Google's April 2026 Review Policy Changes
Google tightened review-policy enforcement in April 2026. Here's what changed and how Revora stays compliant.
Google rolled out stricter review-policy enforcement in April 2026. Here's the honest breakdown.
Asking for staff mentions is banned
What changed: Asking customers to name specific staff members in reviews — your hygienist, technician, trainer — is now an explicit Rating Manipulation violation.
Still fine: customers mentioning staff on their own.
What to do: stop any signage or scripts that ask for staff mentions.
On-site review kiosks are banned
What changed: shared tablets or kiosks where customers compose reviews at your counter are banned as "on-premise pressure."
Still fine: a printed QR code customers scan on their own phone.
What to do: take down any front-desk review tablet this week.
Review gating is enforced
What it is: pre-screening customers by sentiment ("how was your experience?" → positive get the Google link, negative get a private form). It's been against policy for years and is now actively detected.
Revora's stance: we don't gate. We send the same link to every customer regardless of sentiment.
Family and employee reviews get scrutiny
What changed: Google can scan historical reviews for patterns, including reviews from employees, contractors, and family. We don't have public data on how aggressively this runs, but the conservative posture is to assume a confirmed violation can compound. If you've had family or staff leave reviews, they sit in a higher-risk category.
Revora stays compliant
Revora's review requests don't violate any of these policies — the same link to everyone, only to opted-in customers, with quiet hours respected. Email us with questions about your account's posture.