MoneyXpert

"This must be taken into account when comparing online *

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• Comparison portals usually only list those providers who pay them a commission when purchasing or concluding a contract. Therefore, compare prices and services with the providers themselves, i.e. hotels, airlines, banks, insurance companies and so on.     

• If necessary, change the preset ranking by adjusting the filters. Note that sponsored offers are often at the top of the list ("Position 0").

• Portals and providers keep trying to get customers to buy additional services. Really only choose what you need or want.

• Some portals only issue offers after setting up a customer account or providing an email address and / or telephone number. Weigh up whether this is worth it to you.

• Always judge reviews, be it by the portal users or by the portal itself, with the necessary skepticism.

• The use of several portals does not always increase the objectivity of the results, because they often fall back on the same database. "

* PC WELT 10/19 - Link with further information

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"Tips for consumers when using comparative protals *

General

Comparison portals on the Internet can make a significant contribution to saving time and money when searching for a specific service. Knowing and considering how the comparison portals work will help you to search effectively and make the right decision. You will find important information on this in this report.

When using comparison portals, keep in mind that these belong to private companies that want to make a profit. In the case of comparison portals, this is primarily done through commission income that they receive from the providers (energy suppliers, hotels, etc.) in the event of a successful mediation.

Cooperations and interrelations

When making your search, bear in mind that not all portals that provide a comparison on the Internet have created them independently and independently of one another. Many portals use shared data sets and / or comparison computers. You should therefore compare the performance you are looking for on several independently operating portals (see overview in the appendix) and compare their results

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Market coverage

Pay attention to information from the portal which providers are actually included in the comparison. When making your search, take into account that some providers (insurance companies, hotels, etc.) are not even represented on comparison portals.
Preselection, position 0 and ranking

When making a comparison, use the options of changing the portals' default settings, for example by adjusting filters or choosing a different sorting order (“best price first”, “show all”). Do not rely solely on the first result list displayed by the portal.

Please note that the color-coded offers displayed at the top (position 0) are sometimes not part of the ranking, but are often also placed there by the portals for advertising purposes.

When viewing the "total price" or "effective price" of a service, pay attention to which price components are actually included, which conditions for a cashback or similar are to be met and, if applicable, to which contract period the displayed price relates.

Other influencing factors

When making your decision, do not allow yourself to be put under pressure by hints that a certain offer is only available to a limited extent, that other users are currently viewing this offer or that a price increase is expected. Often these tips do not specifically relate to your individual search.

If a discount, voucher, bonus or similar is promised for booking a certain offer, carefully check the requirements, the effort and the likelihood of actually receiving this benefit before you include it in your decision.

Offers from a comparison portal that are designated as “exclusive” are often available in the same or very similar form on other portals.

User reviews

In the case of reviews, make sure that they can actually only be submitted by real customers of the portal and how many reviews are based on a "recommendation rate", for example. Please note that reviews can sometimes only be submitted by customers who have successfully concluded a contract via the portal. "

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* BUNDESKARTELAMT  04/19 - Link with further information

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"Price comparison portals - very popular, but not without problems *

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More favorable conditions, better benefits - which insurance offers more? Comparison portals on the Internet provide quick answers to these questions. But be careful. Our tip: Compare comparison portals!

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Travel and hotels, insurance, electrical appliances, cars and of course prices - there is hardly anything that cannot be compared on online platforms. However, a study commissioned by the EU Commission clearly shows which problems can arise.

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Comparison portals put to the test

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Comparison platforms and corresponding apps are very popular. 74 percent of European users have already had experience with such platforms on the Internet, and 40 percent even use them at least once a month.

The comparison portals, which are listed high up on the search engines, are particularly well attended. A second important selection criterion are positive reports and reviews from other users. The absolutely decisive criterion, however, is always the possibility of being able to compare prices.

In the EU there are a total of 1,042 comparison tools (910 websites and 132 apps) - 84 percent of which are operated by private providers.

EU Commission criticizes lack of transparency

Of all the comparison portals examined, less than half provide information about this

• the logic behind the product rankings,

• where they get the data from and how often they are updated,

• whether and if so, which partnerships exist with companies and

• what the financing of the portal looks like.

