Most businesses understand how important online reviews have become.
A strong collection of genuine Google reviews can improve trust, encourage enquiries and help potential customers choose one business over another. A handful of damaging reviews, meanwhile, can feel frustrating — particularly when a business owner believes they are unfair.
That makes messages promising cheap positive reviews and guaranteed removal of negative ones tempting.
One of our clients recently received an unsolicited message offering:
“Google positive reviews only £5 per review”
The same person offered to remove negative Google reviews for £100 and negative Trustpilot reviews for £150.
They even claimed the service could help the business become “ranked number 1 on Google”.
It might sound like an inexpensive shortcut to a better online reputation.
It isn’t.
Buying fake reviews or paying someone to manipulate your review profile can expose your business to Google penalties, reputational damage and, in the UK, potentially serious consumer law issues.
Fake Reviews Are Now Specifically Banned in UK Consumer Law
This is no longer simply a question of whether buying reviews breaches Google’s rules.
Since 6 April 2025, provisions of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCC Act) have applied to commercial practices in the UK.
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) identifies fake reviews as a commercial practice that can be considered unfair in all circumstances.
This includes businesses writing fake reviews themselves or commissioning somebody else to create them.
In other words, paying somebody £5 to leave a glowing Google review despite never having used your business isn’t clever reputation management.
It’s fake engagement designed to mislead potential customers.
Google Doesn’t Allow Purchased Reviews
Google’s policies are equally clear.
Google prohibits content that does not represent a genuine experience. This includes reviews incentivised through payments, discounts, free products, or services.
It also prohibits attempts to manipulate reviews by discouraging negative feedback or selectively soliciting positive feedback.
So when someone contacts your business promising 20, 50 or 100 five-star Google reviews, they’re not offering a legitimate SEO service.
They’re offering to manipulate Google’s review system.
What Could Google Actually Do?
One argument we occasionally hear is:
“But how would Google know?”
That is a dangerous assumption.
Google has enormous quantities of behavioural and account data available to identify unusual review activity. A sudden influx of reviews from accounts with suspicious histories or patterns doesn’t necessarily look natural simply because the review text itself looks convincing.
And Google can take action.
Where Google determines that a business has violated its fake engagement policy, potential restrictions include:
- removing the offending reviews;
- temporarily preventing the Business Profile from receiving new reviews or ratings;
- temporarily unpublishing existing reviews and ratings;
- displaying a warning on the Business Profile telling potential customers that fake reviews were removed.
That last consequence is particularly important.
Imagine spending money on fake reviews to make your company look more trustworthy, only to end up with Google effectively warning prospective customers that your reviews have been manipulated.
The attempted reputation boost could achieve precisely the opposite.
Google Has Already Agreed to Tougher Action in the UK
This isn’t an obscure policy that nobody enforces.
In January 2025, the CMA announced that Google had agreed to introduce enhanced processes for tackling fake reviews in the UK.
Among the measures was a commitment to sanction UK businesses found to have artificially boosted their star ratings with fake reviews.
That included warning alerts being displayed on profiles where fake reviews had been detected.
Businesses should therefore assume that fake-review detection is becoming more sophisticated, not less.
What About Paying to Have Negative Google Reviews Removed?
This requires a little more nuance.
There are legitimate circumstances in which a negative Google review can be removed.
For example, a review may breach Google’s policies because it is spam, fake, abusive, contains inappropriate material or has no connection with a genuine experience.
Businesses can legitimately report reviews that breach Google’s policies and ask Google to assess them.
That’s very different from somebody promising:
“Google Negative Reviews (1–25 Days) delete only £100”
No legitimate third party can simply decide that a genuine negative Google review should disappear.
Google controls its platform and determines whether reviews breach its policies.
A reputable reputation-management or SEO company might help you assess a review, gather evidence and use Google’s official reporting and appeal processes.
It should not promise that an inconvenient but genuine review can simply be bought out of existence.
And Trustpilot?
The same principle applies.
