I'm sure the production team manipulate (edit) what they film and I'm sure that 'leading questions' are asked to guide and encourage memorable quotes... I'm also sure that they go for more than one take in order to guarantee a recording broadcastable quality but I do not believe that they manipulate (force) the situation such as not allowing guests to ask for a different room / different bedding / clean glasses, etc. The jury even seems to be out as to whether the owners allocate the room or the production team do. I originally believed the production team had a hand in room allocation but various participants have indicated - on the show and on here - that they choose in which rooms the 4iaBers will stay.


And often, where owners have come across badly on screen, the poor quality of their responses to critical reviews on TripAdvisor suggests their on screen behaviour is represented fairly.


The marked sheets should not have been on the bed. The owners shot themselves in the foot there. It doesn't matter whether stains / marks are 'obviously' the remains of washing powder or softener or a poor dye job, if they are marked or in any way damaged they don't go on the bed. An owner can't expect 'real' guests to take the time to analyse whether they are 'clean' marks or not; they are marks and marked bedding doesn't go on beds... especially if that bed is going to be minutely examined on tv.


TA doesn't allow that - a reviewer has to have at least arrived at reception in order to leave a review even if they do not then stay. If, for eg, the hotel has 'lost' a confirmed booking and doesn't deal well with the error when the guest arrives, the review can legitimately cover that.

Having reviewed many places on Trip Advisor, that one smacks of being fake. They said they stayed after seeing it on FIAB so they could not have stayed before Tuesday at the earliest. They say they stayed two nights so would not leave until Thursday morning which would be the earliest they submitted the review. I've never had a review published in less than two days which brings us to Saturday, yet it appeared yesterday (Friday).

Whilst on the subject of the middleaged women who behave and dress like children dressing up, If the pillow was so stained that she felt it necessary to cover it with a towel, I'd question how caring her friend was as she had two pillows on her bed and it would have been far more comfortable to have swapped on of hers and put the "stained" one underneath the clean one.

I fully accept that the producers manipulate things but as others have said if you don't say nasty things they can't.

They obviously did not receive the support they hoped for with their facebook excuse post.

It now cannot be accessed.

https://www.facebook.com/Lillys-Tear...62879/?fref=nf

How can Parkerpoo review be truthful? They stayed there for 2 days after seeing them on the tv

The show finished yesterday so that is not possible.

Could be the way she slated the programme and team. Not the move to make.

It was a load of BS imo.

It does. Someone who watched the show has left a bad review for lily's pad this week.

It certainly does allow a review to be published even though the reviewer has not turned up. I left such a review 5 years ago for a high class place in North Yorkshire where my emails and phone calls to book for a special occasion were treated with contempt and lies. I didn't book, so never turned up, and left a review on TA saying exactly what had happened. It is still there, and is the most viewed of all my numerous reviews.

Don't people wash new sheets and towels before use?

They can and the establishment can request posts are removed. Although they won't ask for the positive review to be deleted.


That reviewer has made one post and could be new to TA. So did they also have the time to join and make their glowing report?

Anyone can say something nasty on that prog or any prog. In theory, the producers could single out on one couple and show all their nasty comments and ignore all the lovely stuff they said as they claimed. But in their case, the evidence also is there on the feedback forms and reflected in their payments which backs up what we saw. They did say those things and if they were manipulated as they said, then they are just plain stupid and nasty.


That post was dread. It was so poorly written and as others have pointed out there were also inconsistencies in their tale of woe. The supporting replies also smacked of them rallying all their mates etc.

No i agree with you on that what i was saying is she would have known it wasnt stained dirt, that you wouldnt sleep on.....that something wasnt quite right..... I actually said on another post i was surprised Liz allowed the sheet to be used.... however, did she? It makes no sense to me, that this person loves her hotel, every room is spotlessly clean and she makes a fundamental error of putting a heavily stained sheet onto a bed KNOWING that another contestant would be sleeping on it.

NO IT MAKES NO SENSE, I dont believe it. I think that sheet was planted. I really do. I just cant get it around my head she would allow the sheet to stay. NO WAY. IF SHE DID then it would be reflected on other things, other items not being clean, etc, but the rooms were all SPOTLESS.

Nah something stinky this way came I think.

On the Four in the Bed Fan page, Louise sister Tracey has gone on there defending her saying how she is a lovely person and everything was very edited, and manipulated, and basically everyone who was being unkind to her were nasty lol.....

Oh dear.... the saying is he who protests too much...... me thinks lol..... I have actually no thoughts either way of Louise and Sue as people, just as proprietors and contestants in a show. What they are like in real life I have no interest in whatsoever.

Perhaps they were a bit naive in going on the show in the first place.

Yes I saw that earlier, she then made a post ripping into the MEN that slagged her 'sister' off, it was promptly removed.

She also said that a whole garden full of customers saw her in the shower,yet on the show it was just one waitress having a fag. they seem to embellish as they wish to their own advantage

I do a lot of reading between the lines when considering TA Reviews

Looks like a lot of negative comments about Lily's Pad aren't in the review section, they're mainly in the Q&A section. I'm not sure if TA have the same criteria for that?

I'm another one who thinks it's very unfair to leave feedback when you haven't had any personal contact with an establishment.

Well ..................I know Sue and know Lily's Tea Room well. I also know the tea room she ran previously. She is a real grafter, works really hard and is a perfectionist. She is actually a really nice person but not one of these 'fake/bubbly in your face people'. She's just genuinely down to earth and matter of fact.


Of course people can't put words in your mouth or portray anything you haven't actually said but ................it does seem that if you want/need a baddie things can be made to look far worse than they are.

