Yelp.com

Complaint: [redacted]I am rejecting this response because:Sincerely,Tyler[redacted]

Hi [redacted],Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted].You expressed concern with a review. It look like you are referring to the review by [redacted]., as you've previously reported this review. We've taken...

another look at [redacted].'s review, and since it appears to reflect the personal experience and opinions of the reviewer, we are leaving it intact.While we share your concern about the possibility of a defamatory review on our site, we don't adjudicate disputes between businesses and their reviewers. Congress acknowledged this predicament by passing legislation that provides statutory immunity to online service providers such as Yelp for the content of third-party posts. See [redacted]. The case law is clear on this point in support of online service providers because of concerns that they would otherwise be forced to remove third party posts every time someone raised issue with their contents. See [redacted]That said, we will revisit your request if you provide to us a final judicial determination that the contents of a review are defamatory and will, at our discretion, take appropriate action with respect to the review and the user responsible for the review.We encourage you to contact the reviewer directly using the private messaging function on our site in order to constructively address your concerns. We do not recommend that you engage in anything other than a well-meaning dialog with the reviewer in order to sort out any misunderstandings.You also asked for your business to be removed from Yelp; however, we don't remove business information. While some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the law. More importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses.Regards,[redacted]Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/11/16) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for The [redacted]
You expressed concern that a page was created for your business. We license basic business...

information from third party data providers who gather this type of information from public records and other sources. We also get business information from our users, who are helpful enough to correct the info we have, or let us know about a new spot that just opened down the street.
You asked for your business to be removed from Yelp, but we actually don't remove business listing information. While some business owners might prefer to keep a lower profile, this kind of information is publicly available and its use is protected under the law. More importantly, we believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.
Initial Consumer Rebuttal /* (3000, 7, 2015/11/17) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
It is not the public listing of my business that I disagree with. It is their review system. I don't want to participate in their allowing of anonymous reviews that can harm businesses. They can "believe that the public benefits from sharing their experiences with local businesses" all they want. I don't share the belief that their method of "sharing" is helpful, and it is actually harmful to the businesses they claim to be helping. Businesses are forced to publicly address "feedback" and become obsessed with dealing with the negative effect on their business from one negative-and often vicious- review. Their energy is spent not on keeping their business alive and on improving their business, but on managing yelp reviews. That is why I did not want to be listed on their site. I did not create this situation and yet I am having to deal with it. I am all for feedback about my business that is given respectfully and privately so that I can address their individual concern. This site makes "feedback" a dramatic spectacle that is not about helping businesses, but driving traffic towards yelp. I don't share yelp's "beliefs" and don't want to be forced to have to deal with the effects of their "beliefs" on my business.
Final Business Response /* (4000, 9, 2015/11/25) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for your response.
Yelp publishes business information so that consumers can share their experiences about local businesses, and because the information is typically a matter of public record and public concern. While we understand that some business owners might prefer to keep a low profile, it's important (and a legal right) for consumers to be able to find and share helpful information about great local businesses.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Complaint: [redacted]I am rejecting this response because: the business does not accept fault for representatives using deceptive practices "bait and switch" we'll give you free clicks (I was told double clicks, that's not 160) and not let you cancel
Sincerely,Heather [redacted]

Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing.
We are unable to locate the business page in question with the information that you've provided.
Please reply to this message with a direct link to the page so that we can further assist you.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/05/27) */
Hi Dr. [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for Well-Adjusted Chiropractic, Acupuncture, and Massage.
You expressed concern with the recommendation...

