# Can I be forced to remove another contractor’s negative review from my web site?



## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Can I be forced to remove another contractor’s negative review from my web site? 

About 2 years ago I took over a project from another contractor. After I completed the project the customer wrote me a long review which mentions the other contractor, which I posted I my web site. Now the “other contractor” is threatening me with a layer to close down my web site if I don’t remove the review. Can he do that?

Few things to consider
1. I copy & pasted the customers review from an e-mail to my web site, the review was not posted by the homeowner
2. Just found out today the customer never filed a complaint against the other contractor.

Here’s the review the customer wrote:

Were the choices I made right?
_"In late winter 2010 we began plans to add an addition on to our home for my 87 year old Grandfather who was in the process of having his home foreclosed on. Budget was a huge factor but we wanted to create a separate space from our existing home to accommodate his needs and to give him a quiet place away from our young family. We decided on a 900 square foot addition consisting of a bedroom, living room, bath, walk in closet and eat in kitchen. In order to accomplish the transition from a single family home to a mother/daughter home we also needed to section off the rear of our garage and turn it into common space. This is now a laundry room that connects the existing house to the new addition. _

_We worked closely with our architect, Richard Gaffney, to ensure that the project would be functional, cost effective and a fairly easy structure to build. I am an HVAC technician and overall am a very handy person so I decided that I would do the mechanical work (plumbing, electrical, HVAC, cable, phones) and finish (roofing, siding, flooring, cabinetry, painting, install of bath fixtures, etc.) on the project myself._

_We started pricing contractors to work on our building and decided to go with AJR Construction for the excavation and foundation. Not only were his prices the best around but he put in long hours and his work was phenomenal. Did I make the right choice there... Without a doubt, I did._

_During the course of the excavating and foundation we began looking for a framing contractor. We got estimates and interviewed at least 15 local contractors. Most of which were seriously overpriced or under qualified. I believe in small business and wanted to give the work to a less commercialized contractor. Which left us with 2 choices out of the 15, (name removed) and David J Festa Carpentry. Their prices were both comparable to each other, they were both local contractors and they were both eager to do the job in the time frame we needed it done in. Our initial choice was (name removed) because their bid came in $1000 less then David J Festa Carpentry. Well.... Let’s just say that the old saying" Penny wise and Dollar foolish" gained new meaning to us. _

_By the 4th day on the job __(name removed)__ made so many mistakes and wasted so much time and material that we had them removed from our property by the police. There was absolutely no chance of us EVER passing inspection for the work they had already completed. We then called David J Festa Carpentry in to assess the situation and evaluate what needed to be done to correct the mistakes and finish our project on time without putting us into bankruptcy. 2 hours after the call Dave came over and began looking over what had been done. He was non-judgmental, he started ripping things apart right away and REMEMBER ... at this time we still haven't even signed a contract with him! To me this was a pretty noble thing to do. _

_After talking with Dave we then realized that the reason his original estimate was $1000 more than __(name removed)__ because he had spoken to our architect several times about changes that needed to be made to the plans in order to pass inspection and to make the building more structurally sound. Obviously, if we had known that we would have used him from the beginning. So we got the contract drawn up and signed the papers to have him complete the job right._

_So the project was back in motion now and finally running smoothly. Not only were things progressing properly but Dave also gave suggestions to make the addition more esthetically pleasing and transition it into the existing home more smoothly without any additional costs to us. Aside from the excellent work done by David J Festa Carpentry, he was always willing to help out or answer questions with the many areas of the project that I took on myself. To this day Dave still stops by on occasion to see how I am doing with things and lends a hand if I need it_

_My view on David Festa the man.... He is a hard working, motivated individual who loves what he does. The harder the project the more satisfied he is when he completes it. Very rarely do you come across an individual like this. There are far too many people in the world who go to work to just collect a paycheck and don't care about quality or craftsmanship. Dave is not one of those people!_

_David J Festa Carpentry did an excellent job of correcting the mistakes that were made by (name removed) . Thanks to David Festa Carpentry our project was finished by our deadline. The work performed was extraordinary; Dave and his crew were meticulous and put a lot of pride into getting the job done the right way. He worked closely with us to ensure that we would be satisfied with the final outcome of the project. He took the time to address any questions or concerns we had through the project. I would certainly recommend him to friends and family (in fact I have) and would not even consider using any other contractor but David J Festa Carpentry LLC in the future."_

Jason & Bobby

This is the e-mail from the other contractor I received this morning:

It has come to our attention that you have a blog on your website that refers to our firm. Please be advised that you did not attain our permission to use our name, gain use of our intellectual property or get permission to refer to our company. Also, the terms and conditions of our contract with our customer were negotiated without your attendance at any of the multitude of meetings held with the customer. We were made aware after the fact that you were interfering directly with our contract with our customer while we were trying to resolve disputed issues, those actions clearly points to you with unclean hands and further undermined the ability of the parties to resolve the issues. Further, the contract dispute between the parties does not create a situation wherein you capitalize on a dispute between parties causing further harm to our firm. 

