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Amazon: My Public Shame

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Re: Amazon: My Public Shame

#448741

Postby onthemove » October 8th, 2021, 12:58 pm

Lanark wrote:I used to write detailed reviews for Amazon, but then I realised how much bad faith there is in the reviews system - they would take good reviews and move them onto completely different products, so I gave up and deleted everything.


I don't think they take reviews and 'move' them.

I think it's rather a case that the product page to which your review is attached gets (ahem) updated. In some cases updated rather more than just a few tweaks to correct errors.. rather updated to be a completely new product.

But yes I absolutely HATE that tactic, and surely it must count as misleading advertising.

I must admit, I've been a bit more proactive... every now and again I look back through my reviews, and if I see the product being shown is now no longer the product that I bought I leave the review in place but SLAM my rating down to 1 star, and update my review text to make it damn clear to anyone reading that my review is not for the product shown.... it also alerts customers that chances are the other reviews on the page are probably not for the current product either. And the 1 star rating then hopefully acts as a disincentive for the retailer to keep playing this trick.

I was going to say that I'm not sure Amazon themselves do this sort of thing, and that it might just be third party retailers to which Amazon seem to turn a blind eye, but I've just checked and a set of socks that I bought and reviewed, when I bought a second time, they were slightly different to the first, and these are sold by Amazon. The picture on the product page had been updated, so you got what you saw in the picture each time, but my review from the previous incarnation was still there and associated with the new incarnation of the product. ... and it bugged me that it said I'd already purchased this item, because the second purchase didn't match with the first! The sock pattern was slightly different, so I couldn't pair up the socks from my first purchase with those from my second purchase which is a pain.

That aside, I must admit, Amazon is one of the few websites that I do write reviews on because in my experience they'll let you say largely anything you want, including stating the price you paid, which retailer you bought from, even comparing against other products from other companies including the price in high street shops even when that's cheaper. So I've got to give them credit for that. They'll let you post a critical review just as happily as a positive review.

I've refused to write reviews on a number of other retailers' websites because they rejected my reviews on the basis that I included the price paid. Well, the price paid determines the value, and hence my rating. If it was a good price, I might rate something 5 stars and exceptionally good value, but you can sure as heck be that the retailer will happily put the price up at some point in the future, and then my review saying great value and 5 stars will still be there, even though I might not think it's worth the new price at all. So if I can't include the price I paid - and therefore the price at which I judged the value - then I refuse to write a review.

Credit should also go to Amazon for letting you edit your reviews - and delete them - after you've posted them. Some retailers push you to write a review as soon as you've purchased but then you can't update it later when the product falls apart or stops working.

But yes, I agree Amazon's 'evolution' of products on product pages while the reviews for previous incarnations remain in place, is rather (in my view) deceitful. I wish they wouldn't do it, and surely it can't be legal (misleading advertising).


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