software. As you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable content. The recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured. The software looks at dozens of different signals, including various measures of quality, reliability, and activity on Yelp. Most of all, however, it's looking for people who are intrinsically motivated to share the wide range of rich and detailed experiences they have every day with local businesses.
It's important to note that the software applies the same analysis to everyone, and that it affects both positive and negative reviews. You asked that we "Post all of them or none of them," but please understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a review. However, 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.
Additionally, while we understand your concerns, we want to make sure you are clear that federal law bars lawsuits against websites like Yelp for the decisions they make about which reviews to post or remove. See Carafano v. Metrosplash. com. Inc., 339 F. 3d 1119 (9th Cir. 2003); Zeran v. America Online, Inc., 129 F.3d 327 (4th Cir. 1997); Barrett v. Rosenthal, 40 Cal. 4th 33 (Cal. 2006).
To learn more about recommended reviews, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/Recommended_Reviews?l=en_US
With regards to your comment, "A complete stranger can write a review about a business that they have never been to and YELP will still post it and the business owner has no recourse with YELP." if you believe a review violates Yelp's Content Guidelines (http://www.yelp.com/guidelines), you can report the content by clicking the flag icon next to it. While reporting something doesn't guarantee that it'll be removed, our team looks at every inquiry and carefully evaluates the content against our guidelines. You'll need to be logged in to your account in order to view the flag icon. For instructions on how to report content, please visit: http://www.yelp-support.com/article/How-do-I-flag-a-review?l=en_US.
Finally, to address your comment, "I can't even get anyone on the phone with YELP. They don't answer, keep rerouting you," while our Yelp Support team doesn't offer phone based support, they do provide email based support through our Support Center (http://www.yelp-support.com). We've tried to include detailed answers to the questions we most frequently receive in our Support Center, but there may be situations you encounter where you'll need to contact our Support team for assistance. For these specific situations, there are articles in the Support Center that include submission forms to inquire about the issue.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

I am sorry when I spoke to you guys in January the two times I stressed and December that no calls were coming in. I expressed that I was not happy with the services and that I wanted a refund. At end of January manager told me they were closing account. So I had no service for the month of January and you guys did nothing to make me as new customer happy and kept rebuttling everything I had to say rather then work with me. Also I was told I'd have help setting up profile which I never recieved. You guys took my money lied to me and did not deliver what was promised and didn't though explain your services.  When I complained about it you did nothing to fix the complaint. So I put stop to it. Again I will not compromise in this matter. You have training issues and false your sales approach. I want full refund. You need to get paid for services you promise and not under deliver your promise s and expect to get paid for something you didn't do of what you promised.
 
Complaint: [redacted]I am rejecting this response because:Sincerely,[redacted]

Hi [redacted],Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted]According to our records, you redeemed a $300 promotional ad credit. To redeem the $300 credit towards Yelp ads, you were required to sign up for our Cost...

Per Click (CPC) advertising campaign and put a credit card on file. You set your Cost Per Click monthly budget at $250, and also signed up for our enhanced profile features, which cost $75 per month. Once the promotion runs out, advertising continues until you stop your ads through your Yelp for Business Owners Account.Your advertising program was a self-serve program, which means that ads can only be turned off by the business through the Yelp for Business Owners Account. If you only wanted to use your $300 promotion, you would have needed to log in and end the program once that credit was used. In Step 3 of your ad setup there were Q&A's on the right side of the page explaining that you could stop your ads any time through the Yelp for Business Owners site: "Can I stop any time? Yes. There's no commitment or obligation. Just come back to the Yelp for Business Owners site and stop your ads. You will be billed at the beginning of the next month for any clicks you bought before you cancelled."Below is a more detailed description of how the promotion was applied:January 28 - 31, 2016- You received 10 ad clicks which cost a total of $28.81- Your prorated Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $8.65- $37.46 of your $300 credit was used and you paid $0February 2016- You received 84 ad clicks which cost a total of $250- Your Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $75- You had $262.54 remaining promotional credit for this month because it was partially used in January- You paid $62.46 for advertising services delivered in February.March 2016- You received 23 ad clicks which cost a total of $250- Your Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $75- You had 0 remaining promotional credit for this month because it was used in January and February- You paid $325 for advertising services delivered in March.April 1 - 30, 2016- You received 21 ad clicks which cost a total of $250- Your prorated Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $74.86- You paid $324.86 for advertising services delivered in AprilYou can view a breakdown of how many ad clicks you received by logging in to your Yelp for Business Owners Account at [redacted] and then clicking on the Yelp Ads tab.You ended your advertising program on April 30, 2016. As advertising services have been delivered in accordance with the Terms you agreed to, we will not be able to offer you a refund. Thanks for understanding.Regards,[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Hi [redacted],Thank you for your response. We appreciate your feedback, and would like to provide some additional clarification about your advertising program.You wrote, "Yelp intentionally maxed out my ad campaign ever month to $325, an amount $200 beyond the original amount of $125 I signed up for, by charging exorbitant amounts per click without providing any ROI results." While you may have discussed another advertising program that included $125 fixed monthly costs with your sales representative, ultimately the advertising agreement you agreed to was for $50 monthly fixed costs (which went towards your enhanced profile and featured video) plus up to $275 monthly variable costs (which went to your Cost Per Click ads). We have attached a copy of your advertising agreement for your records.With regards to your concern with the variable price per click, as noted in your contract, your advertising package included 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 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. Additionally, please note that we aim to maximize the number of clicks you get for your budget over the course of the month.You also expressed concern that you saw "no increase in traffic" to your business. While it is our hope that advertisers will find success via the Yelp advertising program, we want to reiterate that results are not guaranteed.Additionally, we want to address your comment, "Yelp repeatedly attempted to reject my request to cancel my campaign by calling my business daily to stagnant and prolong the process while continuing to charge me for advertising." As stated in your advertising agreement, we require 30 days written notice to your account management contact if you wish to terminate your advertising program. According to our records, our account management team received a cancellation request from you in October, and your advertising program was terminated on October 31, 2016 due to non-payment. If you submitted a written cancellation request prior to October, could you please forward us the email (including headers) [redacted], so that we can look into this further? Please be sure to indicate that it is in regards to Revdex.com [redacted]Regards,[redacted]Yelp Inc.

