am very dissatisfiedPlease let me know on next steps as we are a national company with corporate located in Scottsdale ArizonaSincerely, [redacted]

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] We've forwarded your message to the appropriate partiesAs you may recall, a manager, [redacted] , spoke with you on December 28, to discuss your concernsWe are refunding you the charges from November 1, and December 1, totaling $Additionally, we are waiving the upcoming January 1, charge for $82.58.We hope you will continue to take advantage of the free features available to you on your business account to engage with the Yelp communityFor guidance, please visit [redacted] Regards,***Yelp Inc

Complaint [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: You have ONLY rejected my positive reviews from my clientsThis is unethical! I will only accept all my reviews being shown!Sincerely,Michael [redacted]

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: Yelp has declared that all of my patients submissions are basically not up to their standards This is utterly ludicrous and does not make sense You indicate that the patients were prompted to respond by [redacted] That is absolutely correct they were prompted to give my company a recommendation on Yelp If they hadn't been told where to give the recommendation I will guaranty to you that these senior citizens would have no idea who and what Yelp is All patients of [redacted] receive up to 50% off on Major Hearing Aids brands that is the reason for our existence...to undercut competition to benefit seniors pocketbooks Of course our patients like what we do as they save hundreds to thousands of dollars I am going to ask another patient to send in a review and see what happens I am going on seventy years old and this is tending towards a discrimination case Sincerely, [redacted]

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] You expressed concern that your advertising program continued to run after the initial 6-month termThe terms stated in your advertising agreement with Yelp were:"Commitment Period: months from Service Start Date""Automatic renewal: Month-to-Month"That is to say, once you've completed your initial six-month term, your advertising continues to renew automatically on a monthly basis until we receive a cancellation request from youAdditionally, per the terms of the advertising agreement, we require days written notice to your account management contact if you wish to terminate your advertising programAs you provided your cancellation request on December 3, 2016, your advertising program was terminated as of January 2, 2017.Information about the automatic renewal and the day cancellation policy was also in the "Your Ads Are Live" email we sent you on June 6, 2016: "Note: After month(s), your advertising will continue on a month to month basisIf you intend to cancel your program at any point after your initial term, written notice must be submitted days in advance of your desired date of cancellation."You also wrote, "I called and they stated that they could try to set up a payment plan with me to pay off balance but today they took the full amount out of my account anyway." Please note that any payment plans must be worked out with our finance teamIt looks like an account manager, David, provided you with our finance team's number on January 3, 2017, but it appears you did not work out a payment plan with our finance team and you were charged $on January 4, for advertising services delivered in December Please note that your advertising program is billed in arrears, which means that we typically bill on the first of the month for advertising services that were delivered in the previous monthIt looks like there is a remaining balance of $that will be billed on February 1, for advertising services delivered January - 2, Once that amount is collected, you will not incur further charges.We have forwarded your message to the appropriate parties for their consideration, but at this time we will not be able to offer you a refund as advertising services were delivered in accordance with your advertising agreementThanks for understandingRegards,***Yelp Inc

Hi ***,Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] .According to our records, it appears you increased your ad click budget on April 12, 2017, but did not end your self-serve advertising program until April 26, 2017.That said, we've forwarded your concerns to the appropriate partiesAs you may recall, a manager, [redacted] reached out to you on May to discuss your concernsIt also appears you emailed [redacted] earlier today, May 18, and that she replied to let you know she'd be happy to look over any information that indicated the cancellation of your campaign on April 12, If you haven't already done so, please reach back out to [redacted] directly with any additional information you may have, so that she can look into this further.Regards,***Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/11/09) */ Hi ***, Thank you for writing.We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] Family Medical We first want to make sure you know that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more You also expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsYou asked that we "allow other reviews to be posted to bring up our rating," but please understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US With regards to [redacted] W's review, the review has been evaluated by the Yelp Support team and left up, as it was not found to be in violation of our guidelinesIf a review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, it is our policy to allow the user to stand by his or her review