Greenbarn wrote:As a commercial organisation, I'd be interested to know what steps the AA would take in combatting the use of their name and reputation in a fraud, but I can't be arsed to find out how to email them with the question. Their reply might make good reading, though......
I've resisted going down the VB route up to now, and I've not seen anything to make me change my mind. I used to be a member of Cumbria Tourism with my other (non-accommodation) business, but only because I felt we should because we were responsible for the very first CT website, rather than for the benefits on offer.
Well after a long wait someone finally did something, although the results are not exactly what I expected
Here is what I got from Pam Foden of VB yesterday
Re: Misuse of Quality Rating Stars.
I am now back from holiday and have fully investigated your complaint regarding improper use of our VisitEngland star ratings on the individual entries of seven named lodges on www.lakedistrict-stay.co.uk. I have spoken at length with the website owner, Sam Shimeld, and we are now working closely with him on a full manual check of the VisitEngland and AA ratings on his website. You will see that the star ratings of the seven properties that you mentioned have now been removed.
As part of our research, it has also come to our attention that you operate a website, www.limefitt.com on which you display a five star Holiday Park logo and advertise a selection of lodges on the Limefitt Park (VisitEngland five star Park) and White Cross Bay Holiday Park (VisitEngland four star Park). The page for each individual lodge prominently displays VisitEngland’s five star Holiday Park logo (actually an old English Tourism Council logo) on the left-hand side.
VisitEngland gives permission to the Holiday Park awardee only to use this rating logo on their own website and so we must ask you to remove it from your www.limefitt.com website and the www.whitecrossbaylodges.com site, which appears to be a sister site also run by you.
However, if any of the lodges that advertise on your www.limefitt.com or www.whitecrossbaylodges.com sites have a valid VisitEngland rating, with the written permission of the owner, the rating logo may be displayed as a part of their entry. It is also quite acceptable to mention in the copy describing each lodge that the accommodation is situated on a four or five star park, as appropriate.
We look forward to receiving confirmation from you that the inappropriately used VisitEngland Holiday Park star rating logos have been removed from the pages in question.
Thank you for your rather belated response.
As you are no doubt aware as so much time passed between you telling me you were on holiday (6 weeks now) and any response being forthcoming from Visit England that I took it upon myself to contact Trading Standards. As you will have seen from the AKH website this was a frustrating experience to say the least.
I am glad to see that you have taken action though and that VB does indeed appear to have the ability to police its star rating scheme even if it does take a disproportionate amount of effort on the part of members to get anything done.
Further to your reassurance that appropriate action has been taken by the site in question, would you be kind enough to confirm to me that http://www.lakedistrict-stay.co.uk/accommodation/Bowness-73.html does actually have a VE four star rating. I can’t find any lodge with a number 73 or name Lakeview Lodge at White Cross Bay on the VE website. (Mind you I find it quite hard to find my own lodge on that website and I KNOW it exists, so I could be wrong in assuming that there are still false positives on Mr Shimeld's site!)
I find it quite amusing that you are now accusing me of misuse of your logos. I wonder if anyone else is aware that the use of the 5 star park logo is legally limited to the web site of the “awardee”. Out of interest where do you publish that fact? As you admit there is no reason why I should not legitimately state in text the fact we are on a five star site (a point that I was quite happy Mr Shimeld’s advertisers should make, as you know). I am amazed that it appears to be a problem for VE for me to display your logo advertising this same indubitable fact. This seem totally inconsistent and counterproductive for all parties. In doing I was merely making a perfectly valid, truthful and unambiguous claim that the park the lodges are on is 5 star rated.
However, I have now replaced the VE logos on the sites in question with graphics that now just state the fact that the parks are VE 4 and 5 star rated. I trust that this now complies with your requirements. I would link the new images to the listings for Limefitt Park and White Cross Bay on enjoyengland.com, but unfortunately the web site isn't working (again) so I can't find the link in question. FYI The error generated is:
Proxy Error
The proxy server received an invalid response from an upstream server.