Hi Daniel,Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for Cling & Peck. We appreciate your feedback, and have forwarded your concerns to the appropriate parties.  As you may recall, a Customer Success Manager,...

Bethany, reached out to you yesterday, February 14, 2018 to let you know that we are refunding you $225.12. Regards,HelenYelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/12/10) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted]
It looks like a manager, **, reached out to you on December 2, 2015, the day after you filed...

this Revdex.com complaint. As you may recall from your conversation with him, your advertising program has been terminated and the early termination fee has been waived.
We're sorry to hear you were not satisfied with your advertising campaign and that the address was not updated in a timely manner. It appears the address changes you submitted were initially rejected because our moderators could not verify the new information at that time. The address has since been updated: http://www.yelp.com/biz/bolt-mechanics-farmingdale-3.
Our records indicate that you signed up for an advertising program with $75 monthly fixed costs plus up to $275 monthly variable costs, for a monthly maximum of $350. The monthly fixed costs were for your enhanced profile, which included features such as competitor ad removal and a photo slideshow. Your 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. You can view a breakdown the number of ad clicks you received by logging in to your Yelp for Business Owners Account at https://biz.yelp.com/ and clicking on the "Yelp Ads" tab.
We also want to address your comment, "They log and subsequently charge users for actions such as consumer phone calls." We want to clarify that when advertising with a Cost Per Click program, you are electing to pay every time a user clicks on your ad impression. However, you are not being charged "for actions such as consumer phone calls." Please keep in mind that the activity you see in the Activity Feed feature is not necessarily from users who have clicked on your ad. This activity may also be from users who found your business page through other means, such as our natural search results.
We hope you will continue to take advantage of the free features available to you on your Yelp for Business Owners Account to engage with the Yelp community. For guidance, please visit https://biz.yelp.com/support/using_business_account
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Hi [redacted],Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted] [redacted].To clarify, our cost-per-click advertising programs are auction-based auto-bidding programs, which means that advertisers agree to allow Yelp to set the...

bid price per click to keep them competitive in the market. In other words, the price per click will fluctuate up or down depending on competition, relevance, and other factors, but it will always be the lowest price possible to win the click.We appreciate you bringing your concerns to our attention, and we've forwarded your message to the appropriate parties. As you may recall, a manager, [redacted], reached out to you to let you know that we are refunding you $45.18, which is the difference between the amount you were charged and the cost of your pro-rated enhanced profile features and your 92 ad clicks if the price per click had been $1.69.We hope you will continue to take advantage of the free features available to you on your business account to engage with the Yelp community. For guidance, please visit [redacted]Regards,[redacted]Yelp Inc.

