The Lowdown on the Most Popular UK Financial Comparison Websites

Just came across a fabulous report - Compare and Contrast: How the UK Comparison Website Market is Serving Financial Consumers - released by the Resolution Foundation on October 11, 2007.

The report assesses the eight most popular financial comparison websites serving the UK market along with that of the regulatory agency itself, Financial Services Authority:

• www.moneysupermarket.com
• www.fool.co.uk
• www.uswitch.com
• www.moneynet.co.uk
• www.moneyexpert.com
• www.moneyextra.com
• www.moneyfacts.co.uk
• www.kelkoo.co.uk
• www.fsa.gov.uk/tables
• 
  
• www.themoneypages.com - not on the report list but another one I think is worth a look
  

The areas assessed include: mortgages, credit cards, loans, savings and car insurance. From reading the report it seems that mortgages and car insurance are especially tricky areas to get accurate and complete quotes online as many questions need to be asked to get it right and the various websites vary in how well they do it.

Though it specifically states that the aim of the study is not to determine which is the best, the detailed and impartial comparisons give a consumer a pretty good idea of which one is good or not so good in which area. I really like that the comparison dimensions used in the study are all of critical importance to a consumer: accuracy, completeness and impartiality of the information provided, explanation of technical terms, relevance of fact finding to provide an accurate quote, consumer ease and flexibility in searching and sorting results of the website and facility to contact the providers directly. Interesting factoid: not all providers participate in the comparison websites - Royal Bank of Scotland does not, per the report.

The report does conclude, however, ''there was no “all round best performer”''. It does say the websites perform a very valuable service (i.e. they are not slimy, evil things to be avoided), a re-assuring statement since so many people use them and since the number and complexity of financial choices keeps rising. In fact, some of the sites were found to provide better information on secured loans than the providers themselves! The main criticism is that some of the websites don't properly disclose when their editor's choice or best buys are actually the result of commercial sponsor ties and not the objective best value product.

Here's my summary (caveat emptor, it may not be 100% the way you would read it or the way the authors would say it) of the results:
1) Accuracy of product info - the best: moneysupermarket and MoneyExpert; FSA and uSwitch the worst
2) Accuracy of product quotes - the best: MoneyExpert and Moneyextra; Kelkoo is awful
3) Completeness of info - varies between products more than sites; info on mortgages ''generally poor''; Kelkoo weak across the board
4) Relevance of fact finding - generally poor across all sites for mortgages, credit cards and savings; Motley Fool, MoneyExpert and Kelkoo miss key info in every product
5) Terms explained - moneysupermarket best due to forums where people can ask experts; Motley Fool, uSwitch and FSA explain all terms while Kelkoo explained none and has no product guides
6) Consumer experience - MoneyExpert the best by a lot; Kelkoo is c-r-a-p
7) Flexibility - Moneynet the best, Motley Fool not far behind; MoneyExpert the pits, while moneysupermarket is not much better
8) Market coverage - no one wins but Kelkoo loses with ''low coverage''
9) Impartiality - Motley Fool and uSwitch exemplary by being ''frank and open''; moneysupermarket, Moneynet, MoneyExpert and Kelkoo are completely unforthcoming about their editor's choices as being based on commercial relationships
10) Ability to act on info - Motley Fool, MoneyExpert and FSA are the leaders; the others all only give contact info for affiliated providers (is it so hard to look them up yourself if you have their name?)
About my only overall conclusion is to not bother with Kelkoo; it scores lowest on too many dimensions and is really good in none.

Now that you be aware, you can also beware.

Well done to the Resolution Foundation, an organisation devoted to improving the financial capabilities of the low and medium income person.

Update October 29 - we used moneysupermarket today to get car insurance quotes and found one that has saved us several hundred pounds for the coming year. It was very slick, we were even able to complete the deal directly with the provider by phone after generating the quote online using a quote. There were no less than 26 different quotes and there would have been more except a bunch of providers don't want to insure recently arrived Canadians. Very impressive, took about 30 minutes from start to finish.