How we check reviews

Only someone who took part in a shift that was arranged, carried out and completed via Sunworker can leave a review: the venue reviews the professional, and the professional reviews the venue. If a private customer booked the professional, only the private customer reviews the professional; private customers themselves are not reviewed.

There is exactly one review per shift and direction. A review can be left within 14 days of the shift being completed, not afterwards. Within a venue, reviews are left by the owner or by a person the owner has given this permission in the venue account. The account must have been approved by us.

Anyone who did not take part in the shift cannot review it – not even Sunworker itself. We do not import reviews from other sources.

Every review is technically tied to exactly one shift that was requested, accepted, confirmed, carried out and completed via Sunworker. Without such a shift, no review can be submitted. In detail:

• Reviews can only be left from the signed-in account of a party to the shift. We identify the reviewer by their sign-in, not by anything entered in the form.
• The shift must be completed. As long as it is requested, confirmed or not yet finished, it cannot be reviewed.
• We accept only one review per shift and direction; a second one is rejected.
• A review can only be left within 14 days of completion.
• Every review is marked “After a completed shift”, together with the role in the shift and the month.
• Internally we always know which account a review comes from – even if it is shown anonymously.

We do not publish reviews that we have written, bought or commissioned ourselves. Fake reviews, reviews in exchange for money, a discount or any other benefit, and review swaps are prohibited. Sunworker gives nothing in return for a review, and no review is ever a condition for completion, payment or payout.

Everyone who can leave a review receives the same reminders – on completion, after five days and two days before the deadline, each only as long as no review has been submitted – regardless of the rating to be expected.

A review consists of an overall rating from 1 to 5 stars and, optionally, individual ratings and a comment. The individual ratings for a professional are punctuality, expertise, cooperation and manner; for a venue, briefing, organisation, tone, and breaks and meals.

With every review we show who left it: a venue with its name and logo, a professional with first name, the initial of the surname and profile photo, a private customer only as “Private customer”, without name or location. We also show the role in the shift, the month and whether it was a single shift or a shift over several days.

Venues and professionals can review anonymously. Publicly, neither name nor logo or photo is then shown, only the type and city of the venue or the role of the professional. The reviewed party can see in their account which shift the review belongs to; anonymity applies towards the public. Prices, hourly rates and amounts never appear in reviews. We automatically mask phone numbers, email addresses, postal addresses and links in comments and replies. A private note to the other side is visible only to them, and only from publication; it is never public and does not count towards the rating.

Venue and professional review blind: neither side sees the other’s review until both have reviewed or the 14 days have passed. The existing reviews are then published at the same time, so neither side can adjust its review to the other’s. Until publication the author can edit the review, not afterwards.

A private customer’s review appears immediately after submission, because there is no review in the other direction.

In all cases: if a text is flagged by the automatic check (section 8), it only appears after a person has checked it.

We publish anonymous reviews in batches: only once there are at least three for the same professional or business, at the latest 30 days after the oldest, all with the same date. This way, no anonymous review can be traced to a shift.

We show all published reviews, positive and negative. We do not select anything, highlight anything or hold anything back because the reviewed party does not like it. The default order is by date, newest first. Readers can instead sort by rating, ascending or descending, by the number of “Helpful” votes, or filter. Signed-in users who were not involved in the shift can mark a review as “Helpful”.

The average is the simple arithmetic mean of the overall ratings of all published reviews from the last 24 months. Every review counts equally; nothing is weighted. Individual ratings do not feed into the overall rating but are averaged separately. Withdrawn and hidden reviews do not count.

We only show an average from three reviews and the breakdown by stars from six; below that we show “Not enough reviews yet”. The number of all reviews, including older ones, is shown alongside.

Whether someone pays Sunworker, which level they hold or whether they advertise has no influence on which reviews appear, on their order or on the average. A professional’s level is based partly on their reviews, not the other way round.

The rating plays a role in the search for professionals; there we use the average of all published reviews without a time limit. How we order search results is explained under How we sort.

The reviewed party can reply publicly once, as soon as the review is published. The reply appears directly below the review and can be corrected for 15 minutes.

Replies follow the same rules as reviews: they are checked automatically, contact details are masked, and a flagged reply only appears after a person has checked it. Anyone who considers a review inadmissible can also report it (section 9); a reply is not required for this.

The author can withdraw the review up to 30 days after publication. Publicly, only “Review withdrawn” then remains, without rating or text; it no longer counts towards the average or the level. After that, a review stays unless we hide it under these rules.

