Hotel issued 6 page threatening letter following poor review

[Itsalongwayto]

following on from this post www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4018141-Hotel-threatening-to-sue-us-for-bad-review

The owner has now got his solicitor to issue a six page threatening letter. I don't think I have said or done anything wrong except write a review that he doesn't like and publicise the dangers of his hotel. His initial letter was blackmailing me NOT to write a negative review, threatening 'further action' including contacting my place of work and professional body. I have evidence of all the negative comments i made, except the smell. Advice please.

He’s now posted a bizarre message on the local Facebook Gossip site, and someone has helpfully linked this thread in the comments.

So now a fair portion of the locals have been alerted (although it appears many were already aware of his reputation).

These threads need to go now.

People have made others aware of the hotel, the bloke’s name, the location, and by definition have outed the OP, and now it’s being linked to in his local community. The man may have enemies but he will also have supporters, and by doing this people have set the OP up for potential abuse from other quarters.

And WTF are people stalking the local facebook pages where this man lives?

This isn’t a game, it’s gone way too far now.

By setting themselves up as super sleuths people have made things worse for the OP. Well done.

*And WTF are people stalking the local facebook pages where this man lives?(

Perhaps they also live there?

I support OP but I also believe that threads have to go.

@Treadcarefully1 no stalking at all, it is my local Facebook page and comes up in my newsfeed. He was the one posting on there and drawing attention to his hotel.

@ Whataplonkerheis fair enough, :-) but given that people actively went looking for this bloke, have posted newspaper articles about him, sought out the OP’s review in order to mark it as helpful, it wasn’t beyond the realms of probability that someone would be looking out for what he’s saying out there on social media, iyswim.

It wouldn’t be the first time someone on MN has done that kind of thing....

People were posting what what's already in the public domain. His tripadvisor replies, the stories about him in the media, him taking part in a television show where he made himself look like Basil Faulty...

None of this is digging unknown dirt up on him. They are not revealing his secrets.

The only reason he was found at all from the very limited information regarding some random unknown Devon hotel that the OP stayed at was down to him making himself infamous by his shitty public replies and shady business practices.

This is down to him.

Well no that’s not strictly true is it?

The OP will have alluded to which hotel it was hence how people were able to find the specific review and therefore the OP’s name, and were able to add their “helpful” marks so as to make the review more visible.

I don’t think anyone’s disputing that he’s unpleasant, but this fact, and the fact that people have linked the OP to this thread and the other one which is full of posters gleeful at the fact they’ve “just been on to the review and marked it as helpful” means that the OP is potentially in a difficult position.

Do people really think all this is worth this bloke, and his potential supporters, coming after the OP? Solicitor’s letters? Potential for abuse on social media if he has supporters there (and he will have supporters there,)

The review was posted in good faith. But at this point it really isn’t worth the amount of stress it has potentially opened the OP up for.

Well he's shot himself in the foot doing that.

He's essentially done the same thing as the op.. posted bad mouthing certain guests who are very easily identifiable (pp said the thread was linked on the FB comments so its not been hard to put the pieces together and it's not hard to then find the review and link the TA account and there's a risk that random people could be encouraged to message OP through TA).
All the while badmouthing some visitors to other locals saying he wishes they wouldn't visit at all and potentially turning off other local businesses and people to the visitors with whom his business relies on..

@SquirtleSquad

Well he's shot himself in the foot doing that.

He's essentially done the same thing as the op.. posted bad mouthing certain guests who are very easily identifiable (pp said the thread was linked on the FB comments so its not been hard to put the pieces together and it's not hard to then find the review and link the TA account and there's a risk that random people could be encouraged to message OP through TA).
All the while badmouthing some visitors to other locals saying he wishes they wouldn't visit at all and potentially turning off other local businesses and people to the visitors with whom his business relies on..

Good point. What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If he doesn't like people calling him names and writing scathing stuff publicly, perhaps he shouldn't be calling his guests mentally challenged, nasty or scummy. In one reply he had a pop at a guests weight and in another made rude comments about a man who was there with his second wife and something about why the first was no more.

Then let his comments speak for themselves.