Hi [redacted],Thank you for writing. We appreciate your feedback regarding your advertising program for [redacted] - [redacted].As you noted, you redeemed a $300 promotional ad credit. To redeem the $300 credit towards Yelp ads, you were required to sign up for our Cost Per Click (CPC)...

advertising campaign and put a credit card on file. You set your Cost Per Click monthly budget at $300, and also signed up for our enhanced profile features, which cost $75 per month. Once the promotion runs out, advertising continues until you stop your ads through your Yelp for Business Owners Account.Your advertising program was a self-serve program, which means that ads can only be turned off by the business through the Yelp for Business Owners Account. If you only wanted to use your $300 promotion, you would have needed to log in and end the program once that credit was used. In Step 3 of your ad setup there were Q&A's on the right side of the page explaining that you could stop your ads any time through the Yelp for Business Owners site: "Can I stop any time? Yes. There's no commitment or obligation. Just come back to the Yelp for Business Owners site and stop your ads. You will be billed at the beginning of the next month for any clicks you bought before you cancelled."Below is a more detailed description of how the promotion was applied:July 19 - 31, 2016- You received 12 ad clicks which cost a total of $123.31- Your prorated Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $30.83- $154.14 of your $300 credit was used and you paid $0August 2016- You received 30 ad clicks which cost a total of $300- Your Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $75- You had $145.86 remaining promotional credit for this month because it was partially used in July- You paid $229.14 for advertising services delivered in AugustSeptember 1 - 7, 2016- You received 3 ad clicks which cost a total of $32.27- Your prorated Call To Action, Slideshow, and Remove Competitor Ads features cost $16.20- You had 0 remaining promotional credit for this month because it was used in July and August- $48.47 worth of advertising services were delivered in SeptemberYou can view a breakdown of how many ad clicks you received by logging in to your Yelp for Business Owners Account at [redacted] and then clicking on the Yelp Ads tab.You ended your advertising program on September 7, 2016. It looks like a manager, [redacted], reached out to you by voicemail on September 12, 2016. It appears she informed you that we would not be able to refund your for your self-service ad program, but that the upcoming $48.47 charge for advertising services delivered from September 1 - 7, 2016 would be written off. We've also forwarded your message to the appropriate parties for their consideration. Regards,[redacted]Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2016/01/19) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns.
On our end, it looks like [redacted] sent you emails on December 30, 2015 and on January 4, 6, and 14, 2016, but perhaps some of his messages...

ended up in your spam folder. According to our records, your voucher for BellaTude Hair Salon was refunded on 1/4/2016 to your AMEX. We suggest looking back through your records to verify that the money was refunded to your account.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2015/09/28) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We 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 pages. This is meant to enhance the user experience by suggesting relevant businesses that Yelp's users may not have previously considered. Yelp 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 treated. Businesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertise. We 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 software. As you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable content. The recommendation software establishes an objective standard against which every review can be measured. Even 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 reviews. Please also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a review. However, 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 review. That 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 /* (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 concerns. The response is a boilerplate response of information they post on their web site. I 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 them. They 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 Yelp. I need to underscore the fact that these calls are starkly different than the multitude of solicitations I receive each week for advertising. Other companies sell their ability to build my brand and promote my products. This Yelp representative was once again selling PROTECTION OF MY YELP REPUTATION. This is so upsetting to me.
I would like Yelp to allow a 3rd party to independently verify any one of my claims. If they have nothing to hide then they have nothing to fear. To put this in perspective, my business must submit to periodic inspections from the Department of Agriculture to ensure safe food handling practices. We have nothing to fear when an inspector arrives because we strive daily to ensure that we operate responsibly. Yelp appears to be receiving concerns from a broad base of businesses - not just mine. If 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 issue. I do not have the option to do business with Yelp. My 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 not. I 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 Yelp. I need at least one specific action from them specifically for me. They 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 /* (4000, 9, 2015/10/08) */
Hi [redacted],
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 process. There'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 further. To 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 statements. Yelp's recommendation software is an automated algorithm that attempts to weed out less reliable reviews while showcasing more reliable ones. This means that when reviews are posted to your listing, not all of them will make the cut. We 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 recommended. This 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-advertiser. But 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 fact. Please consider:
1. Third party research (such as Harvard Business School) has debunked this conspiracy.
2. Courts have rejected the conspiracy due to the lack of any fact-based evidence.
3. A simple search across the site proves that non-advertisers often have excellent 4 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 appreciated. When it comes down to it, all review sites face the same challenge: how to identify fake reviews among the many millions of legitimate reviews. It's no easy task, and there is always room for improvement. We 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 attention. Actions taken by this team of people (the Yelp Support team) are separate from actions taken by Yelp's automated recommendation software. If 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 team. Similarly, 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.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2016/01/14) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your advertising program for [redacted].
You expressed concern with the amount of your ad click budget. Our records...

