Rant about reviews
 

First off i would like to say that i think this site is a excellent source of information with lots of good people who like to help.

But i have a problem with the reviews that we are allowed to post up.

I have read many post of people who have had problems with vendors and people only to have the post locked or deleted.

I have been a member for over a year and when i need something or information this is the first place i look.

I believe if people could post up reviews of their experiences people would know who they could use and who they could not.

I read a thread last night about someone having issues about buying frags and the way they were shipped but we cannot say who it was or what happened.

We are only allowed to put up positive reviews, If that is the case how do we warn others of the negative stuff that goes on.

I am out $1400.00 for equipment that was ordered because nobody could warn me. And i have no way of warning others. I really doubt that i will see the money or product seeing how this has been almost 5 months now.And i know that i am not the only one.

If this post is inappropriate please let me know how i am suppose to get my point across. I mean no disrespect.

I would just like to know how we as consumers are suppose to know who is a good vendor and who is not if we cannot post up what has really happened to us.

Hope somebody can give me some insight.

Keith

Keith, it has caused fights, threats of legal action and numerous other issues over the years. We've decided that we just cant deal with the problems it generates. We're just all doing this on our own time so that everyone has a place to get good technical advice and chat with other reefers in the hobby. I know the benefit of saying "Store X is a ripoff, they took all my money and gave me nothing", but we just can't manage the fallout from these posts.
Then there are the others. Store Y sucks. No it doesn't. Yes it does. Goes on for pages. That is not the purpose of the board. We try to be as good as we can within scope of what we can manage, and we, as a group that staff the board, decided we do not have time to manage this type of posting.
Sorry, it's the best we can do with what we've got.

i feel the same way. i finally took the plunge and ordered online for frags only to receive a completely dead shipment. the shipment was replaced and then 2 more pieces from that one are dead and i have still to get my money back for those pieces. this really ****ed me off because i have been so nervous for ordering online and now this happened.

Here's the best we can do.

If you're about to order something online and you're suffering from anxiety, post asking for PMs of others experiences. If you get 50 PM replies from other members saying don't order from the place you're thinking of, then you have an answer. Eventually the stores that screw people will either change, or go away.

If i go asking for PMs do you think people will just start posting in the thread and have it locked down?

Keith

Just wondering, has an eBay type rating system ever been considered? There could be different categories for each vendor on a scale from 1 - 5. Categories could be Quality, Service, Communication....etc. Perhaps a poll for each vendor?

Exactly the right thing to do imo...

People will pm you if they feel strongly, both positively & negatively, about the store you're inquiring about.

If people start posting comments instead of keeping it in pm's then Mod's will delete the offending posts & maybe lock the thread.

And even if the thread is locked down, people can still pm you.

Simple.

VFX.

.

Very good comprimise... I know I send a lot more PMs than I post. If I were a vendor I would be more concerned about the PMs than the open forum.

Scott

Reviews
 

Hi Keith and Colin, I have been a member for a while and watched the discussions over this topic . Frustrating as it is to not be able to 'warn ' others , I think the administrators have it dead right and do a remarkable job of keeping this site civilised and free from rants and unnacceptable content.
There are always two sides to every conflict and Brad clearly highlights some of the possible complications arising from trying to mediate. It is a no win situation for Canreef.

As I see it we have some excellent sponsors and plenty of positive feedback so maybe the way to go is to use this facility. ( I have no connection with any sponsor !!)

Sorry you seem to have had an unfortunate experience...............

................Dave

I know it would be nice to have reviews but I think it is best done in private through PM as suggested and not in the open... this topic has been discussed many a time as well.....

I love coming to this site way above any other reefing site on the web for the simple fact that it is sooooo laid back here... I do more reading then posting but the reason I stay here is that there is almost a cozy feel to this place.....some of the other bulletin boards where they have forums set up specifically for rating people you have bought/sold to/from get out of control and the bashing starts followed shortly there after by threats of law suites etc etc... It is a whole lot of drama that I would rather do without on my home site....makes for an intimidating environment... and from reading any of those vendor reviews it is all a bunch of he said she said were nothing is really accomplished.... "You suck as a seller!"
"OHHHH REALLY!!? Well you suck as a buyer!"
"OHHHH REALLLY!!!!? WELL your momma!!!"
"MY MOMMA!? Now you just gone done it!!! I'm calling the police!"
"WELL I AM SUEING!!!"

