This paper explored the effects of the wording alternatives used by online hotel reviewers, i.e. both direct and indirect positive and negative evaluations (e.g. ‘good’, ‘not bad’, ‘bad’, ‘not good’). The lack of an interaction effect between the wording and expectation manipulations demonstrates that the result pattern may be acribed to Verbal Politeness: wordings like ‘not bad’ transfer an attenuated meaning as compared to ‘good’, whilst the use of ‘not good’ instead of ‘bad’ is interpreted as conveying the same assessment, though in a more polite way.