How we verify information

A listing comes from one of three kinds of source: an open dataset of places published under an open licence (see Third-party data licences in our Terms of use), details the business gives us itself, or the business's own website. We keep the source and the date of every fact.

We keep plain facts: name, category, address, phone number, website, where it is, whether it is open, and the services and hours the business states. We do not publish reviews or ratings, and we do not copy text or photos from other websites. A description of a business is short, built by fixed rules from facts the business publishes about itself, and never copied. A photo appears only if the business gave it to us or it is openly licensed and credited; otherwise we show our own artwork.

We do not publish a claim that a treatment cures, treats, heals, relieves or prevents a condition, or that it promises a result. Text on a listing that looks like such a claim is held back and kept off the website. We say what a business offers, where and when; we do not say what a service will do for your health or your looks.

Some trades are licensed by a state board. Where a listing shows a licence, the fact comes from a public state source, the licensing board's own lookup, and it is shown with the date it was checked. We do not show a licence we have not checked, and we do not call any business "verified". A licence can lapse or change after the day it was checked, so check with the board yourself before you rely on it.

Our automated helpers (bots) re-check contact details, websites and other plain facts against their sources from time to time. Each fact keeps the date it was last checked. A fact that could not be re-confirmed is flagged for a person to look at.

Every item a bot finds gets a confidence score, and fixed rules decide what happens to it. Only an item that reaches the required score and passes every safety check goes live, and every such change is listed so it can be undone. Anything below the line, a possible duplicate, a name that could be a private person's, or a place whose own website has not been checked yet stays hidden and off the website; it is checked again automatically when new information arrives (its own website, the next release of the open data), and if it still cannot be confirmed after a few checks it is closed and stays off the website. A bot never changes anything a person has locked or asked us to remove, it never lists the kinds of business we do not list, and it never invents a fact: if it is not in a source, it is not on the page.

If something is wrong, tell us. A person reads every report, checks it against the source, and fixes the page. See our corrections page.