Etc etc....

That is my two cents.....FWIW

Is it possible to create a thread that does not allow replies?

Maybe there could be an area that allows members to post that they have a negative review to share but in order to learn about it the poster must be contacted outside of the forum via e-mail, phone, etc? No names would allowed. The poster could state the general geographical region, if it is hardware related or livestock, etc. Just to narrow down the posts a bit.

This would "take it outside" the forum, give members the option to learn about the negatives as well as the positives and would put the task of dealing with the back lash created by the review on the original poster.

Do you think that might creat a bit of a problem due to the fact that someone can post things about another reefer and that person has no way to defend themselves other then start a new thread to critisize the original poster? (if that makes any sense lol)

I hear you, it can be very frustrating for both members and staff as if there is one particular sponsor/vendor that is having issues it must not be brought up by name. I understand the business side of it as well. This web site require the donations/sponsorship of the vendors in order to exist. It is advertising for them and in some instances they provide discounts to members. Now I will play devils advocate for a bit, If I was a vendor and a member had a problem with a service that I provided, I wouldn't want that member slamming me on the website. As a business owner myself I have a policy in my shop."If you like what we do, tell your friends. If you don't like what we do, tell me". It states this as it give me the provider of the service or part to get first crack at making it right. I might have hundreds of very satisfied customers but I would think twice about advertising on a website that allows 2or 3 unhappy people who are quick to name, names rather than trying to work it out with me first. It is all about customer satisfaction. Now from the other point. If there was one particular vendor that was constantly providing poor service to the members I would like to see that vendor pulled from the website, but here is the catch. How do you tell without naming names in a thread? I think there should be a members only spot on the website that vendors cannot have axcess to and staff and members can share the good and bad experiences regarding sponsoring vendors. Then staff can see if a vendor is providing poor service or not. Is this a possibility, probably not but who knows. There is also the private message avenue as well. Maybe some of the CR staff can address this better than I can.:biggrin:

I am not sure how the reefer being discussed would know he/she is being discussed as no names would be allowed. However If he/she had anything to say or ask he/she would contact the original poster via email. It's no different then me and a fellow reefer discussing another reefer face to face or over the email, the reefer in question wouldn't be there to defend himself either.

seems like a plan, just make sure to clear your in-box.

If someone was to post up a thread asking for peoples experiences with a company via PM would you respond to that person only if you had a negative experience or a positive one or both? Would you even respond?

Would it be okay to start thread that said PM me for my experience with XXXX vendor. Or is this a bad idea.

Keith

I would be one to respond either way. If I have a good experience I tell anyone I know who needs that service. If I have a bad experience I tell everyone even if they don't want to know or want to listen.

Scott

I would imagine most people would respond either way. Usually people who have good experiences with stores are loyal to them and will tell anyone who will listen about how fabulous they are. Same goes for people with bad experiences.

Like Skylord for example :wink:

I would also be willing to respond via pm's whether it's good or bad.

Depends on the the question. If it's "have you been ever ripped off by XX?" you'll get one set of answers, if it's "considering purchasing from YY, pls give feedback good or bad" you'll get other answers. It's also a heads up to XX and YY that people are watching and gives them the opportunity to PM the buyer to clarify issues that they think might be coming back to haunt them.

I'm just wondering about the rating forum on RC and how it's done. Some how I don't think they have a team of lawyers vetting every rating, is it they're not worried about lawsuits or is the threat overated. Thinking from my Judge Judy watching, if I give negative feedback and it was true I wouldn't have much to worry about, nor would Canreef.

Can see about staying away from vendor rating as just a matter of economics.

Maybe

No, we are not rating vendors at all.

Feel free to utilize the "Forward" features of PMs that you have received about other people's experiences with vendors. This will allow that person to get the information per verbatim from the original author without any misinterpretations.

