Review Policy

LittleSpots relies on honest parent reviews to help families make informed decisions about where to eat, drink, and spend time with their children. This policy explains how reviews work and what we expect from reviewers.

Who can leave a review?

Any registered LittleSpots user can leave a review for a venue they have visited with their children. You must have a verified account to submit reviews. Each user may submit one review per venue. If you visit again and your experience has changed, you can update your existing review.

What makes a good review?

Focus on your family experience at the venue.
Be specific about what worked well or didn't for children.
Confirm or deny specific facilities like highchairs, baby changing, or play areas.
Be honest and fair. A bad day can happen anywhere.

What is not allowed?

Fake reviews — reviews for venues you have not visited.
Incentivised reviews — reviews given in exchange for payment, discounts, or other benefits.
Hate speech or abuse — discriminatory, threatening, or harassing language.
Spam or advertising — promotional content or links to external businesses.
Personal information — publishing personal details of staff or other customers.
Duplicate or mass reviews — submitting the same or similar content across multiple venues.

How moderation works

All reviews are post-moderated. This means your review will appear publicly as soon as you submit it, and it will immediately contribute to the venue's Parent Score. Our moderation system runs lightweight abuse checks before publication. Reviews that trigger these checks are held for manual review and will not appear publicly until approved. All reviews remain subject to ongoing moderation.

What happens if a review is flagged?

Flagged reviews are temporarily hidden from public view and excluded from score calculations. A moderator will review the content and either approve it, request changes, or reject it. If your review is rejected, we will provide a reason.

How scores are calculated

The Parent Score is a Bayesian average of all live, non-hidden reviews for a venue. This approach prevents venues with very few reviews from appearing disproportionately high or low. The score becomes visible once a venue has received at least 3 reviews. Hiding or rejecting a review triggers an immediate score recalculation for the affected venue.

Disputes and takedowns

If you believe a review violates this policy, or if you are a venue owner who believes a review is unfair or defamatory, please use our notice and takedown process.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. Material changes will be communicated through the site. Continued use of the review feature constitutes acceptance of the current policy.

Last updated: April 2026