Fed up: Motel owner responds to bad reviews with harsh replies and home truths
A motel owner has caused a stir with his harsh replies to negative online reviews, slamming past guests as “stupid”, “fatlips” and “a pest”.
As of Thursday, the Huskisson Beach Motel in Jervis Bay on the NSW South Coast had 419 reviews, 67 of which were rated as “poor” or “terrible”.
Owner John Nixon began responding to bad reviews in 2015.
After staying with family at the accommodation last month, one guest described it as “an awful place”, with blinds that were too small for the window and a toaster but no knife to butter bread.
“Sorry that your stomach blocked you from using the blinds, kettle and toaster!” Nixon replied.
“Glad you and your family never return as you have been banned from all properties in the area :)”
In February, a guest left a one out of five stars review. “We were disappointed in the fact that the room cost us $305 per night an we were not even allocated biscuits in the room,” the person wrote. “The manager was so rude and unhelpful that I was truly disappointed and upset with the stay.”
In a response that has now been removed by TripAdvisor, Nixon wrote, “My staff are highly trained in managing f***tards like yourself!
“Please don’t come back again!
“PS. We hope you changed that same shirt you were wearing for three days as it was a big job to deodorise the room once you had left!”
Nixon also told another guest who complained about being allocated a room without a balcony, “The reason you have given this one-star review is due to your stupidity of NOT checking the exact description online!”
Nixon told A Current Affair that his replies to the guests – which has included phrases such as “stinky guest”, “oxygen thieves”, “fruitloop”, “stupid idiot”, and “a pest” – was justified given the problems he had to deal with on a day-to-day basis, such as dirtied rooms.
“I’ll charge them an excess cleaning fee, and then again they’ll put a one-star review on Google, TripAdvisor,” Nixon said.