The Guideline on Consumer Reviews Has Been Published

A. Scope of the Guideline

Guideline addresses the reviews made by consumers on e-commerce sites or complaint platforms regarding various goods or services offered to them by sellers, providers, or intermediary service providers and their ancillary agreements (*)¹ . These reviews must be made through internet.

B. Fundamental Principles

The fundamental principles set out in the Guideline that should be taken as basis for consumer reviews are indicated below:

• Reviews should be made in relation to the production processes, quality, ease of use, promotion, sale, or supply of the goods or services offered to consumers.
• Reviews may also be made regarding ancillary agreements such as delivery, loan, and insurance services.
• Rating tools such as comments, ratings, or stars can be used for goods and services.
• Reviews can only be conducted by the consumer who has purchased the product or received the service.
• Review can be carried out until the stage where the purchase process has reached; on the other hand, in case of order cancellation, termination of an agreement, or exercising the right of withdrawal, review can also be made regarding the process up to this point.
• After consumer reviews are examined by the Board, they are published for at least one year, regardless of whether they are positive or negative, according to objective criteria, without any guidance.
• Reviews including health claims contrary to the legislation cannot be published.
• False assessments cannot be made in order to increase the demand for the seller, provider or intermediary service provider or to create a negative impact.
• This Guideline must also be followed if consumer reviews are published on a platform other than online platforms.

C. Informing Consumers and Control Process of the Reviews

Sellers, providers, or intermediary service providers should inform consumers about the reviews made regarding the goods or services they offer. This information provided in this context; (i) cannot impose rules that would prevent consumers from making reviews or restrict them to only reviewing specific subjects; (ii) should include statements indicating that the published reviews are made by consumers who have purchased the product or service in question; (iii) in case of evaluations that are not allowed to be published, consumers should be notified of this situation and the consumer should be given the right to re-evaluation.

To avoid discouraging consumers from making reviews, it is important for the control process to be reasonable and proportionate. Otherwise, the control process will exceed its purpose and become a deterrent. What is important in terms of the control process is the detection of misleading consumer evaluations. Reviews made to provide a certain benefit to the seller, or a provider are considered misleading consumer reviews since they will not be considered honest and objective. If a misleading consumer review is detected, the relevant review will be removed immediately.

You may find the full text of the Guideline here.

Cerensu Çetin Yenigün, Senior Associate
Kayra Menekşe, Trainee Lawyer


¹ The following situations are excluded from the scope of the Guideline:

• Consumer evaluations of persons who do not act on behalf of the seller or provider, which are providing information about the experience gained regarding a good or service or the seller or provider on their internet environment,
• Reviews that do not fall within the scope of consumer action.