indicate that you signed up for $150 monthly ad click budget and $75 in Enhanced Profile features (Call to Action button, photo slideshow, and removal of competitor ads) for a total monthly maximum of $225. Please note that we recently moved away from a monthly ad click budget to a daily ad click budget. You claim that you set your monthly budget at $15. However, when we were operating by monthly ad budget the minimum was $25 per month, and the minimum daily ad budget requirement now is $1 per day (making the monthly budget $30 or $31 per month), so it would not have been possible to set your monthly budget at $15.
You also expressed concern with the $204.40 you were recently charged. According to our records, you received $225 worth of advertising services ($150 in ad clicks plus $75 for your Enhanced Profile) in December. Your advertising program was billed in arrears, and because you had $20.60 of your promotional credit left in December, you were charged $204.40 for advertising services you received in December.
It appears you ended your advertising program on January 2, 2016 through your Yelp for Business Owners Account. As advertising services have been delivered in accordance with the Terms you agreed to, we will not be able to offer you a refund. However, your remaining outstanding balance of $4.44 for advertising services delivered in January has been waived, so you will not incur further charges.
We hope you will continue to take advantage of the free features available to you on your business account to engage with the Yelp community. For guidance, please visit https://biz.yelp.com/support/using_business_account
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.

Initial Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2016/03/16) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns.
It looks like you contacted our Support team the same day you filed this Revdex.com complaint, and that you've since been in touch with my...

