Feedback is one of our site's most important features for our growing community. Thankfully over 95% Workaway feedbacks are positive, but our dedicated team personally reviews EVERY single piece of feedback that is left by Workawayers and hosts. We love reading about all the fantastic opportunities and connections that members have made through the site, and are here to help look into any potential issues.
Feedback allows us to keep the site safe and fair for everyone.
When negative feedback is being left, it can be a very sensitive issue to deal with, and it is a process we are constantly tweaking and updating. We won't allow abusive words, insulting text or feedback containing overly personal criticism. Everyone has a valid viewpoint on what they do or do not feel is acceptable, and we know that clashes of personality may escalate to a war of words.
After receiving suggestions from the community (that's you!), we have fine-tuned our feedback system to make the site even fairer, safer, and more honest for everyone.
How our feedback system works:
Members can leave feedback for each other if they have been in contact within the last 6 months.
Once a member has left the host or Workawayer a feedback, the other member will have 14 days to reciprocate. Emails and in-app notifications will be sent out to remind them to leave feedback.
The feedback will only be published from both sides at the same time once it’s reviewed manually by our team (during the 14 days). If only one member has left feedback, it will be published after 14 days.
Here are the steps we take when bad feedback is left:
A member of our team manually reviews the feedback, and depending on the seriousness of the situation, initiates an investigation that takes into account the opinions of both parties and any prior feedback.
The rating and feedback will be published on the site once it has been reviewed by our team (unless member has indicated their wish to keep their feedback private). Please note, however, if there are abusive, derogatory or offensive comments, some or all of the text may be redacted and kept confidential. We do this to prevent claims of slander and escalating situations, especially as opinionated comments left tend to be personal and subjective, and can often lead to retaliation.
We ask all members to please ensure that any feedback you leave is not overly personal, insulting, defamatory or could be considered slanderous. Please also note we can not publish hearsay or third-person testimony; if someone else has had an issue with a particular member, they will need to leave their own feedback.
Workawayers can choose to be contacted privately by any paid members to offer additional details or information about their feedback.
This enables members to share opinions more directly, without involving in any potential accusations of public libel, slander or defamation.
Also taken overall profile ratings into consideration, if more than two 1-star ratings are left within a certain timeframe, we take the host or Workawayer's account offline and start an investigation to look into the issues raised.
Sometimes members have questioned why it's hard to find hosts with negative feedback. This is because a lot of these hosts are removed from our host list when we concluded that they are not suitable to continue hosting.
We can however confirm that if a host or Workawayer is online and has received bad feedback, the negative feedback symbol and/or text will be shown on their profile. Neither hosts nor Workawayers can remove this symbol once it has been published.
Workaway is growing fast and we have witnessed hundreds of thousands of people who has benefited from their successful exchange via our site. We love what we do, so rest assured-- ensuring safety and fairness for all is always our top priority.
