Hotel Gets Bad Review, Fines Guests $500!

No likes it when someone talks smack about them, but when it comes to a business getting negative feedback, it probably means you should step up your game or look into who's attempting to defraud your work place.  There's an unpopular third option; fine those who give you a bad review.  $500 to be exact.

The Union Street Guest House in New York City even has a POLICY against a bad review, and a policy agreement for you to sign upon check-in. It states: "If you have booked the Inn for a wedding and given us a deposit for guests to stay, there will be a $500 fine that will be deducted from your deposit for every negative review placed on any Internet site by anyone attending your wedding."

That policy was tested last November when someone gave a bad review of the hotel on Yelp.  Those whom wrote the review were contacted twice by the establishment and threatened to fine their friends who got married at the Union Street.  The Yelp reviewers didn't bite, and instead posted the hotel's response to their negative feedback on Yelp, too!  That's lead to irate responses by fellow Yelpers and a backlash by customers, outraged that a hotel would make such a threat.

The Union Street has been back-pedaling and doing damage control ever since, claiming it was a "tongue-in-cheek response" to a bad wedding party years ago.

Whatever the case, if you deserve it, bad reviews can be a good thing!  It makes you address the problem and make sure a bad review doesn't happen again!  But when you take a defensive stance on negative feedback, it just shows your customers you're not willing to tolerate your customer's opinion or that you're just not gonna try that hard to give them good service since you can just fine them to trash-talking you.  Either way, you suck.

Check out more on this story here! (Consumerist.com)