What 2,508 NZ One-Star Reviews Actually Complain About

We first ran this analysis in May 2026 on 1,493 one-star reviews. The dataset has since grown to 2,508 complaints across 68,417 reviews, and the headline finding has not moved: more than half of NZ's one-star reviews describe a business that stopped communicating. No callbacks, no updates, nothing after a deposit arrived. In 33 of the 48 categories with enough complaints to analyse, a communication failure ranks among the top three complaint themes. For how often complaints occur by category, see The 1-Star Problem. This article looks at what those complaints actually say.

Five themes recur throughout the one-star reviews, from trade work to legal advice. A single review often cites more than one.

The five patterns behind most complaints

Estimated proportion of complaints citing each theme. Themes overlap: a single review often cites more than one pattern.

Poor communication and ghosting is the most consistently cited issue, and the most widespread. Customers describe businesses that go silent after quoting, stop returning calls once work is underway, or become unreachable after payment. Criminal lawyers show the most extreme version: 72% of their one-star reviews cite unanswered calls and ignored emails, including one client "83 days and counting" without a reply.

Substandard work quality means jobs completed poorly, left unfinished, or that caused additional damage. Categories with physical outputs (builders, panel beaters, roofers, cleaners) dominate this theme, though it also surfaces in service categories as incorrect advice or work another provider had to redo.

Silence after the sale is distinct from general poor communication: the business was responsive right up until payment cleared, then vanished. Solar installers, kitchen renovators, and bathroom renovators attract this complaint most, with defects and warranty claims left unaddressed once the invoice is settled.

Bills that exceed the quote covers invoices that significantly outgrow the estimate with no warning or explanation. One mechanic's customer was quoted around $400 and billed $1,600. A vet client was advised a worst case of $780 and invoiced $1,500. Automotive trades, plumbers, and vets attract this complaint most often.

No-shows and late arrivals round out the five: booked appointments that nobody attends, often with no notice and no apology. Moving companies are the worst affected, with 52% of their one-star reviews describing crews that arrived hours late, cancelled last minute, or never came at all.

Rudeness runs underneath all five patterns rather than standing alone: dismissive or hostile staff appear as a top-three complaint theme in 15 categories, usually surfacing when a customer chases one of the failures above.

Where the patterns differ by category

In most categories the five themes above cover the ground. Five are exceptions, each with a signature complaint the others rarely raise.

Building inspectors: missed defects carry the highest stakes. Just over half of one-star reviews for building inspectors (52%) describe a critical defect that was not identified: asbestos cladding, water ingress, structural damage, missing insulation. This complaint type is unique to the category. You hire an inspector specifically to find problems. When they do not, the financial liability belongs to the buyer.

Moving companies: broken and missing belongings. The most distinctive single-category complaint in the analysis: 56% of moving company one-star reviews describe items damaged, lost, or handled carelessly, usually with no compensation offered. A cluster of conduct complaints sits alongside it, including movers demanding unexpected cash payment and, in one account, holding a customer's belongings until they paid.

Family lawyers: the highest complaint rate of any category. Family lawyers attract 250 one-star reviews out of 1,772 total, a 14% one-star rate and the highest raw complaint count in the dataset. When we first ran this analysis, competence led their complaints. In the larger corpus the order has shifted: unresponsiveness now leads (45%), with fees that bore no relationship to the value delivered (35%) and incorrect or negligent advice (30%) close behind.

Solar installers: the sale is when service begins. Solar installer complaints cluster almost entirely around what happens after installation. Post-sale support is absent or inaccessible when things go wrong, and 52% of their one-star reviews describe this pattern. Misleading sales promises about system performance appear in a further 28%.

Roofers: still the category where pricing complaints read like warnings. Around 20% of roofer one-star reviews describe behaviour beyond poor service: quotes several times the going rate, pressure toward unnecessary work, and deposits taken for work that never happened. One customer was quoted over $9,000 for a ridge cap replacement that other roofers priced at $1,500.

What this suggests before you engage

Most of the complaints reviewed describe situations that could have been partly headed off before the business was engaged. Getting communication commitments in writing, asking what the process is if something goes wrong, and confirming what the quote actually includes are basic steps that rarely show up in customer accounts of how the engagement began.