Finally, you asked for your business to be removed from Yelp, but we actually don't remove business listing informationWhile some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the lawMore importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/09/18) */ Hello, Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for The [redacted] You expressed concern with a negative review that you recently reportedIt looks like you are referring to the review by ***As you may recall from the message you received from the [redacted] Support team, the review has been evaluated and left up, as it was not found to be in violation of our guidelinesYou claim that this review was written by an ex-employee; however, based on what we see in the review, we can't confirm that the user has a conflict of interest with the businessYou also wrote that you "are willing to share all documents to prove this is an employee," but as frustrating as it may sound, we don't take the place of a court of law and make evidentiary determinationsIf a review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, it is our policy to allow the user to stand by his/her review You might consider sending a private message to the reviewer or posting a public comment through your free business accountMany reviewers respond favorably to business owners willing to engage in constructive conversation, and at the very least, other [redacted] users appreciate seeing business owners take a proactive approach to dealing with customer concernsOur hope is that by utilizing these means you will be able to rectify any misunderstandings and come to an amicable resolution Regards, [redacted] Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/10/06) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted] Company. You wrote, "Yelp Contract was signed/forged by marketing agent that was hired... by [redacted] movers not [redacted] ." However, according to our records, it looks like our sales representative, Charles, was in contact with [redacted] at (XXX) XXX-XXXX, which is the phone number listed on your Yelp business page. It also appears that the advertising agreement, which has an electronic signature for [redacted] , was sent to the email address that appears on under the Client Information section of the contract. Generally speaking, an advertising agreement is sent to the business owner's email address via Echosign, a program that collects electronic signatures for purposes such as remote contract signing. The agreement is then e-signed, meaning a name was typed in indicating acceptance of the terms of the agreement. With regards to the appearance of the "signature", with Echosign, the program creates a stylized signature for the person who e-signs the agreement, which may be why you don't recognize the signature's appearance. As advertising services were delivered in accordance with the advertising agreement, we will not be able to waive the remaining balance. Additionally, early termination is subject to a fee per the terms of the contract. Thanks for understanding. Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc. Initial Consumer Rebuttal / [redacted] (3000, 7, 2015/10/07) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) From what I am reading you company does not want to take responsibility and change their policy on contracts. I am bluntly telling you that someone forged documentation and you are coming back telling me something I have told you and your staff that the person that we hired set up the account and spoke with your staff, for this reason I requested recorded calls . I know you do record calls. If I hear [redacted] being told all the contract info and verbally accepting this then that is completely different. And in regards to the email.. the email that was given to me by you staff you said the contract we sent to that email is not our company email, also our phone XXX-XXX-XXXX is a company phone meaning not one line so the person in question is able to say oh I am [redacted] and speak on his behalf with out out us knowing. once again for this reason I requested a recorded call to be heard to see who's voice is on the call. Yelp is a bully and after your response I see that very clear! Final Business Response / [redacted] (4000, 9, 2015/10/22) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for your response. You have again alleged that "someone forged documentation," but we can only reiterate that according to our records, it appears that our sales representative was in contact with [redacted] at your business. With regards to your concern about the email address, it looks like the email address that the advertising agreement was sent to was the same email address that was associated with the Business Account login at that time. Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc. Final Consumer Response / [redacted] (4200, 11, 2015/10/26) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) It is in plain english when I have said multi times that Marketing company called Design Portfolio created the account and the email, I have stated multi times that the email the owners use is [redacted] @ [redacted] .com, after reviewing more then 50 complaints against yelp from other angry business owners over the same issue I can see that I only have one option and that is to see an attorney,. I know they record there calls but yet they have not produced this.. if someone is paid to do the marketing for a company of course they will have access to that email.. an it can figure that out... and electric signature is bull.. an actual signature should be required.. so I will be seeking an attorney for this an effort to change there bull policy on contracts!!!!!!!!!!!

