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Ofcom accreditation guarantees an honest evaluation

Usually we 'Shilling activities at auctions. At live auctions the owner of the item for sale may place a fake bidder in the gallery so as to drive up the price dishonestly. Many people may have seen this type of activity on Ebay where suddenly you are being outbid on an item that was going at a low price.

There are other ways for people and businesses to act as a shill. On the internet this is done incessantly. How is this done? It is most common in the form of "review" websites. These are websites that pretend to be offering an honest objective comparison of a product or service when in fact they are built by, and owned by, the ones selling the top rated and reviewed products. Hence when you go to do research you are misled and can be tricked into purchasing what is many times an inferior and more expensive product.

This type of internet shilling goes on in every industry including the sale of telecommunications services. And the dishonest websites offering advice about services such as home phone and broadband are almost impossible to distinguish from the real impartial ones. This can be a true problem when one is trying to find the best deal for a new phone line connection or cheaper line rental. Prices for these services are remarkably close and the true differences are well hidden beneath a barrage of short term incentive offers, and excessive prices for calls to mobile phones.

Obviously an honest evaluation is needed. In an effort to achieve this Ofcom, the government’s consumer watchdog agency for all things related to telecoms has just started giving accreditation to websites comparing home phone service. The first site given a rating of being fair and impartial is Home Phone Choices. This comes as no surprise as other websites in the Consumer Choices Network are among the few accredited by Ofcom for examination and review of products such as home and mobile broadband. Truly there are many honest home phone comparison websites in existence. The percentage of fake review sites in the area of home phone telecoms is relatively small. But separating websites designed to offer education from those based purely on commerce is a great practice. Indeed it would be a fine thing if we might set standards of honesty for the entire internet in this way. The United Kingdom tends to lead the way in this area as we are extremely protective of our citizens. Now if we could just clean up those auctions on Ebay.

Article Source: http://www.ezinearticles.mk

Homephonechoices is a free Ofcom accredited home phone comparison website, that makes it easy to find the best deals for cheap line rental. In a time when mobile phones are making it hard to decide whether people even want a to continue to purchase home phone line services, the need for honest comparison and evaluation is greater than ever.

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