Which Trustpilot reviews can be removed

The single principle behind every removal

Reviews are removed on grounds: legal grounds, and the grounds set out in Trustpilot's own guidelines. A review comes down when one of those applies and the case is made properly.

That one principle explains most of what follows. The question to ask is not "is this review unfair?" but "which ground applies here, and how do I show it?" Almost every damaging review breaks at least one rule; the work is finding which.

The checklist

Work through these in order. A yes to any of them means you probably have a case.

1. Is there any record of this person?

Search your order system, CRM, support inbox and payment records for the name, the email and any obvious variant. No record anywhere is the strongest single indicator you have, because platform guidelines require a genuine buying or service experience.

2. Does the review describe something you do not do?

Read it as a stranger would. If it complains about a product you have never sold or a service you have never offered, it is very likely meant for a different company. Similar trading names cause this constantly.

3. Does the reviewer have a connection to a competitor?

Check the name against public professional profiles and competitor team pages. Look at what else the account has reviewed. A pattern of positive reviews for your rivals and a single negative one for you is worth documenting.

4. Does it make a specific factual claim that is untrue?

Not "the service was terrible" — that is opinion, and it is protected. Something checkably false: that you took payment and delivered nothing, that you are operating illegally, that a named person did something they did not do.

5. Did several appear at once?

Multiple reviews in a compressed window, from accounts created around the same time, with overlapping phrasing, is a pattern rather than a coincidence. Documented together, the pattern is the evidence.

6. Is it abusive or does it target an individual?

Personal attacks, discriminatory content and material naming and targeting an individual employee breach the guidelines of every major platform.

7. Has the same person posted repeatedly?

Duplicate reviews of the same experience, or the same person returning to post again after an earlier review, are usually removable on that basis alone.

The less obvious cases

Plenty of reviews that look untouchable at first glance turn out to be removable once someone looks properly. A few patterns worth knowing:

• A real customer, but a false claim. The person did buy from you, but the review states something checkably untrue. The transaction is real; the content still breaks the rules.
• The right company, the wrong experience. The review describes a dispute with a courier, a payment provider or a marketplace rather than with you.
• Private details. Names of staff, phone numbers, addresses or other personal data in a review are a breach regardless of the rest of the content.
• Old reviews about a previous owner. A business that changed hands or changed name is often carrying reviews about someone else's conduct.
• Reviews that were declined once already. A rejected report usually means the wrong ground was used, not that the review is safe.

If your review does not obviously fit the checklist above, that does not mean it stays. It means it needs a proper assessment, which is exactly what the free scan is for.

What to gather before you act

Whether you handle it yourself or bring someone in, the same material is needed:

• A screenshot of the review, with the date it appeared
• The reviewer's display name and any identifying detail in the text
• Evidence of your search for a matching record, including what you searched and over what period
• Any correspondence, if a matching customer does exist
• Screenshots supporting a conflict of interest, where relevant
• A note of any other reviews appearing around the same time

Gathering this first is not bureaucracy. A report that arrives complete is assessed on its merits; one that arrives thin gets closed, and the second attempt starts from a worse position.

What to do next

If you worked through the checklist and hit a yes, you have grounds worth pursuing. Our guide on removing a fake Trustpilot review covers how to file the report and what to do if it is rejected.

If you would rather not spend your own time on it, send us the profile link. The free scan runs this assessment across every item on your profile and comes back in writing within 24 hours, with the ground for each review and a fixed price.