colleague [redacted]. He is looking into the information you forwarded.
We also want to clarify that Yelp is primarily intended for the review of local businesses, rather than online businesses. It looks like your review of Fashion Nova was removed because it appeared to be about an online experience rather than an experience at the store location you posted to.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.
Initial Consumer Rebuttal /* (3000, 7, 2016/03/18) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
I have not been in contact with [redacted], as he never contacted me back. I explained to [redacted], and sent him proof that the company was trying to bribe me to remove the YELP review. After I refused to take the bribe from them, they contacted YELP who later on removed the review. I sent proof in the form of emails between myself and the manager at the company who gave me offers of discounts as well as a gift card if I changed my review of them. I said no, since I contacted the store several times in hopes for a refund, that I ended up getting only AFTER I told them I was filing a complaint, left that YELP review, and made a Revdex.com complaint. I also saw several complaints from people on your (Yelp's) Facebook page, about how you remove reviews based on what companies offer you. Which makes me wonder, why my review was removed well after this situation happened, and funny enough, in the benefit of the bribing liars. The company broke a " Yelp rule" for contacting me and offering a bribe to take down my review of them. What happens for that? Your company is dishonest, and untrustworthy.
Final Business Response /* (4000, 9, 2016/03/29) */
Hi [redacted],
Thank you for your response.
We first want to address your comments, "I explained to [redacted], and sent him proof that the company was trying to bribe me to remove the YELP review" and "The company broke a " Yelp rule" for contacting me and offering a bribe to take down my review of them. What happens for that?" Please note that anything you send us [redacted] be used publicly as evidence for our Consumer Alert program (https://www.yelpblog.com/2016/02/yelp-consumer-alerts-take-guesswork-online-rev...⇄ if we find that the business is offering compensation for reviews or the removal of reviews. If we do use what you send us, we will remove your name, email address, and other personal information prior to using it.
That said, we want to reiterate that your review of Fashion Nova was removed because it fell outside our Content Guidelines. Because Yelp is primarily intended for the review of local consumer oriented businesses, when reviewing, your review should pertain to the location you are posting your review to. It appears your review was about an online experience and not about an experience with Fashion Nova's Montebello location.
With regards to your comment, "I also saw several complaints from people on your (Yelp's) Facebook page, about how you remove reviews based on what companies offer you," we want to clarify that businesses can't pay us to remove or suppress their bad reviews. Additionally, a business's decision whether or not to advertise on Yelp does not affect how the reviews on its listing are treated. Businesses are not punished if they don't advertise, nor are businesses awarded with preferential treatment with regards to their reviews if they do advertise. We understand there are some misconceptions about this, so we invite you to visit http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq and https://www.yelpblog.com/2013/05/no-yelp-doesnt-extort-small-businesses-see-for-...⇄ to learn more.
Regards,
[redacted]
Yelp Inc.
Final Consumer Response /* (4200, 11, 2016/03/31) */
(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)
I would like to know if you have the emails I sent to [redacted] as proof of what they had done, and if you do have them, what will be the outcome of the FACT that they did try to bribe me before they contacted you to take the review down? This is a company that clearly attempted to bribe me. Also, I don't have to visit a site made by YELP for the benefit of YELP, explaining how YELP doesn't do something YELP clearly does...for instance, taking down reviews without contacting the yelper and understanding the entire picture, FIRST. I can easily go to your Facebook page, or any social media page related to any YELP in any area and interact with real live people who have had the same, or even worse experiences than I have had with YELP. You took down my review, and didn't even allow me to explain that they tried to offer me stuff to take it down before they contacted you. Furthermore, here are your content guidelines, please tell me where it says that I am not allowed to review said location, when I dealt with that location, since its the only one AND their customer service as well... guidelines:
General Guidelines
Yelp allows users to contribute different kinds of content, including reviews, photos, videos, events, votes, tips, private messages, and more. Playing nice isn't rocket science, but just in case, we've put together these general guidelines. Please also read the guidelines below for specific types of content that you might contribute to the site.
Inappropriate content: Colorful language and imagery is fine, but there's no need for threats, harassment, lewdness, hate speech, and other displays of bigotry.
Conflicts of interest: Your contributions should be unbiased and objective. For example, you shouldn't write reviews of your own business or employer, your friends' or relatives' business, your peers or competitors in your industry, or businesses in your networking group. Business owners should not ask customers to write reviews.
Promotional content: Unless you're using your Business Owners Account to add content to your business's profile page, we generally frown upon promotional content. Let's keep the site useful for consumers and not overrun with commercial noise from every user.
Relevance: Please make sure your contributions are relevant and appropriate to the forum. For example, reviews aren't the place for rants about a business's employment practices, political ideologies, extraordinary circumstances, or other matters that don't address the core of the consumer experience.
Privacy: Don't publicize other people's private information. Please don't post close-up photos or videos of other patrons without their permission, and please don't post other people's full names unless you're referring to service providers who are commonly identified by or commonly share their own full names.
Intellectual property: Don't swipe content from other sites or users. You're a smart cookie, so write your own reviews and take your own photos and videos, please!
Demanding payment: Beyond simply asking for a refund to remedy a bad experience, you should not use removing or posting your review as a way to extract payment from a business, regardless of whether you've been a customer.
and when I expanded them....
Expand All
Review Guidelines
The best reviews are passionate and personal. They offer a rich narrative, a wealth of detail, and a helpful tip or two for other consumers. Here are some additional thoughts for conscientious reviewers.
Personal experience: We want to hear about your firsthand consumer experience, not what you heard from your co-worker or significant other. Try to tell your own story without resorting to broad generalizations and conclusory allegations.
Accuracy: Make sure your review is factually correct. Feel free to air your opinions, but don't exaggerate or misrepresent your experience. We don't take sides when it comes to factual disputes, so we expect you to stand behind your review.
Review updates: Review updates should reflect a new experience or interaction with the business. Don't tell the same old story you've already told. If you'd like to add new insight to an old experience, just edit your review instead of creating a new update.
This is my PERSONAL experience. "Firsthand" is a very vague way to describe what we can and cannot write about, especially when the sentence says: "We want to hear about your firsthand consumer experience, not what you heard from your co-worker or significant other."
All that says to me is that you want to hear about the experience I MYSELF had, not the people I know.
You view it as "direct", clearly from what you stated. But I viewed THAT SENTENCE as just my personal experience, and since I am the one who dealt with the store by phone and customer service as well. Both sucked... I felt the review was appropriate.
Definition of firsthand