Furthermore, only 11 percent of the comparison portals indicated contact options and only 34 percent indicated where to turn in the event of a complaint.

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The benefits for consumers

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Basically, comparison portals are to be rated positively. They list a wide variety of products and services that can be compared with one another on the basis of different or identical product properties. Consumer ratings or purchase decisions that have already been made are often taken into account in the comparison process.

Comparison and evaluation portals make the market more transparent. They make it easier for the consumer to find suitable products and services in the oversized range. At the same time, they enable companies to improve their products and services through the opinion of third parties.

The created market transparency as well as the risk of image loss and falling sales figures due to poor customer reviews undoubtedly have a positive effect on the offers and thus ultimately on the consumer.

From user to user

Every user can comment directly on the corresponding product or service and rate it with “grades” or “asterisks”. The current EU study shows that two thirds of users still make their purchase dependent on the opinion of other users.

Even if online reviews are initially only intended as a guide for consumers, they can often influence the purchase decision.

If the opinions of other users are also taken into account when making a purchase decision, caution is also advised. According to estimates by the Federal Association of Consumer Centers, around 20 percent of online reviews on the Internet are falsified or bought by companies.

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Comparison portals are commercial enterprises

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Consumer advocates warn against too much good faith on the part of users. The portals are not "non-profit institutions" - because many portals collect money when the contract is signed. Consumers who blindly trust the rankings do not worry that such portals are “commercial enterprises that want to earn money”, according to the Federal Association of German Insurance Merchants. In many cases, the portals have concluded contracts with the insurance companies or travel providers whose services they offer and then collect not inconsiderable commissions when the contract is concluded. Since consumers could not recognize this at first glance, the Munich Regional Court is now scrutinizing this practice in a test case against Check24. Nevertheless, after a lawsuit and a judgment, it often takes a long time for a provider to ultimately change its business practice, because the time delay alone means an advantage.

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Beware of online reviews

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In principle, users can benefit from this, but untrue or manipulated reviews lead to incorrect assessments. Ultimately, purchasing decisions are made that can harm the consumer. There is currently no solution to this problem to automatically determine whether the review or opinion is true or falsified. The fact is that manipulated reviews are punishable by law.

Consumers should therefore be made aware of the issue. Be critical of the reviews, especially if there is too much praise for products and services - critical user opinions are often more likely to reflect the truth. Do not rely on one provider, but use several comparison portals. Compare the comparison portals - is the motto.

Pay close attention to customer opinions or comments that are sponsored or purchased; these must also be marked as such.

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Be critical on social networks too

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For most consumers today it is a matter of course to also look around on social networks such as Facebook or Twitter. Companies advertise their products and services on their Facebook pages. The number of “fans” on Facebook or the number of “followers” on Twitter can already inspire trust. But here, too, caution is advised. Dubious companies use the opportunity to buy “fans” or “followers”. This means that the number of "fans" is high on the company side, but not necessarily the quality of the products on offer.

Left:  Source: European Consumer Center Austria: Comparison portals put to the test

       Source: "Die Welt": Can you really trust price comparison portals? "

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* Hess. Ministry of the Environment, Climate Protection, Agriculture and Consumer Protection 01/20 - Link with further information

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"Price comparison portal *

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A price comparison portal is a website on which consumers can find several online shops for a product they are looking for on one page in order to be able to compare offers.

table of contents

   1 division

   2 technology

   3 mobile apps

   4 Criticism in Germany

   5 individual proofs

   6 web links

Classification

In contrast to price agencies, Internet price comparisons are usually free of charge for online users. Comparison portals that compare prices of products such as B. Idealo, are usually financed by forwarding fees such as pay per click, pay per sale and pay per lead. Comparison portals, the tariffs for contract structures of everyday life such. B. Compare for electricity, gas, telephone, Internet or insurance, as well as hotel comparison portals are mainly financed by commissions that you receive from the provider if you are successful. Price comparison portals have been around since the 1990s. In the travel sector in particular, there have also been meta search engines since the mid-2000s that compare the results of various price comparison portals. These are mainly financed by forwarding fees. [1] In the meantime, some price comparison portals have been further developed into evaluation portals which, in addition to the pure price comparison, map a ranking of the online shops corresponding to the user profile, the ability to deliver, user opinions and test reports on quality, ecological sustainability and safety.