If we were taken to court, even if we're in the right, it involves our time and money to defend ourselves. The owner of the board currently resides in Hong Kong and I can't see that he really wants to fly here to deal with something like that, or hire someone to do it on his behalf.
Thats the whole point here. It's just way easier to run a board without all that trouble. If a business screws people, it will go out of business eventually. We certainly don't need a public broadcast system for vendor alerts, and if someone really wants to complain, file with the BBB, and others can check with the BBB for reviews.
Now, another point, which does not apply to all cases, but many. Everyone on this board has already bought stuff for their tanks. If the place you bought from treated you well, be loyal to them. Don't worry about some new shop that is $2 cheaper, stay with who is good to you. There are plenty of comments on this board over the last 7 years touting how wonderful many of the regular sponsors are. You all gave them these comments, so stick with them.
I heard of one person who was blatantly warned about not shopping at one particular store. They took your money and didn't deliver. Well, this person tried anyway, becase, well, it looked like a deal. Hmm, well, it wasn't and they should have listened to their friend.

Stick with who's been good to you, and you don't need to post reviews.

I think this is a great topic and I have noticed that in general all the aquarium related forums are lacking some kind of "FEEDBACK" system...

I understand the "he said, she said" stuff would get old fast for the moderators & I respect that.

I belong to another forum called "CANADIANGUNNUTZ" (take a guess) and on that forum there is a feedback system for each time you buy and sell - you simply go to the person you bought from or sold to and provide feedback after each transaction. I think this keeps everyone honest and weeds out the people who have bad intentions...

http://www.canadiangunnutz.com/

Have a look at the link to the site!

I just love how I can go in and look at each users rating before I buy something from them across the country. Each user has a number behind their user name in brackets {ex: Doo(8)} and that is the number of transactions they have made and when you click on that number up comes a page with all the feedback left for them by others.

This works for vendors and fellow members both alike. :)

Just my though on a system that works for 10,000+ users and might work for us...

Thank you

Again, we already have a system that works for us. We just dont allow it.

The true problem comes from canreef charging vendor fees, how would you like it if you paid to have your company name on here, and right below your thread is a thread bashing your company. If there were no vendor fees then they have no true legal action. Which i still doubt they have even though they pay to advertise. But thems the breaks I dont even bother with the vender reviews positive or negative anymore its just a waste of time. I only use canreef to gain and extended knowledge to individuals and of course the buy/sell and lounge.

I just noticed a "What camera" thread with a link to dpreview.com. Then I thought hey, great idea, someone should start up a reefreview.ca, an online wbsite reviewing vendors in Canada.
Anyone?

Lots of places out there for people to voice complaints. Usenet News Groups, Yahoo Groups, etc etc.

If I am wrong perhaps one of the staff can correct me, It boils down to economics as well. Any business relies on advertising and sponsors. The products they sell depends on the word of mouth reports they get from the consumer. Now CR relies on it's sponsors as well, hence the "free to join membership". If members were allowed to slam any sponsor regarding product or service, the sponsors would pull out and advertise somewhere else. I also know that other reef forums will not allow or tolerate their advertising sponsors to be slammed by the members. As I stated before, if one or two members crack down on one sponsor/vendor it can put off other members from doing business and it may have not even been the sponsors fault. I will also point out that in my opinion the staff here are very relaxed about what they allow and don't allow. Check out some of the other reef sites and you will see what I mean. I enjoy the fact that you can have a spirited debate sometimes without having it yanked. Again, try that in some of the other sites. I am very happy with this site and as a business owner I do understand the staff's position. I would like to see a way of rating some vendors but this isn't Ebay. So as I was once told by a former boss when I questioned a companies policy, he said to me. "Don't fight the system, you wont win this one". He was right. The system is set up to what works for them.

The staff here just can't seem to get away from the out cry from people to allow vendor ratings. I feel sorry for them being caught in the middle of an ethics debate. Its never going to happen no matter how hard you try. It just ends up with people getting frustrated (staff and members) :twised:. There is no solution to this as it is the rules and it must be followed.

Hey I agree I wish it would happen so that the bad vendors were not allowed to conduct there criminal dealings on this forum, but I know it will never happen as I have spoken out on this forum several times as to the obligation of the board to not support this type of vendor but thier hands are tied. Oh well. I'm over it now. Just wish this subject was never brought up again.

Speaking of an ethical issue.

Anyone want to buy my soon to be EX-Wife :mrgreen:

Sell her to you really cheap. :lol:

Thats easy to say when your not the one out the $1400.00 that i could have been warn about if people were allowed to inform others.

Keith

This is an important thread and topic and I would like to share my opinions based on being a consumer and a Future Vendor.

