It's not the 1 star reviews that hurt so much because they are generally not reasonable. It's the 3 start reviews that hurt the most, in my opinion. But I still like to respond to the one star reviews for "damage control".
This potential client called looking for tax services.
He was told that the tax preparer that takes in-person appointments is full and not taking clients, and that we still have someone in the office that is still taking "online-only" appointments.
(note that our website and our Yelp profile both clearly disclaim this)
His review was:
I'm sorry if I could leave zero stars I would. I just called this tax preparer to see if my fiancé and I could get our taxes done for 2022. She said the tax preparer only does it digitally nothing in person so I would have to scan documents over and she would review them do the taxes and then send them to us to sign. What a humbug!!! I'm sorry to get my taxes done. I need to at least have a face-to-face conversation with explanation on what needs to be done and what is going to be done. Too bad. So sad.
I'm looking for a quippy but still polite/professional response that sort of belittles the unreasonableness of one star review. It's not him I'm worried about - it's that I still take a few clients each offseason and I have staff that will provide online only services.
I was thinking:
It is true that I have no remaining availability for in person appointments for new clients.
To help accommodate those who are OK with it, we still have availability to offer online services to new clients in some cases.
I don't believe that it is reasonable, however, that simply not having availability should garner a one star review. It is the middle of tax season, I'm only one person and can only do so much, and this is all clearly disclaimed on our website and on our Yelp profile. We have done our best to hire extra help to accommodate late inquires with online-only service offers.
Not OK with online only services? Fine, I understand.
1-star review for it? Not appropriate.
If you have a second, please critique/correct my response, thanks.