1
: coming right from the original source
The sentence, again, states NOTHING about location, or me having to physically be there AT ALL. The only thing it states is that the review should come from me, and not the people I know. You guys should clarify that.
And they did fall outside of your "guidelines" very clearly:
Don't ask for reviews and don't offer to pay for them either: Please don't ask your customers to review your business on Yelp. Over time, solicited reviews create bias on your business page a bias that savvy consumers can smell from a mile away. Learn why you shouldn't ask for reviews. You should also never offer compensation (discounts and freebies count too) in exchange for reviews.
YELP was wrong. Fashion Nova was wrong. Lastly, YOU are wrong. But I would still like to know what will be done as far as my experience with them and their attempted bribing, and them breaking the guidelines.
Patiently waiting.

Complaint: [redacted]I am rejecting this response because: it does not address the original complaint about the $112.91. I was unaware that I was being charged, and I received no service for my payment. All I want is for my original charge to be reversed. Now that I understand how Yelp Ads work, I will use them in the future, but I should not be charged for something I didn't use. Yelp designed a system to trap it's customers to force them to blindly pay. I did not willing pay $112.91. I had previously checked and saw a $0 charge, and was very surprised by the unauthorized $112.91. Yelp didn't give me an opportunity to turn off the Yelp Ads before I was charged. The 4 people I have spoken with at Yelp have all been very uncompassionate in their response to me and basically say it is all my fault and I should have known better. I should have known better than to fall for a scam about free advertising. Sincerely,[redacted]

Hi [redacted],Thank you for writing. We are glad to have this opportunity to address your concerns regarding your business page for [redacted].You expressed concern with the recommendation software. As you may have read, the goal of Yelp's recommendation software is to showcase more reliable...

content. The 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 reviews. Please also understand that the recommendation software is automated: we cannot manually override the software to recommend or not recommend a review. However, 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 review. It looks like you are referring to the review by [redacted] as you previously reported this review. We understand that a negative review about an experience you don't recognize is very frustrating. However, based on what we can see in the review and the information at hand, we weren’t able to confirm that this review is on the wrong business page.In some situations business owners find it appropriate to reach out to a reviewer to resolve matters constructively. If you have not already communicated with the reviewer, you might consider leaving a private message or public comment.With a Business Account, you can privately message users or publicly comment on the reviews. You can also post information about your business, upload photos to your listing, and more. You can get started on claiming your business page by clicking the "Claim this business" button, or the "Work here? Claim this business" link on the business page. Please visit our Support Center for more information: [redacted]For help on responding to reviews, please visit: [redacted]Regards,[redacted]Yelp Inc.

Complaint: [redacted]I am rejecting this response because:While I did sign up for a 3 month ad program the ONLY reason I signed up was because the salesperson told me I would be placed on the 1st or 2nd page. You've not commented on the possibility that an overzealous salesperson told me something Yelp couldn't deliver.  Isn't that possible?  I'm not making this up. I started to complain immediately when my ad started to run. I was on the phone many times w/ your acct. exec. complaining that I was mislead and lied to. I was angry than I didn't get what I paid for. I understand how the ads run but I didn't see my ad any closer than page 9 - most often page 13 and this was with your acct. people on the phone with me.  They could see where I was too. Although this is not the issue, I didn't get ONE phone call from my ad listing with Yelp. For that reason, I feel this contract is invalid. One other thing, I don't know the people who wrote my only review.  How does that happen? Do you write bogus reviews?
Sincerely,[redacted]