Reviews policy

Where reviews come from

1. 1

   You send a request and choose a locksmith

   Up to three verified locksmiths reply with a price, and you pick one.

2. 2

   After the job, we text you a review link

   One review per request. The link is unguessable and works only for your request.

3. 3

   We check it

   Automatically as it arrives, and by a person when a check flags it.

4. It goes on the locksmith's profile

   With your first name, your town, the job and when.

We never copy reviews from Google, Checkatrade, Yell or anywhere else, and we never write or buy them. Locksmiths can't send us reviews, and their terms ban offering anything in return for a review or asking only happy customers for one. A locksmith caught doing either is suspended.

What we publish

• Every genuine review, newest first. We don't hold back low ratings or put the best ones first.
• The rating is the average of every published review, cut to one decimal place and never rounded up, and the number of reviews is always shown beside it.
• When you tell us the price you paid didn't match the quote, the review says so.
• Locksmiths listed from public information and not yet verified show no ratings at all.

The checks we run

Every review is checked against the request behind it. A review is flagged when:

• Locksmith's own number

  The customer's phone number is the locksmith's own.

• Another locksmith's number

  The customer's phone number belongs to another locksmith or listed business.

• Repeat number

  The same phone number left another review.

• Burst

  3 or more reviews of the same locksmith within 24 hours.

• No request

  Not linked to a request made through us.

A flag isn't a verdict. A flagged review stays up while one of our team looks at the request, the numbers and the timing, then either keeps it or removes it for one of the reasons below. Bursts are 3 or more reviews in 24 hours; busy weekends happen, so we look before we act.

When a review comes down

Only for one of these reasons. Never because it's negative, and never because the locksmith asked.

• Fake

  Not written by a real customer about a real job: the locksmith's own review, a competitor's, or one bought or swapped.

• Incentivised

  Written in return for a discount, refund, gift or anything else, which the review doesn't say.

• Abusive

  Threats, hate, harassment or obscene language.

• Unlawful

  Defamatory, or breaks a court order or someone else's rights.

• Off-topic

  Not about the job: about another business, or advertising.

• Personal details

  Someone's phone number, address or registration plate.

Each removal records the reason, a note of what we found, who decided and when. A removed review is hidden, not deleted, it stops counting in the rating, and we put it back if we got it wrong. You can ask us to remove your own review at any time.

Locksmiths' replies

• They can reply, once

  A public reply of up to 600 characters, shown under your review on their profile. It can't be changed later.

• They can't edit, hide or remove reviews

  Not their text, not their stars, not their order. If they think a review breaks this policy they can tell us, and we decide by the rules above.

What green means

Green means a locksmith passed our checks and pays for membership.

• They pay us. Verified locksmiths are members who pay Locksmith100 £29 a month (before VAT); founding members get the first 3 months free. They also buy credits to reply to requests.
• Paying doesn't buy green. Nobody goes green until they pass every check: photo ID, public liability insurance, a basic DBS certificate and a test call. If a check fails later, they lose green until it's fixed, paid or not.
• It isn't a recommendation. It means “we checked these things”, not “we vouch for the work”. Reviews and reply times are how you judge the work.

How we rank

When you say where the car is, we take every locksmith within 10 miles of it (or the 10 nearest, where fewer are that close). Inside those 10 miles, how far away they are doesn't count: a few miles is nothing to a mobile locksmith. They go in this order, and you see the first 10:

1. Those with a phone number, so you can reach them.
2. Verified locksmiths first, whatever their reviews: the ones we checked ourselves, or know. Businesses we've only found online and listed come after them.
3. For urgent jobs (a lockout, lost keys), those open now first: open by their Google opening hours, or at any hour if their own website says 24/7. Then those whose hours we don't know, then those closed now. Each card says which. If most of them are closed (fewer than 3open or unknown), we look at the 20 nearest too.
4. Then by reviews, weighed by how many there are: everyone starts as if they had 50 reviews at 4.0 stars, and their real reviews (ours and Google's together) move them from there. So 266 reviews at 4.7 rank above 10 at 5.0, and 175 reviews at 5.0 rank above 158 at 5.0. The same search gives the same order every time. Car key specialists get a small lead (0.15 of a star) for car jobs.
5. On an equal score, the one with more reviews, then the nearer. Only locksmiths exactly equal (say, two newcomers with no reviews yet, serving the same town) take turns from one search to the next, so newcomers get seen.

Verified locksmiths come first on every page. Membership is what makes a locksmith verified, so it is paid, but paying alone verifies nobody: the checks do. Nothing else anyone buys from us moves them up, and there are no sponsored places. Prices, WhatsApp and credits play no part in the order.

Tell us about a review

If you think a review is fake, was paid for, or breaks this policy in any other way, email [reviews contact email] with the locksmith's name and the review. We look at every report, as well as running the checks above ourselves.

See also our privacy notice for how we handle the names and numbers behind reviews.