When dissatisfactory experiences turn into conflict

Abstract

Online reviews have partly become a complaints channel in which posters vent their negative feelings (Henning-Thurau et al. 2004), but the contents, as well as the way posters express their opinions, may vary depending on the type of review, the platform, and the consumers’ expectations, among others. This study explores 600 negative reviews in Spanish, posted to the outsourced review site Trustpilot about three different companies: Zara, Airbnb, and Travelgenio. The aim of this study is to examine: (1) the themes that posters raise as the source of complaint or conflict; and (2) the impoliteness formulae (Culpeper 2016) found in the three datasets. The results show that reviews are structured around a limited set of themes and formulae, which range from rather descriptive evaluations that report moderate dissatisfaction (Zara reviews) to highly aggressive reviews related to communication problems and significant loss of money and time (Travelgenio).