Did you know we’re changing the way guest reviews work?
Hi everyone,
Guest reviews are one of the most important factors of managing a property. We at Booking.com we appreciate the feedback on the fairness and accuracy you have provided of the guest review score.
Thanks to your input, we have made some changes to the way the guest review score is calculated.
In this new system the overall score won’t be determined by the average of the 6 categories, you’ll find all the details in this dedicated article.
Let’s find out what’s new in the improved review system:
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Now guests select an "overall" score themselves
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Smiley faces are replaced by a new sliding scale of 1–10 for this score
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The 1–10 sliding scale means more objective scoring based on guest feedback.
Your feedback helps us improve! Please leave your thoughts in the comments below:
-Ilaria
We'll see how this goes. Could you provide a screen shot of exactly what the customer will see to perform all the scoring.
I really hope the customers understand it!
Hi fluff ,
As per your and M Adamopoulou request, here is a screenshot of what guests will see:
molto grazie
Ilariathankyousomuchfor posting screenshot.
Ilaria I don’t know why but when I choose to reply to someone the inbox is very narrow. Actually I hardly can see what am I writing.
Please let me know if I can do something about it.
Thanks again for your support.
Illaria I sendyouabove a screen shot of the narrow inbox.
Thanks again in advance for helping me.
why change a good system
Nooooooooooooo, it was not a good system.
Please read the many posts explaining why.
This will be interesting...
We'll see how the guest will rate overall score... I think there will be more 7s and less 10s in overall score at least for the bigger properties.
"grabs popcorn".
You said what I was thinking pibomarco !
The layout alone could well instigate this.
Should really have dumped the 4 x smiley scheme entirely.
Totally agree.
They are trying to be like airbnb. I guess they don't know hosts disliked strongly to the point of expanding their brands.
The only problem with the way it was, is my score was mixed in with others and brought down. I just received my first review score from a totally happy guest he gave me 5 smile faces and then an 8. People have no idea what a fluffing 10 means.
He was a real sweet man from India around 60 so he is used to 4 stars and then they change to 5 smile faces and now it is 5 smile faces and a score to 10? What the fluff?
I agree.
1) I think it would be better to have 1-5 points vs. 1-10 point
2) The scale system is freaky for some people. Some told me that they intent to select 10, but somehow some bars “ stuck on 7” . I didn’t believe it at begining, but few people shared that with me.
So, the STAR system like in Airbnb would be nicer simpler and more people will do the review
3. one guest was so happy with my Accommodations, that he start doing review in front of me. It was so long, so many details , just really overwhelming. Finally he said ok. I’m done. I waited and waited for notification but it didn’t show up. I asked can you please check if it went through. He checked and there was few more steps needed to be done. Even he swear that there was something like thank you for your review before that final steps...
So, it should be much more simpler and shorter.
no wondering that people don’t leave reviews. They travel , they are busy and review MUST be shorter and simpler!
4) I would like to rate the Guest as well. How come we not allow to rate them. Some of them not just nice people and they threaten you by leaving bad review or they don’t pay what they must pay and we even afraid to ask, to upset the guest and get “ pay back by bad review “.
I really think we should able to review guest like we do at Airbnb.
The Best Review Score to All, Marita, CA
I agree. I have experienced black mail many times. I have the reviews to back it up on all of my platforms. Some people make a living out of this. I have even been forced to pay these extortionists money. However, it was mostly Air. I cringe when I see an Air guest because I know I won't have control. Still with Booking there are the real fraudsters that file false credit card claims. Still, this is part of the business and the only thing I really like about Booking is I get to control my own funds. If I must duke it out with a bank so be it, but at least it is better than some third party overly confident and basically a new version of the yellow pages taking my money.
I agree, simple is best.
I tend to agree...
agree
This has just happened to my property. I got all 10's on the category ratings and the final grade is 7. The explanation of Booking: the client just rated his stay overall on the island, not at the property. Well, this is just plain stupid. The new system is really going to affect owners and they will leave Booking.com for this. I am already considering it. Well done, Booking!
Just experienced the same thing. sigh.
Why do they keep messing things up?
Guess we need to get on twitter.
Same happened to us. Clearly not all guests understand it. My score is decreasing. If it continues, I will have no option but to leave B.C , as this is bad for business
We should all post this when ever we get a Bad Overall Score which does not tally with the Individual Category Scores showing 10 out of 10's.
9.7 out of 10 is RIDICULOUS.
Since your little experiment with the New Review Score System, we have gone from touching a 9.9 out of 10 down to touching a 9.7 out of 10.
The 6 Individual Category Scores show 10 out of 10, 10, out of 10, 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10, yet the Overall Score awarded by the Guest is only an 8. And furthermore, there are no reasons left by the Guest to let us know WHY they felt we were only an 8 out of 10 despite marking all the components as a 10.
November, December, and January have seen 3 of our LOWEST EVER recorded Guest Review Scores.
Your new Review Scoring Sytem has only been in operation for, oh yes, that ios right, November, December, and January.
Something is rotten in the State of Amsterdam as Hamlet would have said.
This Overall Score System is not working for us, it is not working for any of the Top Rated Motels in New Zealand, get rid of this system before you have a bunch of Motels all scoring a 9 out of 10.