We are advising you to CEASE AND DESIST from continuing to use our firm’s name on your website immediately and you will notify us in writing within seven (7) days of the date of this letter that you have complied with this request. Further, you will warrant that you will not use our firm’s name in any way, shape or form to further harm our good reputation and standing. You are acting in a slanderous and malicious manner and if you fail to comply with this notice we will proceed with civil litigation against you and your firm seeking compensatory and punitive damages. 

In closing, should the individual(s) “writing” the blogs on your website have any dispute with our firm you are directed to refer them to me in order for us to address and or resolve those issues.

Please be guided accordingly.

Sincerely,


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## Hmbldr (Dec 7, 2011)

I would consult your own attorney and see if they have a leg to stand on.

However, couldn't you just edit their name from the story, substitute generic XYZ Corp. The story is about how you helped these folks out, not who and how bad the other contractor was.

Change the name and you still get the positve play for you and your business.


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## Chris Johnson (Apr 19, 2007)

Personally I would tell the guy to go rub salt, your just posting a complimenting letter from a client.

If he sues you, he better be prepared to sue your client as well.

You have 3 options

1. Comply with his demand

2. Cross out his name in the blog

3. Open a new website owned by your wife that only has the testimonials on it, when someone clicks on it, it leaves your site and goes to that one and upon closing it, they return to your site...now it's a third party hosting and posting it.

But write the guy back and tell him bad advertising is better than no advertising, perhaps he would like to donate to your website to keep his name active on there, along with the google searches.

By the way, nice letter, glad the client is happy with your outstanding service


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Hmbldr said:


> I would consult your own attorney and see if they have a leg to stand on.
> 
> However, couldn't you just edit their name from the story, substitute generic XYZ Corp. The story is about how you helped these folks out, not who and how bad the other contractor was.
> 
> Change the name and you still get the positve play for you and your business.


If need be that’s what I’ll do, but there’s no way I’m remove the review.


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## GRB (Feb 23, 2009)

Hmbldr said:


> I would consult your own attorney and see if they have a leg to stand on.
> 
> However, couldn't you just edit their name from the story, substitute generic XYZ Corp. The story is about how you helped these folks out, not who and how bad the other contractor was.
> 
> Change the name and you still get the positve play for you and your business.


^^^^^^^ This about sums it up.


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## 480sparky (Feb 1, 2009)

If your words are true, let 'em stand.


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

480sparky said:


> If your words are true, let 'em stand.


That’s where it gets tricky, I posted the review on the customers behave, so who is to say it’s not legit? so to fix that the customer has already taken steps to post the same review on other sites
The other problem I see is that the customer has yet to make a complaint against the other contractor which could be considered slander?


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## tgeb (Feb 9, 2006)

Nice work. It is often very difficult to be the "next" guy on a project. You apparently handled it very well. 

I'd tell level/square to brush up on his diction.....then pound sand.


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## rselectric1 (Sep 20, 2009)

David, I KNOW you are honorable. Your help when I was injured has not been forgotten.

My advice would be to remove the other contractors name and replace it with "Contractor A" or something of the sort.

The review still accomplishes the positive flavor without putting yourself in legal jeopardy.

Also, from some of the phrases in the email you received, I am pretty sure that it was written by an attorney, or at least a law student. They are not going to let this stand IMO.

What a great review too!


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## Bill Z (Dec 10, 2006)

Dave,

Right now you are looking really good compared to this one contractor. 

When you stand back and look at the big picture, if you simply black out his name, you'll look good compared to all other contractors your prospect may be considering because they won't know the blacked out contractor isn't their "other guy". It's natural for them to want to take the safe route and go with you.

Blacking out the real offender's name get's you off the hook with him, and advances your marketing twenty-fold. Another advantage is it makes you look more noble by withholding the name, when you use his name it can be construed as badmouthing. 

Don't let your emotions drag you deeper into a conflict you probably won't win. Just black out the name and make it a win-win.

Bill


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Good advice guys thanks! I’ll do it


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## 480sparky (Feb 1, 2009)

festerized said:


> That’s where it gets tricky, I posted the review on the customers behave, so who is to say it’s not legit? so to fix that the customer has already taken steps to post the same review on other sites
> The other problem I see is that the customer has yet to make a complaint against the other contractor which could be considered slander?


