A Norfolk chef has called on Tripadvisor to make sure those who post racist reviews are banned from the site after one of his businesses fell victim to a malicious post.

Eastern Daily Press: No1 Cromer, which has hit back at a malicious Tripadvisor review. Picture: Google MapsNo1 Cromer, which has hit back at a malicious Tripadvisor review. Picture: Google Maps (Image: Archant)

Earlier this week, Galton Blackiston who owns No1 Cromer, hit back at the reviewing website for its failure to promptly take down a review of the fish and chip restaurant which contained racist language and a version of events which the business rebutted.

The review was removed from the website but not before Mr Blackiston had taken to social media himself to draw attention to the problems malicious posts cause.

Now, he has written to Tripadivsor calling on them to do more to moderate posts and ban those who use racist language from the using site.

In a letter sent to Tripadvisor, Mr Blackiston said: “In light of your recent apology we still feel extremely infuriated that this review was able to stay published even after our initial complaint and it wasn’t until the newspapers and support from our following on social media got involved that you made a decision to remove it.

“The use of racist language should have been sufficient for this not to have been published in the first instance, let alone continue to be visible after your so called human error.”

In response to Mr Blackiston’s criticism, a spokesperson for Tripadvisor said all reviews submitted to the site were subject to the same guidelines and anyone could report a review, which would then be reviewed by moderators.

They said: “In this case, an individual in our moderation team investigated the review and incorrectly determined that it met our posting guidelines.

“This was a case of human error. We are very sorry such a mistake was made in this instance.

“As soon as we became aware of the error, we corrected it and took action to remove the review, and we wrote to the management at No1 Cromer to apologise for the distress caused.

“The decision to remove the review was not an arbitrary one. The review contained offensive, prejudiced language that clearly breached our guidelines. No review like that has any place on our platform.”