Reviews now decide where many customers book, eat and buy. Australia, New Zealand and the UK all treat fake or manipulated reviews as misleading conduct, and the UK has made the rules tougher. We design review systems that are honest by default and still bring in more of them.
The rules have caught up
In Australia, the ACCC treats fake reviews, selectively publishing only positive ones and hiding negative ones as potentially misleading under the Australian Consumer Law. New Zealand applies similar principles through the Fair Trading Act. In the UK, the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 brought in an explicit ban on fake reviews and on concealed incentivised reviews from April 2025, enforced by the CMA.
For a small business the practical message is simple. Asking for reviews is fine. Writing them, buying them, paying only for good ones or quietly burying the bad ones is not.
The Studio review moment
Most businesses ask for a review at a random point, usually by automated email days later. We pick the moment the customer feels the result, then make the ask personal, short and easy. For a resort that might be the morning after a perfect dinner. For a tradesperson it is the moment the job is signed off and the site is clean.
We also design the reply. Every review gets a response from a named person, positive or negative. A calm, specific reply to a two-star review often does more for trust than ten five-star ones.
- Ask everyone, not just the happy ones.
- Ask at the moment of value, by a person they met.
- Never offer a reward that depends on the rating.
- Reply to every review within a set time, signed by name.
- Feed what you learn back into the service.
Put it to work
A practical next step
Write down the single moment in your customer journey when people are happiest. Move your review request to that moment, make it come from a person, and set a weekly half hour to reply to every review by name.
Explore the toolsSources and method
- ACCC on online reviews
Australian guidance on soliciting, publishing and moderating reviews.
- CMA guidance on unfair commercial practices
UK guidance under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, including fake reviews.
- Commerce Commission New Zealand
Fair Trading Act guidance for New Zealand businesses.
The methods in this article are Maurice Studio recommendations. External sources inform the underlying principles and rules referred to. They do not validate the Studio approach or guarantee commercial results. Rules change, so check the current position for your business and get specialist advice where it matters.