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: The answer does not address the issue - why YELP allowed a non existing client to post defamatory statements about my services. At this point I am concern that a YELP representative/associate posted the review after my reluctance to use YELP's paid advertising. Again and again, I cannot (and should not be allowed to) review YELP if I never personally dealt with them. However, YELP is trying to hide behind the First Amendment. The First Amendment never intended to create organizations like YELP, where anyone can provide false information about other business. YELP can name the review as they wish, but in reality it is simply a derogatory statement of non existing client, with the purpose of defamation to my law firm.. Yelp claims that "we don't adjudicate disputes between businesses and their reviewers." In actuality, they do by refusing to remove the review and simply siding with a non existing client, which I am starting to believe could be someone associated with YELP. The "statutory immunity to online service providers such as Yelp for the content of third-party posts" is simply not an applicable argument. The issue is not YELP themselves, but their refusal to remove a review form their site. Yelp continues "More importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses." How is the public benefiting from a false statement. In short, YELP's response is same as they have done in the past - cut and paste of inapplicable case and statutory law in attempt to avoid responsibility of wilful refusal to serve the truth. Sincerely,Vassil [redacted]

Hi ***,Thank you for your response.You wrote, "I have nothing showing me the number of clicks or the price per click. A statement should have been sent if there were clicks involved and I have never received anything about it." To clarify, information about the number of ad clicks you received is available in your Yelp Business Account. You can access this information by logging in to your account at [redacted] and then clicking on the Yelp Ads tab. From there, you can select the appropriate dropdown menu options to view a breakdown of your ad spend per month.We've also included a breakdown of your charges below.July 28 - 31, 2016- You received 10 ad clicks at an average cost per click of $3.55, which cost a total of $35.49- Your prorated enhanced profile features cost $6.46- You were charged $41.95 on August 1, 2016August 2016- You received 38 ad clicks at an average cost per click of $7.24, which cost a total of $275- Your enhanced profile features cost $50- You were charged $325 on September 1, 2016September 2016- You received 24 ad clicks at an average cost per click of $11.46, which cost a total of $275- Your enhanced profile features cost $50- You are responsible for an outstanding balance of $325 for advertising services delivered in in SeptemberWith regards to the price per click, as noted in your contract, you signed up for a Cost-Per-Click (CPC) auction-based auto-bidding program, which means that you agreed to allow Yelp to set the bid price per click to keep you competitive in the market. It's important to keep in mind that the price fluctuated up or down depending on competition, relevance, and other factors. However, it was always the lowest price possible to win the click.We hope that clarifies the charges.Regards,***Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2016/01/12) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for Wicked. We are sorry to hear you were not satisfied with your advertising campaign. To be clear,... while the goal of advertising on Yelp is to drive more traffic to the business page, which may ultimately result in more customers, it is important to keep in mind that results are not guaranteed. When advertising with a packaged Cost Per Click program, you were electing to pay every time a user clicks on your ad impression. You were also paying for additional features such as a featured video and enhanced profile (which included features such as competitor ad removal and a photo slideshow). You also expressed concern that you hit your monthly budget cap. As you noted, you signed up for an advertising program with $125 monthly fixed costs plus up to $275 monthly variable costs, for a monthly maximum of $400. The monthly fixed costs were for your featured video ($75 per month) and enhanced profile ($50 per month). Your advertising program also included a cost per click (CPC) program and your monthly cost per click budget cap was set at $275, which means you were only charged when someone clicked on your ad and you agreed to pay up to $275 a month for those ad clicks. If you did not reach your monthly budget cap, you would only be charged for the ad clicks you received. However, if you did reach your monthly budget cap, we no longer delivered ads for your business for the remainder of the month so that you wouldn't have to pay more than you agreed to. Additionally, please note that your Cost Per Click program was an auction-based auto-bidding program, which means that you agreed to allow Yelp to set the bid price per click price to keep you competitive in the market. It's important to keep in mind that the price will fluctuate up or down depending on competition, relevance, and other factors. However, it will always be the lowest price possible to win the click. It appears a manager, ***, was in touch with you after you filed this BBB complaint. As you may recall, your advertising program has been cancelled as of January 6, 2016, and you will not have any further fees to pay. Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/09/28) */ Hi ***, Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] Bakery, Inc You expressed concern with our advertising feature that allows businesses to display ads for their business on their competitors' business pagesThis is meant to enhance the user experience by suggesting relevant businesses that Yelp's users may not have previously consideredYelp also offers programs that will remove competitor ads from a business's Yelp page With regards to your comment, "Yelp is altering my competitors reviews because he is an advertiser," we want to be clear that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more You also expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measuredEven though it inevitably affects legitimate reviews from time to time and misses some fake ones, too, it helps protect the integrity of the site both for consumers (who will be less likely to be led astray by bogus reviews) and business owners (who will spend less time worrying about whether their competitors are writing negative reviews about them) It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US Finally, you expressed concern with some negative reviews, stating, "they were obviously fake or, in one case, contained only factual information that was misleading and false." Please note that Yelp does not take sides on factual disputes, and generally speaking, if a review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, it is our policy to allow the user to stand by his/her reviewThat said, if you have already received an email from us about our decision to remove or leave up content you reported and would like us to take a second look, you can submit a new inquiry by providing the case number (this is provided in our previously emailed response to the content you flagged) here: http://www.yelp-support.com/article/Can-I-request-a-second-evaluation-of-somethi...