Whenever anyone is looking for a place to relax or stay for a few days, many people all over the world sometimes do rely on the Google star ratings on hotels that are posted by Google, but recently Google had to pay a fine of over a total of 1.1 million euros to French hotels due to misleading the tourists based on their Google star ratings.
Google has been applying its own system for rating hotels and places through Google maps and the search engine, but when this seemed a little doubtful to the French hotel owners, the French national competition conducted an investigation on this and found that Google had replaced the rating system that was approved by the government and the public tourist board, and instead had its own system installed with a star rating system suited for Google’s criteria only, this had made the system rate some top leading hotels really poorly which of course affected their audience. This applied to more than 7,500 establishments.
The French national system concluded that these false ratings were not only affecting the overall business of these hotels but also was spreading way too much of false information on their services which led to people who booked their rooms in advance go through a whole lot of stress. It also showed the French tourism industry in a bad light. It led to a negative competition between hotel owners who had a lower ranking in real life but were rated many stars ahead on Google. The DGCCRF concluded that this was rightfully so very unfair to the top ranked hotels and then hereby announced that Google will have to pay a fine for all of these mistakes.
Google of course has agreed to pay the fine of 1.1 million euros as reported by the Directorate General for Competition, Consumption and the Repression of Fraud (DGCCRF) and as also agreed on presenting the actual ratings of these hotels according to Atout France ratings.
People now looking up on Google for honest ratings can now fully trust Google on that. Google’s spokesperson has confirmed that according to the DGCCRF’s actions it will abide to the newly set terms and will make the necessary changes to show the real French hotels star ratings on Google Maps and Search.
Read next: Google is experimenting with new Tabs widths and size options in the new tab scrolling feature for its Chrome browser
Google has been applying its own system for rating hotels and places through Google maps and the search engine, but when this seemed a little doubtful to the French hotel owners, the French national competition conducted an investigation on this and found that Google had replaced the rating system that was approved by the government and the public tourist board, and instead had its own system installed with a star rating system suited for Google’s criteria only, this had made the system rate some top leading hotels really poorly which of course affected their audience. This applied to more than 7,500 establishments.
The French national system concluded that these false ratings were not only affecting the overall business of these hotels but also was spreading way too much of false information on their services which led to people who booked their rooms in advance go through a whole lot of stress. It also showed the French tourism industry in a bad light. It led to a negative competition between hotel owners who had a lower ranking in real life but were rated many stars ahead on Google. The DGCCRF concluded that this was rightfully so very unfair to the top ranked hotels and then hereby announced that Google will have to pay a fine for all of these mistakes.
Google of course has agreed to pay the fine of 1.1 million euros as reported by the Directorate General for Competition, Consumption and the Repression of Fraud (DGCCRF) and as also agreed on presenting the actual ratings of these hotels according to Atout France ratings.
People now looking up on Google for honest ratings can now fully trust Google on that. Google’s spokesperson has confirmed that according to the DGCCRF’s actions it will abide to the newly set terms and will make the necessary changes to show the real French hotels star ratings on Google Maps and Search.
Read next: Google is experimenting with new Tabs widths and size options in the new tab scrolling feature for its Chrome browser