We hide a review or reply only for one of these reasons:

• insult, abuse or discrimination
• personal data such as phone numbers, addresses or names of third parties
• blackmail or review swaps
• no connection to the shift
• conflict of interest, for example a review on behalf of a competitor
• retaliation, for example for a cancellation or a report
• a review in exchange for money, a discount or any other benefit
• the shift did not take place as described
• false statement of fact
• otherwise unlawful content
• a comparably serious breach of these rules or our terms and conditions, which we name specifically in the statement of reasons

A review is not hidden merely because it is negative or because the reviewed party disagrees with the rating. Opinions and value judgements remain as long as they relate to the shift. We never change the rating or the text – we only decide whether a review stays visible.

When a comment or reply is submitted, we check it automatically with an AI model. The model does not make any final decision: if a text is flagged or the check is not possible at the moment, it only appears after a person has checked it; until then the author sees “Under review”. If a text is not published, the author is told why and can respond once. The decision to hide is always made by a person.

Every published review can be reported via “Report” on the review, while signed in, with a reason from section 8 and an optional explanation. The reasons “The shift did not take place as described” and “False statement of fact” are available to the reviewed party and start the review procedure under section 10.

Any person or organisation can also report content they consider unlawful without an account, by email to kontakt@sunworker.eu. So that we can process the notice, it should contain:

• the exact location, ideally the address of the page (URL), and which review or reply is meant
• an explanation of why the content is unlawful or breaches these rules
• the name and email address of the person or organisation submitting the notice
• a statement that the information is accurate and complete to the best of their knowledge

We confirm receipt of every notice – immediately in the account, by email with a reply to the address given. We handle every notice promptly, diligently, objectively and without arbitrariness; the decision is made by a person. We inform the person who submitted the notice of the outcome, together with the ways to challenge it.

An account can report the same content only once and can submit at most 20 reports per day.

If the reviewed party objects that the shift did not take place as described or that the review states a false fact, we examine the individual case in these steps:

1. The review is publicly marked “Under review”. Further reports about the same review belong to the same procedure.
2. The author is notified and can submit one statement within 7 days. Only we and the two parties see the statement; it is never made public.
3. We check the shift against the data on Sunworker – request, acceptance, confirmation, recorded times, completion and, where necessary for the objection, the messages about the shift.
4. Once the statement has been received or the 7 days have passed, we decide: the review stays, or we hide it with a reason from section 8. If the author cannot substantiate a disputed fact in a comprehensible way, we hide the review.
5. Both sides receive the decision with a statement of reasons (section 11).

The review remains visible until the decision. We hide it beforehand only if the breach is obvious.

If we hide a review or reply, the author receives a clear and specific statement of reasons. It states:

• what we have done – the review or reply is hidden for all users in all countries
• the facts and circumstances we rely on, and whether we acted on a notice or on our own initiative
• whether automated means were involved, such as the check on submission
• the reason from section 8 and, for unlawful content, the legal basis, otherwise the rule concerned on this page or in our terms and conditions
• how the decision can be challenged (section 12)

The reviewed party is also informed that and why the review was hidden; the person who reported it is informed of the outcome of their notice. We record every decision internally with its time, reason and the person who decided.

Anyone who disagrees with a decision – the author, the reviewed party or the person who reported – can lodge a complaint free of charge within six months of being informed of it: by email to kontakt@sunworker.eu with the subject “Review complaint”, a reference to the review and the reasons.

We handle every complaint promptly, without discrimination, diligently and without arbitrariness. The decision is made by a person, not solely by an automated system, and where possible by a different person from the one who made the first decision. If the complaint is justified, we reverse our decision without undue delay; a hidden review is then published again. We communicate the outcome with reasons.

Anyone who frequently submits manifestly unfounded reports or complaints, or frequently publishes manifestly unlawful content, will first be warned. After that, we may for a reasonable period stop processing their reports and complaints or suspend their ability to leave reviews.

The courts remain open at all times; a complaint to us is not a precondition for going to court.

If someone deletes their account, the reviews they have left remain as a statement about a shift that actually took place, but they are anonymised: the author is then shown as “former account”, without name, logo or photo, and the link to the person who left the review is deleted. We delete private notes.

Reviews about a deleted account are no longer shown publicly once the profile has been deleted. Where we have to keep data for longer because of statutory retention obligations, we restrict it from any other use.

Anyone affected by a review can also exercise their rights under the General Data Protection Regulation, in particular erasure (Art. 17 GDPR) and objection (Art. 21 GDPR). We then weigh the interests of the person concerned against the right to freedom of expression and information. Details are set out in the privacy policy.

Sunworker is provided by Sunworkers Ltd., Sinasi Bei 69, Kings Resort, Block C, Flat/Office A2, 8015 Paphos, Cyprus, registered with the Department of Registrar of Companies and Intellectual Property of the Republic of Cyprus under HE 464110. Full details are given in the legal notice.

Please send questions about a review, notices without an account and complaints to kontakt@sunworker.eu; you can write to us in German, English or Greek. These rules are part of our terms and conditions (§ 7).