⇄ Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc Initial Consumer Rebuttal / [redacted] (3000, 7, 2015/09/29) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) The response from Yelp does not address my specific concernsThe response is a boilerplate response of information they post on their web siteI provided three specific remedies and would have liked to have heard that they'll consider any one of them or indicate that they've had other concerns of this nature and are working to address themThey did not In the days since this complaint was filed I had another review that was negative and it was followed up by a sales call from YelpI need to underscore the fact that these calls are starkly different than the multitude of solicitations I receive each week for advertisingOther companies sell their ability to build my brand and promote my productsThis Yelp representative was once again selling PROTECTION OF MY YELP REPUTATIONThis is so upsetting to me I would like Yelp to allow a 3rd party to independently verify any one of my claimsIf they have nothing to hide then they have nothing to fearTo put this in perspective, my business must submit to periodic inspections from the Department of Agriculture to ensure safe food handling practicesWe have nothing to fear when an inspector arrives because we strive daily to ensure that we operate responsiblyYelp appears to be receiving concerns from a broad base of businesses - not just mineIf they are unwilling to address these issues then they must be hiding something The difficult part of this problem for me is that this is not a typical consumer issueI do not have the option to do business with YelpMy business is forced to have a relationship with Yelp whether I opt to purchase advertising or any other service from them or whether I do notI can't choose to place management of my online reputation with one provider or another, therefore I have no power Here is my middle ground: I cannot except a boilerplate response from YelpI need at least one specific action from them specifically for meThey can choose which of the three they'd like to address, or suggest something else, but it is not fair or appropriate to ask me to submit requests into their automated systems again Final Business Response / [redacted] (4000, 9, 2015/10/08) */ Hi ***, Thank you for your feedback You wrote, "In the days since this complaint was filed I had another review that was negative and it was followed up by a sales call from Yelp." We want to reiterate that there is no relationship between reviews and anything having to do with Yelp Ads or the Yelp Ads sales processThere's no amount of money a business can pay to manipulate their reviews or rating and Yelp doesn't skew things in favor of advertisers or against businesses that don't If you believe, however, that an individual has provided you with different information, we would like to investigate furtherTo that end, please provide us with the name of the individual whom you spoke with, their phone number, and the date and time of your conversation with them, if known It also sounds as though you don't accept our explanation of the recommendation software, but we can only stand by our previous statementsYelp's recommendation software is an automated algorithm that attempts to weed out less reliable reviews while showcasing more reliable onesThis means that when reviews are posted to your listing, not all of them will make the cutWe acknowledge that even some legitimate reviews will not be recommended, but we still believe that the software as a whole makes our site more trustworthy and useful to consumers As indicated in our prior response, the recommendation software is automated to help avoid the potential for human bias inherent in individual decision-making: we cannot reverse the software's decisions, either to suppress an active review or to restore a review that isn't currently recommendedThis also means (and I can say this with 100% certainty) that we cannot manually manipulate the recommendation software to favor an advertiser or punish a non-advertiserBut once again, the system is not static reviews may come and go as the software picks up new information We recognize that there have been news stories alleging that Yelp manipulates reviews and ratings to reward advertisers, yet these allegations are not based in factPlease consider: Third party research (such as Harvard Business School) has debunked this conspiracy Courts have rejected the conspiracy due to the lack of any fact-based evidence A simple search across the site proves that non-advertisers often have excellent and 5-star ratings while many advertisers have low ratings For more information about this issue, please visit http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ We do understand the recommendation software can be frustrating at times, and your feedback is appreciatedWhen it comes down to it, all review sites face the same challenge: how to identify fake reviews among the many millions of legitimate reviewsIt's no easy task, and there is always room for improvementWe hope to be able to continually improve on this issue We also want to address your comment, "it is not fair or appropriate to ask me to submit requests into their automated systems again." We want to clarify that we have a dedicated team of people who evaluate the photos, reviews, and other posts that users bring to our attentionActions taken by this team of people (the Yelp Support team) are separate from actions taken by Yelp's automated recommendation softwareIf you report a review by clicking on the flag icon next to it, then the content will be evaluated against our Content Guidelines and Terms of Service by someone on the Yelp Support teamSimilarly, if you request a second evaluation here http://www.yelp-support.com/article/Can-I-request-a-second-evaluation-of-somethi...