Reviews policy
Reviews are not open yet. This policy is published before they are, so that it is a commitment rather than a defence written after the first argument.
Who can write one
Anyone with a verified account. Verification is by phone number, because a phone number costs money and an email address does not.
A review marked Verified customer is one where the author showed evidence of the transaction — an invoice, a job card, a payment. It is optional, it is badged, and it counts for more. Everything else is an ordinary review and is published all the same.
How we verify reviews: we verify the account, and we verify a transaction only where the author offers evidence. We do not check that every reviewer was a customer. That is the honest answer, and the law requires us to give it.
What happens to a review after it is posted
It is published immediately. Nobody reads it first and decides whether it deserves to appear.
One review per person per business, editable rather than repostable.
What gets removed, and what never does
Removed for breaking a content rule: illegal content, personal attacks, someone else's personal data, content that is not about this business, and sabotage by a competitor.
Never removed for being negative. Not on request, not for a paying advertiser, not for a phone call. An advertiser's complaint goes into the same queue as anyone else's, and is logged as such. Removing criticism because a business asked is itself an unfair commercial practice under EU consumer law, and it would destroy the only thing this catalogue is for.
When a review is removed, both the author and the business get a written statement of the reason, and the author gets one appeal.
Right of reply
Every claimed business can reply publicly to any review about it, always, without asking us. The reply appears under the review.
If a business flags a review as not from a customer, we ask the author privately for evidence of the transaction. No answer within 14 days and the review or its badge comes down. We adjudicate whether a transaction happened. We never adjudicate whether an opinion is fair.
Ranking and votes
Reviews sort by recency by default. There is an upvote and no downvote: at the scale of a small island, fifteen coordinated votes could bury a review, and burying criticism systematically is the thing the law forbids.
Votes never touch the star average, and never change how visible a critical review is. The most helpful positive review and the most helpful critical review are shown side by side at the top of every business page, always.
Ratings
A business's score is a Bayesian average, pulled toward the site-wide mean when there are few reviews. One five-star review does not outrank forty at 4.8 — which also removes most of the payoff from buying three fake ones.
Reporting something
Use the report link on any review, or write to hello@carservice.cy. Say which review and which of the rules above you think it breaks.