1) I agree with CR Staff negative reviews will only cause trouble and should be banned.
2) CR Staff are currently allowing positive reviews which is great.
3) Vendors advertise on this site to increase customer business, not take away or hinder it.


Many sites like Ebay, Frags.org, etc use a numbering system for grading Vendor performance.
What if Canreef set up a Positive Review Site (like a Poll) that gave you 5 categories to grade from 1-5 1 being Good and 5 being Perfect. Only your grade selection would be allowed on the Review Site and possibly (name???)
Also Canreef would allow the vendors a choice whether they wanted to be part of the Review Site or not.
This would be a win win situation for us all as a customer we can see the vendors that are doing exceptional and make our decisions to purchase accordingly. As a vendor you can choose whether or not this review site would benefit your company or NOT and choose not to be part of the review area.

Just my personal opinion and hope that someone can chime in and help take this to the next level with more ideas.
Kevin

I'm sorry you're out money, but it is not the responsibility of Canreef to monitor vendor conduct. If you've been taken advantage of, I would pursue legal action through appropriate means.
This topic is something we've discussed at length for many years, and we've adopted a policy that works for us in running this board. It's not designed to assist anyone in stealing your money, it's just how we can manage the board long term with the least amount of trouble.

Pics and price please... :mrgreen:

does she clean? is she reef safe?

HAHAHAH who am I kidding I already have one & ONE IS PLENTY! :lol:

Trying to lighten up the topic :redface:

Has anyone ever attempted legal action with a vendor? PM if you have any experience with this. Judging from the response to this thread i am not sure about Can Reefs policy working.

Keith

I'm sorry but I can't stay out of this now. Its your responsibility to ban any vendor from this forum that you know is not a good vendor, comitting criminal acts against canreefers (fraud, theft, etc.etc.). Do you not realize that you are also legally liable if you support a vendor that is comitting a criminal act against people on this forum and are aware of it. Perhaps if someone has a beef with a vendor you should send them a pm and listen to what they have to say. Sometimes people just want to vent and all they need is someone to care.

I realize that this post may cause me to loose my membership (I'll just sign in under a different name) but I need to voice my opinion.

So at that point, I think we all want to know 24storm, is this a vendor in our forum ?

I for one will PM you to find out who stung you in case I can help.

Why do people feel the need to post such stupid comments?? Never has any one lost their posting rights for this kind of thing, so give it a rest already.

Now, we provide a board to discuss reef related topics as defined by the ownership of the board. We are in no way responsible for anything a store does in it's dealings with any customer, whether they advertise here or not. And for what it's worth, the only store that has had this brought to our attention is no longer an advertiser on this board.

We are not looking for vendor rating methods or ideas, we just do not allow it here. Period. This is not something that will be discussed or negotiated.

If anyone can find a board that supports it, please post it there.

Lets compare......
 

I am going to step in quickly here to revert some questions back to you for consideration in response to your comments:

1) Is the Vancouver Sun or The Province or ANY newspaper responsible to ban any vendors from their Classified sections that they know are not a good vendor?

My guess is no however feel free to contradict my beliefs if otherwise.

2) Are the media companies also legally liable if they support a vendor committing a criminal act?

My guess again is no because if one is to look at the numerous "Massage" parlours and Personal Ads in the Classified section where in essence it is public advertissement of prostitution.

How about the car vendors that sell used cars that later turn out to be vehicles with altered VINs? My guess is again no they are not legally liable because they are only providing a service for these companies to advertise in their papers.

3) If the victim consumers of these Personal Ads, Massage Parlours, or car vendors were to write to the media company complaining about their experience with that particular company, are they OBLIGATED to publish this information?
My guess is they are not obligated to publish this information but they will if it is news worthy.

This analogy is not much different from Canreef's position and policy on this matter. Both environments are privately owned and they both set their own policies and regulations. Vendors will advertise and Canreef provides a service for these companies to do so. For reasons already outlined very well by Brad, Canreef is not obligated to publish vendor ratings and they are moderated by the staff accordingly.

We (the staff and owner) sincerely want to keep Canreef as positive of an environment as possible and this topic has been discussed many times before publicly and amongst the staff. We have all collectively agreed on this therefore we hope you all understand the position we have taken and that this decision had not been made in haste.

Having said that I understand you may have been angry, upset or maybe even irrational when you wrote your post however I will encourage you to conduct in better mannerisms with the concludiing remarks of your posts.