What I'm saying is.... the words are true, as in your customer wrote them.


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## SuperiorHIP (Aug 15, 2010)

If I was a potential customer reading your reviews it wouldn't matter much to me if you had xyz framing or **************. I personally don't think its worth the time to try and leave their name in the review.


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

480sparky said:


> What I'm saying is.... the words are true, as in your customer wrote them.


I also want to protect the customer so they don’t get a slander suit, without a complaint filed by the HO its just slander. I changed the wondering to “CONTRACTOR A” You guys are right, no need to stoop to CONTRACTOR A’s level. (and not so square) LOL


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## BamBamm5144 (Jul 12, 2008)

Um, is this guy making up different meanings to words?

How did you use any "intellectual property" of theres?

Anyway, as said just substitute the name with whatever and be done with it. Then let him know it's on other websites too.


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## angus242 (Oct 20, 2007)

What's the difference of a bad review of that company on your site or a bad review of that company on:
facebook?
angieslist?
yelp?
google places?
service magic?
billy bob's southern gin, fine wine and contractor reviews?


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

angus242 said:


> What's the difference of a bad review of that company on your site or a bad review of that company on:
> facebook?
> angieslist?
> yelp?
> ...


The difference is that I posted the review on the customer behave and those review companies can handle lawsuits. I’m sure when the customer post this review on these review sites the poop is going to hit the fan. Contractor A is lucky I didn’t hyper link his name in the review. I did an extensive search on his company this morning, my review wasn’t visible until page 4 of Google, LOl now it’s on page1 in two spots.


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## 480sparky (Feb 1, 2009)

festerized said:


> The difference is that I posted the review on the customer behave and those review companies can handle lawsuits. I’m sure when the customer post this review on these review sites the poop is going to hit the fan. Contractor A is lucky I didn’t hyper link his name in the review. I did an extensive search on his company this morning, my review wasn’t visible until page 4 of Google, LOl now it’s on page1 in two spots.


Drop a dime on a lawyer, and if possible, have that lawyer send a letter back stating the customer review appears to state the facts and will not be removed.


Just a suggestion.... you may want to remove the references from your post as they will start to appear on Google searches as well.


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

480sparky said:


> Just a suggestion.... you may want to remove the references from your post as they will start to appear on Google searches as well.


i know:thumbup::laughing:


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## BrandConst (May 9, 2011)

Chris Johnson said:


> Personally I would tell the guy to go rub salt, your just posting a complimenting letter from a client.
> 
> If he sues you, he better be prepared to sue your client as well.
> 
> ...


I would have said go pound sand up his ***. But in all actuality is it worth the money to hire an attorney to defend a review?


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## Tom M (Jan 3, 2007)

I would try to black out the name and all links to it. Im no lawyer but it seems to be a lot of slander and defamation of charactor on the internet. I myself always read reviews and the honesty is important but there has to be lines crossed.


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## angus242 (Oct 20, 2007)

slander - defamation, in which someone tells one or more persons an untruth about another which untruth will harm the reputation of the person defamed.
defamation - Any intentional false communication, either written or spoken, that harms a person's reputation.

Seriously? Neither one of these has happened. The keywords being "untruth" and "intentional false". I don't understand when it became a crime to speak the truth about someone. The truth isn't always unicorns and glitter. 

I've worked very hard for years to keep my business reputation positive. All it took was one wacko guy to have my name on the internet complaining about me not being professional with calling him back because he called a wrong number trying to get a hold of me. 

Was he making something up because I didn't call him back when expected? Nope. Is he an idiot because he called the wrong number expecting for me to receive the message and call him back? Yep. 

It's a public world and sometimes the truth hurts. Obviously Freakin' Shoddy framing played their bad hand to the wrong people. Now they're being called out on it and want to cry "foul". Maybe next time instead of being a douche-company, they'll treat customers better and perform better craftsmanship.


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## Tom M (Jan 3, 2007)

angus242 said:


> It's a public world and sometimes the truth hurts. Obviously Freakin' Shoddy framing played their bad hand to the wrong people. Now they're being called out on it and want to cry "foul". Maybe next time instead of being a douche-company, they'll treat customers better and perform better craftsmanship.


I think the usual lack of respect for hiring proffessions played into this as well. This guy was handy and in the trades so he played GC and went for 1000 cheaper from the get go. Its his right and he knew enough to stop everything from going further. But there are to many foolish consumers that think construction is just something anyone can do if they had nothing better to do. 
As far your case goes I think your making light of the fact that he didnt knowingly realize he called the wrong number. There was more to it and now you suffered. If I thought you cut me off on the highway and flipped me the bird is it okay that I write something in a review about you? For me to say Im pretty sure it was you should not justify it.


