I’ve seen several posts about review missing from profile. All my reviews and photos from the last 5 months are longer there. I was not suspended or anything. I noticed this when I went to create a new review, which worked fine. The number of reviews and pictures seems right, they just are not there. I already know there are other threads, but I’m new to the forum, so please don’t lecture me. I submitted a request to Google to help, but is this a systemic problem and should I just wait?
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If you’ve already seen multiple posts about this, @Peter.M, then there’s no need to create another one. Bugs like this usually get fixed over time. Since you’ve already submitted a request to Google, the best thing to do is to wait.
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Hi @Peter.M
Welcome to Connect, and thank you for asking.
If I understand correctly, five months of reviews and photos are vanished and you cannot see them in your contributions.
You are correct about several posts about not visible reviews, but this seems to be a different issue.
I have a few questions to try to better understand what’s going on:
- were all the missing photos all attached to your reviews? If so, this can explain why also the photos are not visible.
- are you able to find and share with us some of the listings where you posted the reviews in the last five months? This may help.
Generally speaking, when a review is made private it is not visible on the place where was posted, but the author of it should be able to see the review on his profile.
Normally a review disappears from our profile only when the place we reviewed is removed from Google Maps, but it sounds strange for me that all the places where you contributed in the last five months are removed.
If you can provide some details this may help us to escalate the issue correctly.
Thank you
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@Peter.M تحياتي لك ارجو ان تكون بخير.لقدتم الاجابه على استفسارك من قبل اعضاء الفريق.السيد ارمست.شكرا للجميع
Hello @Peter.M welcome to the Local Guides Connect community!
When you said:
do you mean, you don’t see any of your reviews under My Contributions → Reviews or you do see them older than five months?
In fact one of your recent reviews was indeed published two days ago:
The difference between the issue mentioned by you and reported here and the one mentioned by @ErmesT is indeed the question, whether you see none of your reviews, while the public sees some or if some of your reviews and/or photos are hidden to the public (aka “made private”).
In can tell, 10 out of your 223 reviews and 47 of 522 photos are hidden to the public.
As @ErmesT indicated, this can only be solved by yourself, independent whether the other issue applies to you or not. For that, I suggest reading How to find your hidden reviews.
Otherwise, just follow the thread here and if you are convinced having the same issue, add a comment there specifying whether this occurred using the desktop Web browser or in the mobile app (apple or Android) of which version.
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Wilfried - Thank you for replying. The review I just wrote for Lake Sawyer got published - I did that as I haven’t written review in a while and that’s when I noticed a big chunk of my reviews missing.
The last photograph was my trip to Switzerland in August and the last review was fall trip to Vermont in September/October I think - the start of the trip. I also had a trip back to AZ and I’m sure I had at least 5-7 other reviews and photos during that period.
They are not visible to my profile and I can’t find them at all. I checked one for the Belfry in Vermont, not there. I can’t remember all the other places, but I know there were several.
They just seem to be missing period.
I’m was not aware on how to see reviews that are not public or have been declined, so I’ll look, I’m just not that versed in being a local guide other than I’ve been doing it for years, slowly and when I feel that a place needs a review.
It now says 10 reviews are private and 47 photos are, which would be about the amount that I have not seen since August. It could also be reviews of the last years that didn’t get published, but I don’t know why.
That just can’t be my fault. I got no indication at all that any of the reviews were bad from Google.
I see them nowhere on any desktop or phone, on the maps that show where the reviews/photos are. They are just gone. Also is there a way to know what 10 reviews are private?
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Thank you for replying. I replied to Wilfried for the specifics. I’m not sure what happened, but the entire period is missing from my profile. The “hidden” counts would line up with what is missing number wise, rought 10 reviews and 47 photographs, for 5 months. I never had any problem having my reviews published that I’m aware of, so this has to be Google. This just can’t be me as a local guide. The lake sawyer review published immediately and I’m contstantly getting pinged by Google “you’re popular, write a review”. I’ve been super busy since the holidays and I just checked this.
Doing these reviews is a lot of work, I do it as a public service. I do not care about my stats, but I’m not going to bother if I’m going to have problems like this going forward. I generally do a review when I feel like the merchant deserves it, good bad or middle and I am generally very even keeled.
I would just like an explanation as to what is going on and whether I should bother to do this anymore.
I’d also like your assessment of my reviews and see what I could do better in case I am doing something wrong.
Also note that the reviews were there the last time I checked in December.
Hallo Peter, thank you for the feedback!
It seems @ErmesT was correct assuming your issue is not the same as others were reporting recently, since they don’t see their own posts, but the public does.
All posts, text of reviews and contents of photos and videos are checked by a filter, not only for obeying the rules given by Google, but more importantly to detect SPAM and false information. If there is only a little suspicion, the post will be not published.
If a photo or video is attached to a review and only on of those is rejected, the entire review including all other media will be hidden.
Therefore, as a first step after detecting a review is hidden, remove all photos and videos and watch, if text only is accepted. If so, attach the photos again but one by one to identify which on did cause the problem - or - (my preference) post photos and video separately directly to the listing.
This is indeed a big problem, we are all facing, since Google will never tell us, if a post was rejected by the filter.
The only method, I am aware of, is to open two Web browser sessions on the desktop side by side with one being logged in and the other anonymous (aka private) without logging in and scroll down both, until you find a difference. This is described in the link How to find your hidden reviews., I provided above and works for photos as well as for reviews.
Hope this helps. Please let us know, if you have more questions.
I appreciate it Wilfried - The Belfry in Montgomery Center Vermont, population 103 is my hometown, so I know for sure I did a review there. I also know for sure I did a review for Enterprise Rent-A-Car in Cambridge because the team there was so competent. I just don’t know what is going on. I’ll wait for to hear back.
Peter, there is no doubt, you wrote those reviews. The question is, if they were published or rejected by the filter.
Did check under “My Contributions”->“Reviews” either on desktop or the Maps app, whether you can see those two reviews?
Nope, the reviews are 100% missing, like deleted missing. I checked all the reviews by date incognito for both merchants (enteprise rent-a car in Cambridge, MA) and Belfry Restaurant in Montgomer Center and my stuff is simply not there.
The guys in Cambridge gave me a high-end vehicle for absolutely no extra charge, they just let me pick it out for a trip back to my hometown and my actual home (it’s an AirBnb) after 40 years that was very important to me after my Dad passed.
His tools were still in the back half of the barn. I could still smell our horses and the wall paper in the pantry was my mom’s. It was like I never left.
Anyway, this just irriates me to no end because this trip and the reviews meant a lot to me personally and also to the people of those businesses - many of whom I still know. In a small town like that, a level 7 guide with 6 million views can be helpful.
I write reviews the old fashion way, when someone deserves it or it means something to me.
I’m not sure what to do but I’m mad for sure.
@Peter.M
Thanks for the details.
I checked The Belfry and your review is not visible. I haven’t check Enterprise Rent-A-Car in Cambridge because there are several of them (a link would help).
But your answer is enough to understand that the places have not been removed from Maps. Therefore the reviews should be visible at least on your profile.
Whether they are publicly visible or not is an issue to be addressed later, when they will be visible again at least to you.
I have proceeded to escalate the problem
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