That is where you are headed over the next 24 Months with no Motels in New Zealand scoring over a 9 out of 10.
Do y ou really believe that is the way to go?
You are delusional and need to listen to what is being said.
If Booking.com keep getting told this by their Partners, then they will have to listen.
If you agree, pass this on to all your contacts within the industry.
Have you noticed how they hide the motel *** reviews and scores? I have. If you click on my B&B you will see my reviews plastered all over the first page, but you must dig for those hotel motel reviews. Even the get shanked inn is hard as booking posts the nicer reviews first and guests have no idea how to click to find the NEWEST and LOWEST reviews. Build your brand get instagram, wix, facebook time to ditch these guys and teach people how to book direct. Booking gets worse everyday and I dislike that they do not let me write my description which is what at the end of the day makes guests cross because they do not know exactly what they are getting.
I think very few read descriptions...they prefer to see more pictures and read on reviews.
It is time to start learning how to use third party sites to brand your business. Do you have a website? Time to start building your brand instead of theirs. Get a website on wix they have a hotel site as great as booking and they let guest pay online. Get a facebook page, get instagram and find some worlds greatest host pages on facebook there are lots of host groups to assist in your brand expansion.
Thanks for your suggestions.
I have to state though that BDC has excellent servcices...
This seems like properties with a good rating consider the old system fine and the others bad.
Be careful what you wish for... Better the devil you know... :)
My property rating is 9.4 for the past 90 days and 8.6 forever, not sure why I cannot seem to get to 8.7. So screw the devil. I believe in Jesus. Hah, but this person is from France where nothing can get done easy. I know. My sister lives there.
Well the new system is worse in that case. It drives ratings down..... and many partners are upset.
I would not call it good necessarily, but they did made an OKAY system worse.
If someone has a 9.6 or 9.8 grade will loose it and will low to 9.0 with this introduction.
Yep.
This is stupid. It makes no sense. How are people to know that one happy face is equal to 2.5 out of 10? When you have a 1-10 and then 4 happy faces. Do you imagine people think about this? How about ditch the happy faces and put 2.5 in it's place if you want to keep the 4 places.
Why is it that my property is not ranked upon its own merits? Why is my score manipulated DOWN because of who you consider my peer group? I am a B&B so comparing me to the Bed Bug in aka the Grand Hotel, Motel 6 and Econo lodge is not fair. My 90 day score is 9.4 but my overall score of 8.6 does not change no matter how many 10's I get in a row. What the fluff?
My peer group is other B&B's and maybe homestays but not motels.
From my point of view. It makes morr sense to put a 1 to 10 for each category and have the final average. It makes no sense to have the faces from 1 to 5 and a final score from 1 to 10.
The client will be confused and all the final will be 7 or 8. Everyone will have the same score.
Totally agree. Lets keep it simple. It is the K.I.S.S method. Keep it simple stupid.
or : " Keep it Simple, Son :) "
What if it is a girl? How about Keep it simple silly?
for the P.C peeps.
Exactly, mixing the two is not good.
1-5 star system would be better and simpler!
no happy faces, that is not necessary!
happy faces for lovers, we are business people! Ditch happy faces. Change to 5 star system please!
Make an option to leave reviews for the guest as well!!!!
YESSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!
And many guests, we're learning the hard way, will put the slider at 1 or 2 thinking they are the highest scores they can give.
It was fine before , if its not broken dont try to fix it !
There's a really simple solution to this mess of rating system.
1: Remove the 5 lowest scores, and the 5 highest from your average rating. This way it eliminates the unfair reviews but still have them up there for people to read. At least then our 'comment' would mean something. and 5 highest scores are gone too.
I would be ok with that
or 2: if the difference is really big or the reasoning completely not in your control, change the end score to the old system and use the average score of the 6 smilies
"... the ratings will no longer be used to calculate your overall review score .... Having this independently chosen score is in keeping with industry best practices"
AirBnB use the ratings of cleanliness, location etc to calculate an overall score, in a very similar way to the system that BDC is moving away from
TripAdvisor appears to use a 1/2/3/4/5 system, which appears to be more like what BDC are moving to
Which of AirBnB / TripAdvisor review systems is considered "industry best practices"?
Hi Isle of Wight Vacations ,
"Industry best practices" it's not just referencing the travel industry. There is a norm for the overall experience to be rated separately from categories.
Industry practice is largely that an overall review rating is separate from ratings on individual categories.
Hope that helps,
-Ilaria
Yup, I have this narrow box via mobile as well.
PC version ok.
Exactlyfluff but I am using mostly my iPhone so that’s a problem.
Thanks for attaching a screenshot of what you're seeing M Adamopoulou!
Let's see if the team can reproduce it working out why this is happening.
Do you own a property?
There is no way a guest can rate all 10 and then give an overall rating lower.
It makes no sense.
I had a few guests that rated all 10 except for the location (which is clearly stated on the site, this not really my fault and I can not do anything about the location of my property).
I am sure that these guests would have still given me an overal rating of 10 which would make sense.
On the other hand it does not make sense that the guest gives a total overall rating lower than the rating calculated by his answers.
Simple as that.