alleged Defamation in a public Forum, Defence

who_am_I?

Hi
My Sister has just revived an email from a solicitor regarding alleged defamation in a discussion about a service provider in an on-line forum, Unfortunately my sister had left just enough information to be positively identified by the service provider. She was one of many posters that gave their honest opinion and left a negative review. The service provider did join the forum and defended all comments made, shortly afterwards the thread had been taken down & forum rules were changed to prevent any comment other than Recommend/not Recommend a service provider.

The Solicitor has requested an apology in the forum along with a personal apology to the service provider. my Sister is unwilling to do either.

Naturally starting a new thread to apologise will draw attention to that service provider again, I would expect the Streisand effect to take hold and further negative feedback to be left for the service provider.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect

Also, as the service provider was able to defend the comments in person no defamation has taken place. (see page 2 below)
http://www.dilloneustace.ie/download/1/www.rate-your-defamer.ie.pdf

I believe that my sister should respond to the email with the following points:

1, No defamation had taken place for 2 reasons, a) she gave her honest opinion, b)the service provider was able to defend the comments made.
2, Starting a new thread drawing further attention to the service provider when the last one was removed is not going to improve the situation. the thread will either be immediately deleted or bring further unwanted negative attention to the service provider.
3, The service provider was privileged to be privy to the frank and honest discussion on the forum, all to often in Ireland disgruntled customers just leave without leaving any feedback and the service provider never has a chance to improve performance, for the sake of the business the service provider would be well advised to view it as constructive criticism and not take the matter personally.
http://www.marketingdonut.co.uk/marketing/customer-care/customer-complaints/profiting-from-customer-complaints

What do you think?

As this has already become contentious with the request for an apology (often a precursor to litigation) the only advice anyone can give you on this forum is to speak to a solicitor.

Beyond that I wouldn't be happy expressing any opinion on the matter really as I have no idea of the context of the comments or what was actually said and, obviously, you should NOT repeat the comments here.

Tom Young

I closed this thread. Do not repost this issue here again please. I suggest that a decision could be made in relation to this. Take it seriously and seek legal advice from a professional per the charter.