⇄ of content you have already reported, someone else on our Yelp Support team will take a second look Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Hi [redacted] Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] ***.We appreciate you bringing this to our attention, and have informed our Sales team that you no longer wish to receive any communication from themIf for any reason you continue to hear from them, please let us know at http://www.yelp.com/support/contact/questionsIf you'd like to update your email notification preferences, you can do so by logging in to your business account at [redacted] , clicking "Account Settings" at the top of the page, and then clicking "Manage your email preferences." From there, check or uncheck the appropriate boxes, and then click "Save Settings."Regards,***Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 5, 2015/08/24) */ Hi Dr***, Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] ***, DDS We first want to be clear that a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp, or a business's decision to downgrade their advertising program, does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise or if they downgrade their advertising program, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more You also expressed concern with the recommendation softwareAs you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measuredEven though it inevitably affects legitimate reviews from time to time and misses some fake ones, too, it helps protect the integrity of the site both for consumers (who will be less likely to be led astray by bogus reviews) and business owners (who will spend less time worrying about whether their competitors are writing negative reviews about them) It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsYou wrote, "all the valid reviews should be moved to the main reviews list," but please understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US You also expressed concern with a review of your businessWe assume you are referring to the review by Laura K, as you've previously flagged this reviewAs you may recall from the message you received from the Yelp Support team, the review has been evaluated and left up, as it was not found to be in violation of our guidelinesYou claim that this review is "falsified"; however, Yelp does not take sides in factual disputesRather, if a review appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, it is our policy to allow the user to stand by his/her review Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 6, 2015/11/24) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for writingWe are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business pages for [redacted] and [redacted] You expressed concern with some reviewsIt looks like you may be referring to the reviews by [redacted] C and [redacted] G, as you've previously reported these reviewsWe have taken a second look at these reviews but, after careful consideration, we reached the same conclusion as before and are unable to remove the reviewsAdditionally, we have carefully considered your concerns that one of the reviewers may have a conflict of interest, but we are still unable to confirm the conflict using the information we have in our systemsIf a review appears to reflect the reviewer's personal experiences and opinions, it is our policy to let the user stand behind his or her review You also asked for your businesses to be removed from Yelp, but we actually don't remove business listing informationWhile some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the lawMore importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses We also want to address your comment, "They participate in unfair and shady practices involving removing star reviews when you do not agree to advertise with them." To be clear, a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treatedBusinesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertiseWe understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and http://officialblog.yelp.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-...⇄ to learn more With regard to your concerns with the recommendation software, as you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable contentThe recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured, and looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviewsPlease also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a reviewHowever, the system is not static reviews may become recommended or not recommended over time as the system continues to make decisions based on a variety of factors To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc Initial Consumer Rebuttal / [redacted] (3000, 8, 2015/12/08) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) It is understood that Yelp as a business cannot distinguish between a competitor or ex employee reviewThat is unfortunate and has caused lots of grief for hard working business ownersHowever, information being posted on a business yelp page violates TOS and Content GuidelinesWe have NEVER been contacted by Yelp regarding the " [redacted] G" review [redacted] G makes multiple statements regarding our Ventnor location while she writes her review referring to our Northfield locationA yelp user with an ax to grind has posted information that will ensure that we will lose revenuePosting that a "Juice Bar" does not produce "Fresh Juice" when we do in fact produce "Fresh Juice" is not within the terms of service and is a violationWe are a Juice BarFor a person to post that we do not produce fresh juice at our Ventnor store is absurd and is sure to hurt our bottom lineWe create jobs and have employees who depend on us to feed their familiesWhy has this review not been removed or at the very least, moved to the appropriate page? We have a yelp page for our Northfield store which is a "grab and go" locationWe are requesting your help in removing this review based on its multiple violations or at the least, moving it to the appropriate storeOur Ventnor store is a FULL SERVICE location an should not be represented as otherwiseWe will lose business when people wrongly accuse of not producing the product we advertiseYou yourself can see that we advertise "Fresh Juice" and we obviously have produced such based on the other reviews we haveWhy can someone now go on and state that our Ventnor store does not produce fresh juice? Why did we even claim the Northfield business if Yelp is going to just allow anyone to post and inappropriate information on our Ventnor store? I previously had a reviewer write a review for our Northfield store that ended up on our Ventnor Yelp pageYelp agreed to remove this review because they admitted that the review was for the wrong storeThis prompted us to claim the Northfield pageAdditionally, per Yelps guidelines, reviews should be based off of a "personal experience"The reviewer herself, " [redacted] G" states that she is not reviewing the business based off of "personal experience"I urge Yelp to please review [redacted] G's review for the wrong store and to please either delete it due to the violations I listed above or to please at least move it to the appropriate store so that our mother store, Ventnor, is not harmed by this review which states informationWe have already received multiple phone calls asking us if we make juice on site due to the information in this reviewPlease help us rectify this situation and bring it to a close Final Business Response / [redacted] (4000, 10, 2015/12/21) */ Hi [redacted] , Thank you for your response We wanted to let you know that [redacted] G's review has been moved to the Northfield location Regards, [redacted] Yelp Inc