American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Cowshed Cowboy · Post by **Cowshed Cowboy** » Mon Sep 28, 2020 11:06 am

Do any of you write reviews of places you stay in or eat at, must admit I've never bothered to make the effort. Admittedly I do read other peoples reviews for accomodation, you can generally ignore the odd outlier like this guy's review obviously was, but if enough people make the same comment regarding some aspect of the place I take that as a reasonable reflection of the reality.

I've never stayed anywhere that was so bad I felt the need to post a negative review, if there was something that I felt was lacking I'd rather mention it directly with the person in charge, I've often seen replies to reviews along the lines of an apology and " we wish you'd brought it up on your stay and we'd have sorted out the problem ". Reviews can have a powerful impact and perhaps some people don't realise they could be putting the livelihoods of often poorly paid hardworking staff at risk for situations totally outside their control.

Interesting case.

God'sGift · Post by **God'sGift** » Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:23 pm

if you are not 'allowed' to make a negative review, then what's the point of reviews anyway...?

phuketrichard · Post by **phuketrichard** » Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:46 pm

God'sGift wrote: ↑Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:23 pm if you are not 'allowed' to make a negative review, then what's the point of reviews anyway...?

and goes without saying, but i will
if ur not allowed to assign negative karma, what the point of assigning positive?

la8rat · Post by **la8rat** » Mon Sep 28, 2020 3:58 pm

I've made positive reviews about places and then not been able to book there the next year due to increased popularity. I don't bother anymore.. Kind of shooting yourself in the foot.

newkidontheblock · Post by **newkidontheblock** » Mon Sep 28, 2020 11:20 pm

Corkage fee is a very relevant part of a review. And the fact that the manager was kind enough to make an exception. It shows flexibility by the management. Why didn’t he include it in the original review?

I rarely drink alcohol, so never had to deal with a corkage fee. But I would think it’s very important to those who like their particular brand of liquor.

Personally, I’ve left reviews on both Agoda and on CEO. There are some CEO members who disagree with my impressions of a resort, but that’s their opinion. No personal attacks, please.

nerdlinger · Post by **nerdlinger** » Tue Sep 29, 2020 12:29 am

Cowshed Cowboy wrote: ↑Mon Sep 28, 2020 11:06 am some people don't realise they could be putting the livelihoods of often poorly paid hardworking staff at risk for situations totally outside their control.

I don’t necessarily see it like that - holidaymakers are gonna go somewhere, I can’t imagine anyone pondering a Thai holiday but deciding to stay at home because none of the hotels had a high enough tripadvisor rating. That money is gonna go somewhere so it may as well go to places that get it right.

(Edit: fwiw the only times I’ve ever written a bad review have been when somewhere was flat out criminal scamming)

phuketrichard · Post by **phuketrichard** » Tue Sep 29, 2020 2:46 pm

from
TA

Ironically, it was an expat hotel manager who pursued the legal action, not the Thai owners.

monomial · Post by **monomial** » Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:01 am

The customer was probably a jerk, and wrote an unnecessarily vindictive review. But every business owner, hotel or otherwise, knows you have to deal with that. I have customers that leave unfair, crappy and downright false reviews all the time. Worse, satisfied customers don't leave reviews, so the majority of reviews are usually bad. But you don't have the customer arrested because he is an asshat. In fact, the very act of filing a defamation suit against the customer makes me think there probably is something to the guy's complaint.

If the owner had simply shrugged it off and let it go, like any well balanced person would have, I would probably have simply discounted that particular review as over the top. I mean slavery? Really? Now however, I can say for sure I would never stay at this hotel. There is simply too much risk the customer was telling the truth...

Anyone who would file a defamation case for this clearly has emotional issues.

RandyN · Post by **RandyN** » Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:56 am

Anchor Moy · Post by **Anchor Moy** » Wed Sep 30, 2020 1:27 am

monomial wrote: ↑Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:01 am The customer was probably a jerk, and wrote an unnecessarily vindictive review. But every business owner, hotel or otherwise, knows you have to deal with that. I have customers that leave unfair, crappy and downright false reviews all the time. Worse, satisfied customers don't leave reviews, so the majority of reviews are usually bad. But you don't have the customer arrested because he is an asshat. In fact, the very act of filing a defamation suit against the customer makes me think there probably is something to the guy's complaint.

If the owner had simply shrugged it off and let it go, like any well balanced person would have, I would probably have simply discounted that particular review as over the top. I mean slavery? Really? Now however, I can say for sure I would never stay at this hotel. There is simply too much risk the customer was telling the truth...

Anyone who would file a defamation case for this clearly has emotional issues.

Think the problem for the hotel was that he has been writing multiple negative reviews about their hotel every few weeks since he stayed there. He is the one who should let it go IMO. No balanced person writes more than one negative review surely ? Multiple negative reviews from one person (who stayed one night I think ) is not fair because it does push down the better reviews. Also, I suppose that there are not many guests right now on Koh Chang so every vote counts.

And all this because he wanted to drink his gin in the restaurant ? Really ?

My 2c.

American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

Re: American facing jail for negative reviews of Thai resort

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