Reviews and Reputation for Tradespeople: The Rules.

Reputation comes from the work and how you communicate. Then: ask every customer the same way, make it easy, reply without giving away private details, and fix the things that keep coming up.

And stay within the law. Since April 2025, fake reviews and hidden rewards for reviews are banned in the UK.

See how to ask customers for Google reviews.

• Review: a customer's public opinion of your work, on Google or another site.
• Testimonial: a customer's comment you show on your own website or leaflets.
• Fake review: a review that pretends to be from a real customer but isn't.
• Incentivised review: a review given in return for a reward, like a discount or prize draw entry.
• Review gating: only asking customers you think are happy. Google bans it.
• CMA: the Competition and Markets Authority, which enforces consumer law.

Since April 2025, the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act bans businesses from:

• Writing a fake review, or getting someone else to write one.
• Getting reviews in return for a reward without that being made clear.
• Showing reviews in a misleading way, including hiding the bad ones while showing the good ones.

That last point matters for testimonials on your own website: picking only the glowing ones can be misleading. Google's own rules go further, and ban any reward for a review.

The same message, every time, to every customer.

Never buy reviews, offer rewards, or ask customers to hide criticism.

Write for the next customer reading it:

• Thank good reviewers for something specific
• Check your records before replying to criticism
• Never mention addresses, prices or private messages
• Acknowledge the problem without arguing
• Offer a private way to sort it
• Only report reviews that genuinely break the rules

Check first; never reply from the van between jobs.

1. Save the review and your records.
2. Check whether you can match it to a job, without guessing in public.
3. Write a short reply that acknowledges it and offers a private route.
4. Sort it privately if you can.

Don't get friends to argue, threaten the reviewer or share job details.

Yes, with permission. Keep your own job write ups, testimonials and photos on your own website. Review sites change their rules, and accounts get closed. Show a fair mix, not just the best.

Group comments into turning up on time, updates, tidiness, workmanship and invoicing. One unfair comment doesn't define you, but something that keeps coming up deserves a look.