Last updated: 7th May 2026

Review Policy

At Autotrader, we’re committed to helping you make informed decisions when buying a vehicle. We know it’s a big step, so we want to make sure that the dealer reviews you see are genuine and trustworthy.

This policy sets out how you can share your review, as well as our approach to collecting and displaying customer reviews about dealers on our website, and the steps we take to maintain the integrity of such reviews.

We’ll go through:

• What are fake and misleading reviews?

• How do we help protect you from fake and misleading reviews?

• How you can share your review about a dealer on our website and apps (“Platform”)

• How your reviews are handled

• What should you do if you think a review is fake or misleading?

What are fake or misleading reviews?

Fake and misleading reviews are banned under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers (DMCC) Act 2024.

A fake review is when someone leaves feedback pretending they had a genuine experience but, in reality, they didn’t. We do not allow fake reviews to be published on the site.

Even if a review is technically true, it’s also not allowed if it’s shared in a way that could mislead you. Here are some examples:

• Hidden rewards: If someone gets paid, gets a discount or a gift for leaving a review, but this isn’t made clear in the review itself

• Only showing the good bits: If a dealer only collects or shows positive reviews, or tries to hide or remove negative feedback, that’s misleading too

How do we help protect you from fake or misleading reviews?

We want you to be able to trust the reviews you read, so we have taken steps to minimise the risk of fake and misleading reviews appearing on our Platform.

Dealers who have an advertising contract with us have to follow our Dealer Review Business Rules (“Business Rules”). These rules are in place to make sure reviews are genuine and helpful. Dealers must:

• Invite only real customers to leave reviews

• Ask for feedback from all customers, not just those who’ve had a good experience

• Never write fake reviews or get someone else to do it for them

• Not offer rewards or incentives for writing reviews, or for removing or editing a negative review

We work with respected review companies, who are required to check for fake or misleading reviews.

If Feefo or one of the other Syndicated Review Partners tells us a dealer keeps getting flagged for fake or banned reviews, we’ll investigate it. We might put the dealer on our “watchlist” or even end their advertising contract if needed, in accordance with our Business Rules.

Whenever a review is reported, Feefo or the other relevant Syndicated Review Partner will review it. If it’s found to be fake or otherwise banned, it will be deleted, and we’ll remove it from our Platform too.

How you can share your review about a dealer on our Platform

We partner with Feefo to collect dealer reviews and display them on our Platform. Every dealer who has an advertising contract with us can use Feefo reviews at no extra cost.

Some dealers may additionally choose to work with an additional review partner to collect reviews. We also publish reviews that are collected by the following additional review partners (“Syndicated Review Partners”):

• Feefo

• Trustpilot

• Reputation.com

• Car Dealer Reviews

• Judge Service

You have three simple ways to leave a review:

1. Visit the dealer’s store page on our Platform and leave a Feefo review there. Feefo shares your feedback with us, so it gets published for others to see.

2. After interacting with a dealer, you might get an email invitation from Feefo asking you to review your experience. Your response will be published on our Platform.

3. If a dealer uses another Syndicated Review Partner, you may receive an invite from one of those partners. If you leave a review in this way, your review will still be shared with us and shown on our Platform.

When you leave a review for a dealer, you’ll be asked to give a rating from one to five stars and write a short description of your experience. This helps other consumers make informed decisions.

Reviews should be based on your genuine experiences with a dealer. We do not allow fake reviews to be published on our Platform. Where Feefo or a Syndicated Review Partner identifies that a review is fake or misleading, or otherwise does not comply with their respective content moderation guidelines, you may be asked to amend it to bring it into compliance, or it may be removed (see “How are dealer reviews moderated and managed?” below for more details).

If you have a complaint about a dealer, you can separately raise this with our Customer Security Team (for more details, please see here).

We do not enable the dealer review functionality for “pay as you go” traders who advertise with us. This applies to very small traders/dealers who do not have an advertising contract with us, but place adverts on an ad-hoc basis. As such, you are not able to leave a review, or view reviews, for such traders on our platform. You may be able to leave a review, or view reviews, for the trader if the trader has reviews on their own website or through another platform.

How your reviews are handled

How are dealer reviews moderated and managed?