Do people really think the OP should be caught up in all this? With solicitors letters and threats of court which for all we know he might follow through into the bargain?

It’s very easy to sit here and say “oh, he won’t go to court, and if he does he won’t win,” but the posters saying that aren’t the ones going through it.

And what happens if this thread makes it into the daily mail?

Seriously. The only person defaming him is himself. OPs review - shrug, I would have thought, fair comment, now I know what to expect, might still be worth it for whatever reason. Owner's replies? Owner's attitude? Hell NO No NO. Not in a million years will I go there. He himself has been responsible for that.

All the OP has to do is ignore any letters and keep the review up. If he thought he had a case he could go after trip adviser and get them to take it down.

/|\ this!

@VytaminSea as I said in my first post I have been there. When I posted a comment elsewhere someone came on to the thread and said “you should be careful, this bloke might cause a lot of trouble for you.” And everyone responded with “no of course he won’t, she’s entitled to voice something which is of concern here,” and within about an hour i was being subjected to legal threats, solicitor’s letters and demands for apologies and then breakdowns of my finances.

In itself I don’t think the review is wrong, and if it had only been the review then his responses would speak for themselves. But these threads have led to posters finding the review to mark it as helpful, to deliberately highlight the fact that they don’t think people should go there, even though they themselves have never been there. And through that the OP has been outed on here, and because someone has linked a copy of this thread to a facebook post the thread has been linked to the OP and now anyone who is potentially on this bloke’s side could quite easily find the OP and give her a hard time over it.

It’s all very well people sitting here saying “ignore the letters, he won’t do anything,” but what if he does? He already has form for going back and back and back to councils etc re his refused planning permission. He clearly doesn’t just lay down and take no for an answer. Are the MN’ers telling the OP he can’t do anything to her going to be paying her legal bills if she gets a court summons?

Threatening legal action over the review was ridiculous, but there were plenty of other reviews there which would back up what the OP had said, so it was unlikely to come to anything. But threads talking about it with hundreds and hundreds of posters going on to mark the review as helpful has made it much worse and is far more likely to give this bloke some ammunition if he does decide to go to court.

He’s clearly prepared to spend money here because he’s already sent the OP a solicitor’s letter, and again, suggestions that it wasn’t a real solicitor and that there is a criminal act being conducted here is pure speculation and again, inflammatory.

@VytaminSea I agree with you here.....! My suspicions are raised...

If he doesn't have the money to maintain his hotel, it is difficult to imagine how he is going to have the money to pursue legal action. He also threatens legal action on Facebook.

He is a real unpleasant person, and is known for his personality locally.

Wow! This as turned into quite a thread! Thank you to those who have offered advice and thank you to those who have shown concern.
Just to let you all know I am fine. TA have been contacted and are investigating. MNHQ got back to me and are monitoring the thread but see no need to remove it. They have removed posts that they have felt are directly insulting to the owner.
I have had some solid legal advice and will not be removing this thread. I may update the TA thread to include his threats.
If the daily mail gets hold of this his business will be toast and it certainly won’t be due to anything I’ve said. Happy Saturday x

@Treadcarefully1

@ Whataplonkerheis fair enough, :-) but given that people actively went looking for this bloke, have posted newspaper articles about him, sought out the OP’s review in order to mark it as helpful, it wasn’t beyond the realms of probability that someone would be looking out for what he’s saying out there on social media, iyswim.

It wouldn’t be the first time someone on MN has done that kind of thing....

He's a horrible bully and deserves to be put in public for that. He has brought this entirely in himself and only has himself to blame.

You seem overly anxious, why not just ignore the letter you got? I don't think you got very good legal advice.

@PatsEarrings

Well she could represent herself or have a Mackenzie friend but what if she loses? I genuinely don’t think it’s worth the time, insane levels of stress and potentially a lot of money.

Yes, it could be costly if it goes to court and the OP loses. But, given that she has photographic evidence to support her poor comments about the hotel, she will have no trouble defending her comments as true. She will not lose.

I have never hoped for the daily mail to get hold of a thread more than this one!

@JacobReesMogadishu he has replied on TA....his second attempt as the first had my name, village and job in it.