User reviews can't replace star ratings

On Tuesday night (6th December), the Tourism Society held a Debate at Westminster Central Hall chaired by Lord Thurso MP, with panellists from VisitEngland and TripAdvisor, on the motion "This house believes that the abundance of user-generated rating sites, which are more useful to both he public and the travel sector, have the potential to make grading systems obsolete". The only point made from the hall which raised applause was mine when I said that the user-review sites are not yet doing enough to ensure their content is genuine. The motion was defeated by a considerable majority.

There will be a big feature on user-review sites - and TripAdvisor in particular - in the Dec/Jan issue of Bed & Breakfast news, which should be out tomorrow afternoon (Friday 8th) on the Association's member pages, and a link will be sent to all members then.

As always, give us your views at comment@bandbassociation.org