In addition to general price comparisons that compare products from a large number of different product categories, there are also specialized price comparison portals that only compare providers of one market segment such as computers, electronics or drugs and then often use additional special parameters for comparison.

While price comparisons mostly relate to items in online shops, so-called product search engines compare the offers of stationary retailers. This channel is increasingly used by chain stores as an additional reach channel in addition to the distribution of brochures.

Most of the more than 1000 price comparison portals in Germany are so-called "white label price comparison portals", ie they access the database and possibly also the sorting algorithm of another comparison portal. [2] These white label price comparison portals are often used within portal websites with a large community. The number of portals with their own database and their own sorting algorithm has declined sharply in recent years. B. Booking when comparing hotels, Check 24 when comparing insurance and Verivox when comparing electricity and gas tariffs. [3]

technology

One way of collecting price information is to read it in directly from the dealer. These are then compared with the database of the comparison service. The comparison requires a mix of information extraction, fuzzy logic and human judgment for assignment.

An alternative approach are web crawlers, which look for price information directly from the provider and feed it into a database. This means that data can also be fetched against the will of the retailer. A combination of these methods is also often used.

Comparison portals with a large reach are now automatically supplied with product information as part of search engine marketing activities. [4] Tools (so-called feed engines) are used to read and send product data from web shops. [5] Different price comparison portals place different demands on the data sets, which makes it necessary to structure the data accordingly before sending it. [6]

Mobile apps

The spread of apps has increased sharply with the advent of newer smartphones. Basically, apps that are quick and easy to use help achieve the breakthrough, as the customer is unwilling to type in a lot of information. That is why the latest price comparison products use mobile tagging. The camera is used to read in the image information.

Criticism in Germany

Comparison portals position themselves as a neutral entity and arouse the expectation among consumers that the information on the platform corresponds to this positioning. Since the ratings can influence purchasing decisions, there is also a potential incentive to manipulate, because paying customers of the portals are dealers and business people. Experience shows that some portals contain both authentic and manipulated ratings and reviews [7]. Manipulative designs with the use of random generators, so-called dark patterns, are used with the aim of misleading consumers. [8] As a rule, the business model of the portals is not recognizable to consumers. The Bundeskartellamt therefore carried out a consumer law sector inquiry into comparison portals from October 2017 to April 2019 in order to examine suspected violations of consumer law in the industry. To this end, 150 comparison portals from the service areas of travel, energy, insurance, telecommunications and finance were surveyed and 36 examined in more detail. The suspicion of consumer law violations has been confirmed in some points. According to the findings of the Federal Cartel Office [9], the following behaviors in particular can mislead consumers:

   In the hotel sector, commission payments by providers have an impact on the presentation of results preset by the comparison portal. Higher commission payments can possibly influence the position in the ranking.

   Comparison portals in the hotel and insurance sectors sometimes only consider less than 50 percent of the market offers. It is not clear to the consumer which providers are not shown.

   Many comparison portals work with references to supposedly limited availability, practically hardly realized advantages or supposedly exclusive offers.

   Numerous comparison portals do not create an independent comparison, but use data sets from other portals.

   Consumers are often not adequately informed about the practices of the comparison portals.

At EU level, a legally binding regulation is being negotiated under the name "New Deal for Consumers", which among other things provides for the disclosure of ranking criteria. ([10])

In view of the bankruptcies of Teldafax, Flexstrom and BEV, the consumer center (VZBV) has asked the federal government to comprehensively define the responsibility of the comparison portals towards consumers and providers. The Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection is examining (as of February 2019) whether the Federal Network Agency can be strengthened in its supervisory function. [11] As part of a study, the Federal Ministry has defined how consumer protection can be improved.

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* Wikipedia.org - link with more information