Trustpilot explicitly prohibits fake reviews and says businesses should not write, request or encourage fake reviews.
Businesses can flag content that breaches Trustpilot’s guidelines, including reviews suspected of not representing a genuine experience.
However, simply disliking a review, disagreeing with it or considering it unfair isn’t sufficient reason for removal.
Trustpilot also warns that misuse of its platform can result in actions including restrictions, account suspension, Consumer Warnings, hiding a TrustScore and potentially legal action.
So paying an unknown third party who promises to make genuine negative reviews disappear isn’t a sensible reputation strategy there either.
The SEO Claim Should Be Another Red Flag
The message received by our client included another familiar promise:
“I hope you will be ranked number 1 in Google ranking.”
There is no credible way to guarantee that purchasing a batch of reviews will make a business number one on Google.
Reviews can certainly contribute to a business’s online prominence, reputation and local search presence. Genuine reviews can also influence whether somebody chooses to click, call or request a quotation.
But local search rankings depend on numerous signals.
Anyone selling £5 reviews alongside promises of number-one Google rankings should therefore be treated with considerable caution.
Fake Reviews Can Damage Something More Valuable Than Rankings
There’s another issue that isn’t really about SEO at all.
Trust.
Suppose a potential customer sees 150 five-star reviews and chooses a contractor, solicitor, restaurant, garage or funeral director because those reviews suggest consistently exceptional service.
If a significant proportion of those reviews came from people who had never dealt with the company, the customer has been deliberately misled.
That’s precisely why regulators and review platforms take the issue seriously.
Consumers are also increasingly good at spotting suspicious review profiles.
Dozens of generic five-star reviews appearing within a short period can raise more questions than they answer.
Negative Reviews Aren’t Necessarily Bad for Your Business
It may sound counterintuitive, but a completely spotless review profile isn’t always the most convincing.
Real businesses occasionally have unhappy customers.
What matters is how the business responds.
A thoughtful response to criticism can demonstrate professionalism, accountability and good customer service.
If somebody complains about a delay, misunderstanding or problem, a calm public response explaining what happened and offering to resolve it may actually give future customers confidence.
Trying to erase every criticism can be much less convincing.
What Should You Do With a Genuine Negative Review?
First, establish whether the reviewer was genuinely a customer and whether the complaint has any basis.
If the review breaches the platform’s rules, use the platform’s official reporting procedure.
If it appears genuine, respond professionally.
Avoid getting into an argument. Acknowledge the customer’s concerns, correct important factual inaccuracies calmly, and, where appropriate, invite them to contact you privately so you can investigate the problem.
And if you resolve the issue successfully, the customer may decide to update their review themselves.
That’s genuine reputation management.
How Should You Get More Positive Reviews?
The safest strategy is also the simplest:
Ask real customers.
Build review requests into your normal customer journey.
Depending on the business, that could mean asking after a completed installation, successful delivery, finished project or resolved support request.
Make leaving a review straightforward by providing customers with a direct link to your Google review form.
Most importantly, don’t tell customers what rating to leave.
Ask for their honest feedback.
Over time, a steady flow of genuine customer reviews creates something that £5 fake reviews cannot reproduce: credible evidence that real people have actually used and recommend your business.
Received One of These Messages? Delete It
Businesses are increasingly approached through email, WhatsApp, website forms and social media by people selling Google reviews or promising guaranteed review removal.
Our advice is simple.
Don’t buy them.
If a review is fake or breaches Google’s guidelines, there are legitimate ways to challenge it.
If your business needs more positive reviews, there are legitimate ways to encourage customers to leave them.
And if your overall online reputation needs improving, that should come from better customer experiences, better communication and a structured review strategy — not 50 five-star reviews bought from a stranger on the internet.
A strong reputation takes time to build.
It can take considerably less time to destroy.
Chris Giles Snr built his first client website in 1995 and has remained at the leading edge of web development and SEO ever since. He is a Fellow of The Chartered Institute of Marketing (FCIM).
