No I Do Not Want to Leave A Review For Your Business

I had some work done on my house recently. It was fairly standard stuff, a small repair. When it was done, I told the company to email a receipt.

I opened the email only to find that the company had asked — if I was satisfied, would I mind leaving a review? I could do this on Google or Yelp, it didn’t matter. What mattered is that I left a review.

Over the past decade, small businesses have gone to great lengths asking clients or patrons to leave reviews. What started with restaurants, coffee shops and hotels has extended to exterminators, carpenters and electricians.

It’s like everywhere you turn now someone asks you to leave them a review.

On the one hand, I understand it. Like Rotten Tomatoes has done to movies, Google Reviews and Yelp have done to small businesses. People invariably don’t know who to call for service, or where to go for brunch. They simply turn to the companies and establishments who are best-reviewed.

On the other hand, reviews don’t write themselves. And when someone asks me to leave a review— I think it’s only right to ask for a discount. Say it takes me a half hour to write a review, maybe an hour. Time is money and, well, I’ve already paid for the service; so isn’t that hour, technically, one that I am not being compensated for.

A discount on future services would only even things out.