The proxy server could not handle the request GET /Where-to-stay/.
Reason: Error reading from remote server
In due course I will probably follow the advice of the current Tourism Minister (they don't last long do they!) and replace it with a Trip Adviser rating as this is, apparently, the future of Quality Assessment in England.
Did you notice during your "research" that the SLP site who ARE entitled to show the logo are also showing the same “old English Tourism Council logo” that I was using. Perhaps you should let them know?
Anyway I should obviously congratulate you on your efforts to investigate beyond the original complaint but I am disappointed that your extra “research” was so limited and particular in its scope. A quick Google search for lodges on Limefitt Park or White Cross Bay shows a plethora of web sites committing the same “offence” you are now complaining of on my sites – i.e. showing the VE logo that quite correctly and unambiguously identifies the park on which the lodges advertised are sited as a 5 star park. Would it be safe to assume that you have contacted them too and issued the same takedown requirement? If not then perhaps you will now find and contact all of these web sites and insist that they too remove the "inappropriately" used VisitEngland Holiday Park star rating logos. You will even find some who “haven’t noticed” that White Cross Bay got downgraded to four star recently and who are still displaying the five star rating. I am sure we can all agree that you can't reasonably ignore such a large volume of contraventions now that you yourself have precipitated this particular issue by insisting that I remove the logo from my sites. That really would not be fair would it?
I will look forward to a progress report from you in the near future.
This is a classic example of a self justifying bureaucratic quadrille. Pointless point scoring paid for out of public funds seems to say 'We are not listening, but we 'won' all the same'.
They have lost their way because they have been protected. There is nothing like the harsh wind of competition and payment by results to eliminate this sort of nonsense.
Sad to say, the worth of these awards is draining away every moment they fail to pull themselves together. Any half sensible organisation would have thanked someone for letting them know about misuse of its award symbols... but, no, they thought better to reveal suspect motivation by finding fault.
It would have been far more convincing if the two matters were handled separately. Thanks for the info about the abuse. Then another communication dealing with the supposed abuse on the informant's part. Putting both in the same letter proves the need to score points and, apparently, the wish that people do not report abuse of award symbols.
It hardly motivates people to report problems if you feel you will be investigated as a potential delinquent yourself.
Sticking both matters in the same letter speaks volumes and shows a marked lack of managerial skill and finesse.
Windy, I think your measured and factual response says it all, while Charles' post is a brilliant analysis of the situation. "This guy is a PITA wanting us to do our job, so we'll show him." The fact that what was, and is, being asked of VB is fundamental to the reason for their existence seems to have passed them by.
I see there's another interesting post from a B&B owner somewhat disgruntled with the ratings and awards scheme, and the inspection process. Still, it's only a handful of people griping, so the other tens of thousands are obviously highly satisfied. Which means that VB can put their head back in the sand and go back to what they seem to do best, which is displaying their ostrich-like arse to owners and guests alike.
Greenbarn wrote: VB can put their head back in the sand and go back to what they seem to do best, which is displaying their ostrich-like arse to owners and guests alike.
Paolo, we really need a LIKE button!
Nightowl
Forever going one step forwards and two
backwards......
I don't really care about not being able to display the VE park logo (as long as they are consistent and stop everyone else doing so as well!)
I am just glad that the lodge on Limefitt, where my lodges are, which was falsely claiming a 5 star rating, and those on the neighbouring White Cross Bay wrongly claiming 4 star, have now had them removed from the Let's Stay site.
So friendly Sam of Let's Stay has come up to scratch.
Only because he was forced to! - He refused my polite suggestions to clarify his listings by removing misleading star ratings. It's only pressure from VB that has made him do the necessary.
To be honest I was very surprised and disappointed by his off-hand attitude to this matter as he'd always struck me as a pretty straightforward guy. Maybe he just didn't want to risk offending the people listing on his site?
