From the Mailbag

No. We pay in full, including service, and book under ordinary names. If a kitchen recognises us and sends out something extra, we note it in the review and leave that dish out of the score.

Five stars is too coarse, and online it is badly inflated. A 0–10 scale with half points, plus a printed breakdown of five criteria, gives you far more information than a row of icons.

Because we use the whole scale. On most review apps almost everything decent sits above 4 stars. Our 6 is a perfectly good meal; our 8 is a place we push friends towards. Compare our scores with each other, not with app ratings.

No. We do not sell coverage, sponsored reviews or removals. We correct factual errors quickly, such as a wrong price or opening hour, but verdicts stand.

At least twice for sit-down restaurants, on different days. Street stalls get a peak and an off-peak visit. Bakeries get a morning and a late-afternoon visit.

Yes. A chef change, a menu overhaul or a big price rise triggers a revisit, and anything scored 7 or above is rechecked at least every eighteen months. Previous scores stay visible in the review history.

Good. Check the breakdown first: you may simply weight service or the room more than we do. If you think we got the food wrong, write to us with specifics. Specific complaints sometimes trigger a revisit.

Watch for accounts with a single review, praise without a named dish or price, clusters of similar posts in one week, the full restaurant name repeated like an advert, and superlatives only. Our home page has a checklist you can tick through.

Rarely. We will cover a small group if each site has a real kitchen cooking from scratch. When we do, we score the branch we visited, not the brand.

Yes, as long as they say so. A pitch never guarantees a review, a visit date or a score, and we will never tell you when we are coming.