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

I like to use projects like as a selling point to potential customers & to keep myself in check, choose your contractor wisely, balance price & experience. 

Customer told me one of his deciding factors besides price was that contractor A was BBB rated (not accredited) and I was not. Dumb mistake on my part, lesson learned. The customer thought that if a contractor was in the BBB that said contractor was golden, not true as the HO soon found out. I tell all my potential clients BBB means nothing 

Few more sad framing pics.

Architect specked out LVL’s ripped to 7 ¾” 12” OC to create a step into the existing house. Contractor A changed the floor beams to 11 7/8” 16” OC not realizing that the extra height didn’t leave 6’8” headroom in the transition opening, big mistake


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Look closely at the middle pic, what framing do you see wrong?


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## Tom M (Jan 3, 2007)

Sorry for the drift Dave.

Having been in the business for a while and hearing stories customers tell about contractors I can honestly say that 90% of the time there was more to the story and were equally at fault. We can see from your pictures that there are serious issues with the work but like others have said your review is great with out anyone elses name in it. Best leave it at that.


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## Tom Struble (Mar 2, 2007)

festerized said:


> Look closely at the middle pic, what framing do you see wrong?


isn't that what they call a W valley?:whistling


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Customer is at fault, Ho didn’t do his homework. When push came to shove Contractor A said fine I’ll eat the extra $1,000 if you give me the job, that and the BBB was the HO deciding vote 

I did my own research on Contractor A during bidding, he very little online presence, crapy 3 page web site, no testimonials, no pics, just some BS copy & pasted wording. Myself I had plenty of reviews, AL Google, reviews on my site and plenty off pics, just wasn’t BBB rated


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## festerized (May 19, 2007)

Tom Struble said:


> isn't that what they call a W valley?:whistling


If you look closely the sleeper doesn’t plain to the last common rafter nor does it meet at the ridge.

2x6 sleeper with 2x6 rafters so rafters are not full bearing

Valley rafters aren’t touching sleeper at all! All being held up by nails
Rafters don’t plain to sleeper, look closely at second rafter from left
Rafters don’t reach ridge


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## angus242 (Oct 20, 2007)

Tom M said:


> As far your case goes I think your making light of the fact that he didnt knowingly realize he called the wrong number. There was more to it and now you suffered.


Nope. Everything was 100% fine, he called to give me an update, I didn't get the message because he called the wrong number (not hearing my voice or message should have been a clue) and within 16 hours, he was posting crap about me. 

What do I think? He was insecure or had a bad experience with contractors in the past and was very quick to assume I wasn't calling him back.

Regardless of any of that, I'm saying he _is_ fully well within his rights to post the info of what happened, even though I believe _he_ was at fault. I don't have to like it but he's not lying that I didn't call him back. There is more to it but he's not lying.

I'm sure in Dave's situation there is more but the customer still has the right to tell their side of the story.


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## Fence & Deck (Jan 23, 2006)

I learned 30 years ago. I never, ever refer to another company by name. No matter how bad they are, I never say a word. By bad mouthing someone else, it reflects back on you, it makes you look small and petty, and can come back to bite you. You can say what someone else might have done, you can show pix of a lousy job, but never ever mention another company by name.


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## cabinetsnj (Jun 10, 2012)

There are some online reputation management companies that might be able to help with this. If they cannot help, you should certainly consider speaking with an attorney, you have to obviously weight the cost of such services against the oppurunity cost of losing a client here or there if they read the negative reviews.


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## J F (Dec 3, 2005)

Would you pls quit fkn posting in all these old threads?! 

:laughing: But, seriously...


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## jamestrd (Oct 26, 2008)

the letter is not written buy a lawyer because slander and Libel are 2 different things.

Libel would be what you are Liable for..and you are not even at that , as you did not write it..(although that review sure sounds like it..I never had a HO write that long of a letter nor mention another outfit umpteen number of times...:thumbsup

If on your blog you keep mentioning them or whoever does the writing on it,they may have something.

Its routine to send a letter, but to follow through with such a frivolous suit is another..even they don't want to waste that money..

If your customer attests to it and you guy go to court, sounds like this HO will be right there for you..

For giggles, I would go on a law forum and drop this on them..there's a few good ones..
This if you cant get a good answer form your own attorney..


I think most attorneys would tell you to take it down only because its not worth the headache..but if you are standing on principal, you may want to know real potential outcomes..which are probably nothing..oi think a judge would throw this out


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## jamestrd (Oct 26, 2008)

J F said:


> Would you pls quit fkn posting in all these old threads?!
> 
> :laughing: But, seriously...



damn i got sucked in..didn't realize...lol


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