Guide

Community reports on your restaurant — how to claim your page and dispute one

A community report is a diner's word, labeled as exactly that. It can nudge your score by a few points at most, it fades on its own, and if it's wrong you can put it in front of a person. Here's how.

Diners can file community reports — pests, suspected food poisoning, sanitation issues, and praise — on any NYC establishment's page. Here's what those reports are (and aren't), what they do to the score, and the exact path to claim your restaurant and dispute a report that's wrong.

When this applies
You own or operate a NYC food-service establishment and a community report has appeared on its page — or you want your side of the counter set up before one does.

How it's normally done — and how we make it easy

Step by step

1. 1

   Know what a community report is — and is not

   Community reports are filed by diners from the NYC Sniffer app, and they are unverified — no inspector confirmed them, and every surface that shows one says so. A report is one of five kinds: pests (rats, mice, roaches, flies, or other), suspected food poisoning, another sanitation issue, or praise for the taste or the cleanliness. Reports can carry photos. Any number of diners can report the same establishment, but each device can file at most three reports per restaurant per day — and twenty-five a day citywide — so no single phone can flood a listing.

2. 2

   Understand what it does to the score

   Negative reports can dock the score, but the dock is deliberately small: capped at a few points total no matter how many reports come in, weighted toward recent reports, and fading to nothing over roughly ninety days of quiet. Praise never adds points — it surfaces as a signal to diners, so a stack of friendly flags can't buy back a bad kitchen. Wherever the score carries a community effect, that effect is shown as its own labeled line, never blended in silently.

3. 3

   Look up your establishment

   Search your restaurant by name — every NYC establishment already has a page. That page is where community reports appear, alongside the inspection record the city keeps.

4. 4

   Create the free report

   From your establishment's page, run the report — it's free, and it puts the grade history, open items, and community reports on one sheet saved to your account. That's the claim: the establishment is now in your library.

5. 5

   Open the hub with a membership

   A membership unlocks the establishment hub — the working side of the page. The single-establishment plan watches one restaurant; the multi-location plan watches up to five. The hub is where the tools live: every visible community report with its dispute action, the inspection forecast, proof-of-fix uploads on open violations, and the inspection-prep checklist.

6. 6

   Dispute the report from the hub

   In the hub's Community reports section, open the report and choose to dispute it. Say plainly what's wrong: the date it describes and why it can't be right, what actually happened, and what's changed since — a pest-control service visit, a passed re-inspection, a repaired condition. A few specific sentences beat a page of outrage; you're giving the reviewer a reason the report doesn't hold. Submitting marks the report disputed and sends it to DailyDog for review by a person.

7. 7

   Know what review means

   Review ends one of two ways. If the report doesn't hold up, it's hidden — it leaves the public page and stops counting toward the score immediately, though it's retained in the record rather than deleted. If it stands, it stays and the dispute is closed. Until review happens the report remains visible: a dispute is a challenge, not an eraser.

Frequently asked

Are community reports verified before they're published?

No — and they're labeled unverified everywhere they appear. They're a diner's account, not an inspector's finding. That's exactly why the score effect is bounded and why the dispute path exists.

How much can community reports move the score?

A few points at the very most, regardless of volume. The community effect is capped, recent reports carry more weight than old ones, and the whole effect fades over roughly ninety days if nothing new is filed. It renders as its own labeled line, never folded invisibly into the number.

Can praise raise the score?

No. Praise flags surface on the page as a signal to diners, but they never add points — otherwise a score could be bought with a stack of friendly reports. The only way up is the inspection record.

Why does a disputed report stay visible until it's reviewed?

Because a dispute is a challenge, not a verdict. If disputing hid a report instantly, every report — including the true ones — could be silenced with one click. Disputed reports are marked as disputed while they wait, review is prompt, and a report that doesn't hold up comes down and stops counting immediately.

Is a hidden report deleted?

No — hidden, not deleted. It leaves the public page, the app, and the score entirely, and it counts for nothing. The record of it is retained, which keeps review honest and reviewable.

Can someone flood my page with reports?

Each device can file at most three reports per restaurant per day, with a citywide ceiling of twenty-five a day per device. Combined with the capped score effect — a few points at most, no matter the volume — a coordinated pile-on has less reach than a single bad inspection.

Do I need the hub to dispute a report?

Yes — disputes are filed from the establishment hub, which is a membership feature. That keeps disputes tied to the operator of record rather than an open comment war. For anything else, the contact form works without a membership.