This is going to be a difficult one...

People are allowed opinions that disagree with a poster or highlight issues, doing so does not make them a moderator.

On the topic itself have sat in Westminster meetings and when issue was raised and pointed out that while our API is not perfect it would allow for a lot better result than is currently going on in the broadband comparison market, and importantly where people point out mistakes we are quick (generally less than 24 hours) to get the fix into the API.

We cannot join the Ofcom accreditation scheme because it requires you to list by lowest price first (apart from one featured offer), we prefer to sort by order of descending speed.

When some have been saying that comparison sites only care about the referral fees, their wording may have not been soft but ultimately that is the case and FTTP is seen as niche, that they should be so wrong and offering G.fast and FTTP products to people who have no chance to get them appears to be overlooked. Oddly one of the problems is managers running the other sites have lots of commercial experience often but little broadband knowledge.

In the original post you mentioned something about why has this site not called the comparison sites out, we have but that was some time ago now, we are trying to lead by example.

FTTP enabled exchange is irrelevant to what is available to an individual postcode.

As for identifying you will need to find out what checker engine those sites are using and what logic they are applying.

Ofcom has no special relationship beyond

Some sites pay to have their listings checked periodically by Ofcom and then are allowed to say accredited. In short you can say some sites are paying to get some links to them from the Ofcom site.

Ultimately you are another poster who is just trying to belittle someone for having a strongly and clearly held conviction about wanting things to be done properly.

No, I am belittling you (your words, not mine) for not taking time to try and understand the problem, and it’s causes, before ranting on a public forum.

We don't almost ever have access to FTTP services (of which there are many providers)

Pardon ??

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

No, I am belittling you (your words, not mine) for not taking time to try and understand the problem, and it’s causes, before ranting on a public forum.

Your position seems to be its far too difficult to get things right and as the price comparison sites only care about making money by fair means or foul then we must expect them to run price comparison websites providing, wrong, inaccurate, incomplete or misleading data?

I don't know why this this seems to be your expectation since energy price comparison websites seem to list all the suppliers available in your area as long as you click the button saying you want them all listed and not only ones the site can switch you to or only green or ethical ones.

And broadly speaking the price comparison data is accurate despite the fact that OFGEM's crazy regulatory regime allows companies to offer 20 or more different variable price tariffs depending on the moment at which a customer joined the supplier. These multiple variable tariff inherent lead to abuse of old customers by encouraging the best prices to only be offered to new customers who's currently new tariff can then be made a legacy one in turn. But that is the fault of OFGEM for allowing this so called form of competition and not the fault of the price comparison websites.

But the price comparison website all seem to manage to capture data for all of the suppliers in any one postcode aera and list all of their currently available tariffs to new customers. So I don't know why it should be so difficult for broadband as computers would normally be as efficient in collecting and calculating data regardless of the actual product the database relates to.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:20:42)

In reply to a post by MCM:

Since you appear to have a problem understanding what people are telling you about these sites why don't you stop wasting our time and take your complaint, as you see it, to someone who really cares and might do something about it for you. Perhaps your MP or even the Prime Minister. This isn't a site for those with a perceived grudge about some other web sites to post about their comprehension problems.

I don't have a grudge about price comparison websites I just want consumers to be given the right price information so they make the best choice of broadband supplier. You sound rather like someone from Volkswagen taken exception to their fiddled emission data being exposed with the retort that "car still works dunnit" or something similar.

You seem to have what I would call a thing against any post someone makes about fibre broadband that is not of a technical nature involving an artisan working at the coalface linking up a piece of cable or sending data down the cable and I suspect are someone who might broadly define himself as a doer rather than a thinker, analyser or debater, although I may of course be wrong about that and you can of course tell me why you object to people making this kind of analysis of the workings of the broadband marketplace.

If you want to tell me where the forum rules say that you can't make points that may relate to the regulatory framework of the marketplace or the need for external intervention by Ofcom or the Competition and Markets Authority then I would be grateful if you can point me to the location of that requirement in the forum rules.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:31:37)

"But the price comparison website all seem to manage to capture data for all of the suppliers in any one postcode aera and list all of their currently available tariffs to new customers. So I don't know why it should be so difficult for broadband as computers would normally be as efficient in collecting and calculating data regardless of the actual product the database relates to."

Interesting theory for how they are listing things, but the simpler explanation is that they are being fed some data that they are not understanding and mistakenly showing lots more than they should.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Interesting theory for how they are listing things, but the simpler explanation is that they are being fed some data that they are not understanding and mistakenly showing lots more than they should.

The general tenor of the discussion by some others here seems to be that even though broadband price comparison websites make loads of money from click thru income that we must expect them to be incompetent amateurs who are no good at what they are doing.

In any other field this would be considered as either breaking the law or negligence and lead to either criminal prosecution or civil lawsuit as a consequence of the damage they are doing through their deliberately criminally malfeasant or deliberately reckless actions.

But apparently it seems that in broadband comparison data you should be able to supply customers with any old totally wrong and misleading price comparison data you like that causes consumers to become locked in to an unusually and punitively long up to 2 year and typically 18 month long contracts that are not in their best interests without fear of facing any sanction or redress from the misled customer for doing so?

EDIT:- Seems almost as though nothing has changed re [censored] and misleading broadband comparison site data since 2016 these comments were made by the then ASA and Ofcom Chief Executives at www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2016/01/asa-uk-and-ofcom-find-advertising-of-broadband-prices-likely-to-mislead.html

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:44:48)

Post deleted by MrSaffron

Post deleted by MrSaffron

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:49:34)