Impossible to remove inappropriate ratings?

I’m still struggling to understand the procedure of flagging inappropriate user reviews:

Review removal only removes the text but not the rating:
The removal of an inappropriate review only seems to make the review content invisible but leaves the corresponding rating. This is unfortunate, I can’t see any obvious reason why a user who gives an incorrect bug report or complains that the addon doesn’t do something it is clearly not built for should be able to drop the rating average.

Flagging often doesn’t work:
Also, most of the time flagging a review doesn’t have any effect and after a page reload it isn’t even marked as “flagged” anymore. There are 3 reasons to choose from for flagging a review -> spam, inappropriate language and bug report/support request, which suggests that reviews are not for reporting bugs. So as I understand it flagging such a review would result in its removal(?) Sometimes this is the case - more often than not it isn’t. And there is no way for me to tell if a removal-request (by flagging the review) has been rejected (and why) or not been processed yet or if something went wrong (since “flagged” disappears on page reload).

Inappropriate/incorrect content:
And lastly, it would be nice to have a 4th reason for flagging reviews: Inappropriate content. For example, sometimes users seem to expect the addon to do something it clearly isn’t made for. Or they moan about some misbehavior that is not caused by the addon. Or they are seaking additional features…

This post is not meant to be a complaint but merely a wish for some clarifications;-) Because it’s somehow frustrating to be left helpless when users are able to spam the review section with (incorrect) bug reports and other mislead expectations. It also happens that a user is angry about the removal of her/his review and adds several new bad reviews using different anonymous accounts. And even if I manage to also have them removed as well - the rating seem to stay for eternity.

I’d be happy about any clarification or correction of what i understood wrong and about your option on this matter - whether Mozilla/AMO member, developer or addon user.
Thank you:)

They process better flagged reviews ago but I don’t know what’s happened.
I report seversl reviews but they still not removed!!
Their management is really poor!

Review removal only removes the text but not the rating

Both are removed, but the rating calculations aren’t done immediately after the removal.

time flagging a review doesn’t have any effect and after a page reload it isn’t even marked as “flagged” anymore

Flagging does work, but the page only tells you a review is flagged immediately after you flag it. Reloading the page doesn’t keep that state. If something you flagged isn’t removed, it could be that a moderator hasn’t looked into it yet, or decided it wasn’t worth removing.

@jorgev: Thank you for your answer

Both are removed, but the rating calculations aren’t done immediately after the removal.

This is definately not true (anymore). On my addon page there are ratings listed from reviews that have been removed many months or even a year ago.


EDIT: The total review count is correct, but the itemized stars counts are not: In my case for example it shows 39 x 5, 9 x 4, 1 x 3, 2 x 2, 3 x 1 where it should be 31 x 5, 9 x 4, 1 x 3, 1 x 2, 1 x 1. The average rating is been calculated using the wrong numbers (and is therefore lower). Hope this helps clarifying :wink:


If something you flagged isn’t removed, it could be that a moderator hasn’t looked into it yet, or decided it wasn’t worth removing.

OK, so that means the developer can never tell if it has been processed already and it also means that the 3 flagging reasons to choose from are sometimes a sufficient reason for removal, sometimes not - depending on the mod. We just have to accept that a user can leave a permanent bad review/rating for idiotic reasons (i.e. that the addon doesn’t do something it obviously wasn’t made for) :-[

I understand that Mozilla wants to be user friendly and therefore offer the opportunity to speak out - but I think it would be nice to not have this at the expense of the developer. In the past we were able to add the reason for flagging a review - which makes perfect sense, since the mod most of the time cannot know why a review is completely inappropriate.

I think you just noticed an inconsistency that is somewhat intentional. The review count only counts “reviews”, which have a rating and some review text. It’s also possible to leave a rating without a review, and those ratings are counted for the star breakdown, but not for the review count. They also don’t show up on the all reviews page.

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It’s also possible to leave a rating without a review, and those ratings are counted for the star breakdown, but not for the review count. They also don’t show up on the all reviews page.

Ahhhh, that explains a lot^^ Thank you for clearing the fog of confusion :-]