What changed when I re-checked every list

Every guide on this site says it gets looked at again at least every six months. Most of the lists were last checked in mid-May, so in early October I went back through all of them before the deadline rather than after it.

This is what that involved and what it turned up. It is less exciting than a new list. It is also the part that makes a list worth trusting.

What the re-check covers

I looked up all 160 entries across the 21 guides again. For each one I checked three things.

• Whether Google still lists the business as trading. A temporary or permanent closure gets a closer look.
• The current star rating and review count on its Google profile.
• Whether its website still loads.

Each business was looked up using the Google listing ID saved during the last check where I had one, so the answer comes from that exact listing and not from whichever business happens to rank first for its name today.

Three businesses have closed

Google now shows three listed businesses as permanently closed: a cosmetic clinic in the CBD, a carpentry firm and a cafe in Walkerville. I did not take Google's word for it on its own. Two of the three websites no longer exist and the third now carries a notice pointing patients to other practices. All three have come off their lists.

A closed business sitting on a recommendation list is the most basic failure a guide like this can have. It sends you somewhere that is not there.

Why a closure flag is not enough on its own

One business came back marked temporarily closed with only four reviews, which would have been alarming for a brokerage sitting near the top of its list. It was wrong. The business had rebranded and Google had moved its reviews to a new listing under the new name, which showed it open and still at a perfect score from more than a thousand reviews. The old listing was a leftover.

That is why nothing comes off a list automatically. A closure flag starts a check. A person finishes it.

The star ratings barely moved

This is the result I found most useful. Across the 74 businesses whose review numbers changed since May, 58 kept exactly the same star rating. The other 16 moved by one tenth of a star, nine of them up and seven down.

One plumbing firm picked up 566 new Google reviews in under five months and its average did not move at all. Once a business has a few hundred reviews, its star score is close to fixed. It tells you how the business has done over years. It tells you very little about how it is doing now.

What is still to do

The guides for licensed trades also promise a licence check: plumbers, earthworks, auto electricians, the general trades list and mortgage brokers. A Google lookup does not cover that, so those lists have new review numbers but keep their old verified dates until each licence has been looked up again on the relevant register. That is being done by hand, one business at a time.

A handful of other entries could not be matched to a Google listing with confidence, usually because the business has changed its name or trades from a home address. Those are being checked individually rather than guessed at.

If you know of a business on one of these lists that has closed, moved or changed hands, tell me. That kind of tip is exactly what a six-monthly check can miss.