The company that collects your review will take steps, in line with its respective content moderation guidelines, to make sure reviews are genuine. This is the same whether it’s Feefo or one of our other Syndicated Review Partners. They check for anything suspicious, moderate the content, and handle any requests to update or remove reviews. If your review doesn’t comply with the relevant moderation guidelines, Feefo or the relevant Syndicated Review Partner might reach out and ask you to edit it so that it meets the guidelines. If there’s ever a disagreement about a review, they’ll manage that too. 

What role does Autotrader play?

Autotrader’s role is to publish your review on our Platform so everyone can benefit from your feedback. We don’t edit or manage the reviews ourselves. We want to stay neutral and make sure everyone’s voice is heard.

If you ever have a concern or question about a review, let us know. We’ll pass your message straight to Feefo or the other relevant Syndicated Review Partner to help you out.

If Feefo or other relevant Syndicated Review Partner determines, following investigation, that a review is fake or misleading, we will work with them to ensure that it is removed from our Platform. We will also recalculate the dealer’s star rating (see below) so that it no longer reflects the score given in the removed review.

We occasionally receive requests from dealers to move reviews from one dealer account to another dealer account. We have a documented process in place for dealing with these requests and only allow the requests in limited circumstances, where it is appropriate for the reviews to be transferred to the relevant dealer account to ensure transparency for consumers. This might be, for example, where there has been a recent change in legal entity, such as a change from sole trader to limited company, but the dealership is under the same management and operating at the same premises.

How do we use your review?

When you submit a review, you’re helping others make informed choices. We’ll show your review on our Platform so it’s visible to everyone. We may also feature it in our marketing materials, including emails and social media. Your feedback makes a difference and helps other consumers feel confident in their decisions.

How are reviews shown on our Platform?

Reviews from Feefo or other Syndicated Review Partners are sent to us and we publish them automatically, exactly as they’re provided.

We display the logo of Feefo or the relevant Syndicated Review Partner alongside each review, so you’ll know where it came from.

To help you understand how a review was collected, Feefo reviews are labelled as:

• “Customer review” for reviews left directly on a dealer’s store page on the Platform; or

• “Customer invited review” for reviews collected after an email invitation from the dealer.

We think recent reviews are most helpful so, by default, reviews are listed from newest to oldest. You can also filter reviews to see those from the past 6 or 12 months, or filter to see reviews by star rating.

What’s the star rating?

We show an average star rating for each dealer, based on reviews from the last 12 months, provided by Feefo and other Syndicated Review Partners. This helps you see, at a glance, how other customers rate their experiences.

If a dealer doesn’t have a star rating, it means:

• They haven’t received any reviews in the past year; or

• They haven’t received any reviews at all.

If a review is removed by Feefo or a Syndicated Review Partner (for example, because it is suspected to be fake or misleading), we will promptly update the relevant dealer’s average star rating on the Platform.

What is a “featured review”?

Dealers can highlight their most recent 5-star review from the past 6 months on their page. If this option is chosen, that review will be pinned at the top, making it the first review you see. If there’s no recent 5-star review, or the dealer hasn’t picked this option, then no featured review will appear. All other reviews are shown underneath in date order (most recent first).

What are the Highly Rated Awards?

Every year, we recognise dealers who consistently earn highly rated reviews from their customers. Dealers who meet our criteria over the past 12 months receive the “Highly Rated” award. You’ll see the award badge on their adverts across our Platform, and winners can also share it on their social media or display it in their showrooms for the next year.

It’s important to know that this award is not a personal recommendation from Autotrader. Instead, it celebrates those dealers who have consistently been awarded positive reviews from their customers.

We use a clear, data-driven process to decide the winners, looking at all reviews from Feefo and our other Syndicated Review Partners. To keep things fair, any dealer found to be involved in fake or misleading reviews, or any other serious breach of our terms and conditions, is excluded from the awards.

What should you do if you think a review is fake or misleading?

We want you to trust the reviews you read. If you spot a review that doesn’t seem right, there are several ways to flag it:

• For Feefo reviews, go straight to the Feefo Report a Suspicious Review page.

• Use the ‘Report this advert’ button you’ll find on every advert across our Platform

• Email our Customer Security Team directly at customersecurity@autotrader.co.uk.

If you report a review to us, we will notify Feefo or the relevant Syndicated Review Partner and they will investigate it carefully. If they find the review is fake or otherwise banned, they’ll delete it. We’ll make sure it’s removed from our Platform too.