I saw the FB post and (as I know her) - I have absolutely no doubt that what she posted was the truth. She is a genuinely caring and kind hearted person - she's just not fake and in your face. A 'perfect baddie' for this type of show.

Just look at the past reviews for Lilys Pad and Lilys Tea Rooms and see for yourselves.

EXACTLY. I hate these so called relatives coming on defending they were not on the programme and therefore can only go by what their member of family tells them.

Did you read all the sob story of how her sister saved her life blah blah blah, what the hell has that got to do with underpaying a lovely hotel by 30.00 lol.......

I have no thoughts of either sue or louise as people but as contestants on a show I was watching and have every right to comment on they showed themselves to be totally nick picking and game playing and yes perhaps a bit naive lol.

BIB. Of course you are absolutely right. BUT the same applies to all the contestants who were with Sue, and none of them came over half as nasty, spiteful, pernickity and game playing as she did. TBH she did her business no end of harm by what she said, and to those of us who read the FB post before it was taken down, her comments only confirmed our thoughts.

BTW Penny, if you know Sue and her business so well, surely you also know the name is Lilly not Lily?

Actually you couldn't be more wrong - she's been stacked out all week.

And if you want to be so childish as to question whether I know Sue or not simply because of a spelling error then you fill your boots mate.

I've got far better things to do than make up stuff.

Your petulant, puerile response on this forum says it all. Why get so angry?

BTW, I am certainly not your "mate". We have never been formally introduced.

There is no frosted or obscure glazing in our house at all. The bathroom windows are at least 1m wide and even taller. The downstairs cloakroom window faces the front drive with the lane outside beyond.
The cloakroom has a wooden slatted blind and when I go in there I just close it and open it when I leave the room.
Likewise for the ensuite that overlooks the back garden, I drop the blind and put the light on if we have house guests or anyone else likely to be in the garden.

Why wouldn't you? It's really not a hardship, it simply manages the situation.

I think the barmaid peering directly at the window and the shower session were different times? but to say the window was open and the blind was buffeted by the wind to the extent it left an unclothed Louise exposed to a viewing public was verging on a hysterical comment I think.

While I don't doubt that some contestants are very easily lead to make comments which can be cut and shown in the programme as very harsh, we've often seen them back down, or explain more fully at feedback time and there's been a resolution. So what I'd like to point out following the protestations, is that at the point they had their round table settling up on last night's programme, there had been no editing, or choosing what to show on air. The contestants had only had their personal interactions and full feedback forms to debate. They wouldn't have known the verbal assessments and comments that we saw on the finished programmes when things could be, and yes probably were, shown somewhat out of context.

So if all the feedback was balanced by good as well as bad and anyone was grossly misrepresented on the show - why then would Sharon be bristling so much? because it certainly turned very frosty and that surely wasn't edited in

Penny, I don't doubt if you know someone then you feel defensive and you're the only person here who actually knows the people from Lilly's Pad. I would say that they really didn't come across well on TV, but that the thing that put me off them the most was the significant underpayments they made at every establishment.

Why would you choose to reduce your payment rate from £85 for two people to £60 for two people for bed and a full cooked breakfast, on the basis that you didn't care for the china (when you are infact fans of china) and that one person had bedding unacceptable to them, whilst also then defending that position by saying the guest was not allowed to request the bedding be exchanged for synthetic
Ergo, you significantly financially penalize someone for not solving a problem that you fully acknowledge they weren't informed about, or given any opportunity to address That just puts me in mind of the old saying 'when in a hole, stop digging'
I think they'd have been very well advised to keep a dignified silence or at least down play it rather than drawing more attention to the programme.

There's a review of the tea room not the b+b on TA and Sue has responded to it saying that if there was a problem it's best to raise it immediately so it can be rectified straight away.....you literally can't make it up! Hypocrisy at its best

On my way to watch Columbo when I saw the repeat and have changed my mind. Audrey is quite sweet although very eccentric (nowt wrong with that). However the ladies seem even worse than before. At breakfast the blonde says how pretty the China was, the brunette says it was too formal for breakfast and all of a sudden the blonde changes her mind and agrees with her friend. Make up your own mind!

I think Audrey is without facade, what you see is what you get but she could do with a better fitting bra if her boobs got any lower they'd be in her dinner plates when serving,

You are right - you couldn't make it up! There are several other responses along the lines of "if you had said at the time" too. Sigh.

She's absolutely right of course.
But of course, knowing that, it makes it all the stranger why she wouldn't take that up with the crew if she had a problem that she knew she was genuinely going to have to complain about.

I'm trying to imagine the conversation after check in.
"I need to speak to someone to get the pillows and duvet changed because I'm allergic. I don't think it'll be a problem, there'll be alternatives available"
"No. You're just going to have to suffer it"
"Oh, I'm not happy, but I've got an antihistamine tablet I can take"
"Will that work?"
"Dunno, I've never slept on feather before" (as heard on TV)

What is all this 'issues' people on this show have of late? everyone's got issues!

the reasons for underpayments these days on this show are ridiculous.

There's no problem with feather bedding, the problem lies with the person allergic to them. My son has a feather allergy and I take his own pillow with us when we stay somewhere. But surely you tell your hosts when you arrive if you have an 'issue' with certain bedding

The sister has waded in with more BS .... Will they never learn!

From FB ''

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1414...9538044964221/

Do you mean rude?

How was anything made worse? They underpaid everyone, said no to to staying at any of the places again and were hyper-critical!

But there were contradictions in that post. Say two different things and what are you left with?


No, they didn't and there was a bit of nastiness creeping out at their place when they made the teddies.



The lady doth protest too much methinks!