Yelp Under Investigation for Extortion

Sunday, 20 March 2011 06:57 |

By Henry Lewis | WDSD Reporter

This past February, two law firms filed a class action suit accusing Yelp.com of extortion. The lawsuit alleges that Yelp offers to hide negative customer reviews of their businesses in exchange for advertising sponsorship contracts and/or enrolling in a type of tiered membership.

Have you had this kind of experience with Yelp? If so, we would like to hear about it -- e-mail ron@wineanddinesd.com

Yelp.com is a user review and local search website that allows its users to search for businesses in specific locales and read reviews posted by others. Once registered with the website, viewers can review businesses themselves. While the site also incorporates aspects of social marketing in its interface, the majority of viewers visit to search or review local businesses. The website has become increasingly popular since it was launched for the San Francisco market is October 2004.

According to Wikipedia, Yelp.com had more than 39 million monthly unique visitors as of late 2010. Wikipedia states that revenues for the site were approximately $30 million for 2009, with $50 million expected for 2010. In the last two years, the site has expanded its markets throughout the U.S. and Canada to include the United Kingdom, France and Germany.

The class action lawsuit against Yelp was filed on February 23rd in the U.S. District Court, Central District of California, Santa Ana. You can view a PDF of the complaint here. The suit alleges that the site tried to convince a Long Beach veterinary hospital to pay $300 a month, for a minimum 12-month commitment, so that the owners could suppress or delete reviews that disparaged the hospital.

Yelp has received criticism from business owners since its inception. Many believe that it has a bad policy regarding restricting positive reviews as "suspicious" while keeping any and all negative reviews despite the fairness of the review or the possibility that it was intended to disparage a competing business.

So do your own research and decide for yourself whether Yelp portrays an accurate assessment of a business before you trust those star ratings. For more information on the extortion case, read the aforementioned complaint or take a look at the Wired.com and East Bay Express articles on the subject.

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Comments

0 #4 Erin 2012-06-06 21:33

I personally have not had any issues with yelp. I've done hair for 18 years and every time I get a complimentary phone call/card I always mention they could review me online but it nev seems to happen. I imagine getting positive reviews isn't so common. They say their are ten negative reviews written for every positive. I have never personallyexper ienced a negative review either, although the salon does have a few dating back a couple of years, and yes they are annoying to read. I think I would focus not on why five star ones are being erased but why are one/two/three star ones ever being written.

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0 #3 Melanie Lane 2012-06-04 15:58

I also had this happen! I recently posted a five star rating for the salon and it was on the site for a week and then removed. Yelp and other rating sites do both businesses and their respective clients a disservice by not being transparent in what they keep on their site. Hopefully more people become aware of this flaw and demand better service!

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0 #2 Michael Kushner 2012-04-05 22:51

Should i simply state what a relief to discover somebody that simply is familiar with what they are having a debate about on the web. You definitely understand how to bring a dilemma to light making it useful. Lots more people need to read this and appreciate this side of the article. I cant imagine you are not more well-liked because you certainly have the skill.

Regards;
http://www.kushnerlawfirm.com/Business-Lawyers-Santa-Ana-Costa-Mesa.php

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-3 #1 Kimberly 2011-11-11 15:24

YES we have had our own clients go on yelp and put a review on yelp with a 5 star and it is removed emediately! I personally wrote one and not for the sake of bringing up my reveiws but to explain that this site does not keep the reviews that have 5 stars on there and also some things about our staff etc within 12 hours it was removed. we are at a 1 1/2 star and we are and have been so hurt by these reviews because we can not get the ones removed that are slanderous to begin with then to top it off we have non that are really even positive. I have several times thought I guess i have to pay otherwise this is just going to go on. Anyway I am so happy this is happening to them cause it is so wrong!!

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