Asking customers for reviews is explicitly permitted and encouraged. What changed in 2026 is that several common methods became formal violations: offering any incentive, filtering customers by sentiment first, asking while they are still on your premises, using a shop tablet, and requesting that a particular staff member be named. Several of these were standard practice in the trades.
What is now prohibited
Incentives of any kind
Discounts, free services, loyalty points, gift cards, prize draw entries. The prohibition applies regardless of whether you ask for a positive review or an honest one, and it extends to offering something in exchange for a customer amending or removing a negative review.
In the United States there is additional legal exposure through federal rules on fake reviews. Canadian businesses have obligations under competition and consumer protection law rather than that specific rule, and the platform prohibition applies regardless of jurisdiction.
Review gating
Asking how the job went, then sending a public review link to the satisfied and a private feedback form to the dissatisfied. Long prohibited and now actively enforced. Every customer must have the same route to leaving public feedback.
Asking on your premises
The change that caught most businesses out. Requesting a review while the customer is still with you, including counter tablets, waiting-room kiosks, QR codes at the desk, and handing over a device, now runs against the policy on pressuring users.
Shared devices carry a second problem: reviews from one device and address tend to trigger spam filtering regardless of policy.
Asking for specific content
Requesting that a customer mention a technician by name, include particular services, or use particular wording. Common in home services and now explicitly prohibited. An organic mention is fine; an engineered one is not.
Staff review quotas
Targets for numbers of reviews collected, and leaderboards comparing team members, are now treated as rating manipulation. Internal recognition is a grey area here, so caution is sensible.
What remains entirely permitted
- Asking every customer, in the same way
- A follow-up email or text after they have left
- Review links in email signatures, on invoices, and on receipts
- A printed card given with the paperwork, to be used later
- Verbally asking whether they would be willing to share their experience, without pressure and without a device
- Responding to every review you receive
The compliant path is not restrictive. It is essentially: ask everyone, ask afterwards, on their own device, without scripting it or paying for it.
Solving the awkwardness
Most owners dislike asking, which is why it happens inconsistently. Three things remove nearly all of the discomfort.
Separate the ask from the moment
The awkwardness comes from asking face to face, which is now also non-compliant. A message sent later removes the social pressure from both sides, and the customer can decline by simply not responding.
Make it a process, not a decision
If asking is a judgement call made per customer, it will be skipped when you are busy and applied selectively, which drifts toward gating. A message that goes to everyone automatically after job completion removes both problems.
Keep the wording short and open
A brief thank you, a plain request for honest feedback, and the link. No suggested wording, no mention of stars, no reference to what the review should contain. Shorter requests also read as less needy, which helps.
Practical points
- Timing. Soon after completion, while the work is fresh, but after they have left. Same day or next day for most trades.
- One reminder at most. Beyond that it becomes pressure.
- Make the link direct. Requiring someone to search for your business loses a proportion at every step.
- Do not ask only your happiest customers. Beyond being a policy breach, a profile of uniform praise reads as curated, whereas a small number of mixed reviews handled well is more persuasive than perfection.
- Steady beats bursts. Sudden spikes in review volume can attract scrutiny, and continuous accumulation is more durable anyway.
If you are currently doing one of the banned things
Stop, and do not attempt to remove past reviews collected under the old approach, which risks compounding the problem. Revise the request templates, remove any incentive language, retire the counter tablet, and move to a follow-up message sent after the customer has left.
Enforcement now includes review removal, rating adjustments, and profile restrictions, so the cost of continuing is no longer theoretical.
Frequently asked questions
Can I offer a discount for a Google review?
No. Google prohibits offering any incentive in exchange for a review, including discounts, free services, loyalty points, gift cards, and prize draw entries. The prohibition applies whether you request a positive review or an honest one, and extends to incentives for amending a negative review.
What is review gating and why is it a problem?
Asking customers about their experience first, then sending a public review link only to satisfied ones while directing others to a private form. It is prohibited because it produces a public profile reflecting screened customers rather than actual experience, and it is now actively enforced.
Can I ask for a review while the customer is still on site?
Google's policy indicates merchants should not pressure users to leave reviews while on the premises, which covers counter tablets, waiting-room kiosks, and handing a customer a device. Requests sent after the customer has left, to be completed on their own device, are the compliant approach.
Can I ask customers to mention my technician by name?
No. Requesting that a review include specific content such as a staff member's name, particular services, or particular wording is prohibited. A customer mentioning someone organically is entirely fine; asking them to do so is not.
What is still allowed when asking for reviews?
Asking every customer in the same way, sending a follow-up email or text after they have left, including review links in email signatures, invoices, and receipts, providing a printed card for later use, asking verbally without pressure, and responding to reviews you receive.
How do I ask for reviews without feeling awkward?
Separate the request from the face-to-face moment by sending it afterwards, make it an automatic process applied to every customer rather than a judgement call, and keep the wording brief and open without suggesting what the review should say.
West Coast Media Solutions Inc. builds websites for businesses across Canada. Conversion research is heavily context dependent and widely misquoted; where we describe a principle rather than citing a figure, that is deliberate.
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