Review Blackmail

I keep running into this problem.

Guest arrives, guest does something they shouldn't, guest is asked to leave, guest leaves terrible review (often telling us that they will before they leave in an attempt to blackmail us).

Now I have no problem with justified bad reviews, and will happily take constructive criticism, however review blackmail really gets to me.

Most recently at our other property, The Witch's Hat, we had 7 people check in and stay for a night (they booked for 4). The next morning they were asked to move one of their cars from the driveway as it was blocking access and we are only permitted a certain number of cars on our driveway at any one time.

They refused initially and then said that in that case they wanted a full refund for the previous night (this was at about 9am the next day). Obviously we refused as they had stayed with us and 7 people at $32 each isn't a small refund.

One guy got very aggressive, shouting and swearing etc, demanding either a full refund, or to be allowed to stay for free for the next 3 days (7 people!) or they would leave us multiple terrible reviews. We again refused, as I refuse to be blackmailed into giving a refund.

^Obviously this is the sort of situation nobody wants, but we are running into this more and more often, where guests are trying to blackmail us. Give me a full refund or I will leave a bad review. Obviously, sometimes a refund is justified and then we will give a refund with no qualms, but in some cases there is absolutely no need for a refund.

Another case recently was where I had a couple stay at The Emperor's Crown for one night - they came down in the morning and instantly started to lay into me about the "state" of the room, shouting, screaming and swearing. I went and checked the room (we always check the rooms before guests check in also and there was no problem)and found that they had been smoking and doing ice (quite obviously) in the room. Again, due to this, I refused to refund them (usually a $500 charge for smoking in the rooms) and they tried to blackmail me with a bad review which I refused to give into.

This is happening more and more often, as more and more people book online.

Whilst I understand that this is always going to be the case, what really gets to me is the way booking sites (we use Agoda, booking.com, hostelworld, hostelbookers and wotif primarily) and TripAdvisor deal with our appeals in these cases.

Yes, I can write a management response and I will, however I think the booking sites should do much more to protect us from this kind of blackmail. Whenever I appeal, 99% of the time the review will stay up, because it "does not breach the review guidelines".

Without us, these booking sites would have no business to run - now I understand that they need to present a "fair" review system, but I find that more often than not, the booking site works to protect the customer much more than the hostel.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what to do in these sorts of cases? Just grin and bear it, or do you have another tactic? Do you think I should just give in and refund?

Input greatly appreciated!