How they work
Link to the customer service ratings»
The customer service ratings which appear on Trustnet are designed to allow users to vote on the standard
of service they've received from the group which supplies their pension or insurance bond wrappers.
Users are invited to vote on various different aspects of customer service, including administration speed,
admin accuracy and policyholder communications, and professional users are asked about broker support and
technical support – issues particularly relevant to this type of investor.
A score of 1-5 stars can be given for each element of customer service we include, and an overall star
rating of 1-5 worked out based on the average rating given.
Votes are representative of user opinion, and do not represent the views of Trustnet or Financial Express,
and we strongly recommend that you support the picture this survey paints with your own research.
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How do we prevent mis-use of these ratings?
To prevent mis-use of these ratings by individuals or by corporations looking
to manipulate their own standing in the rankings, a number of security measures
are in place to prevent dishonest voting.
Every vote is recorded but only some are marked 'valid' and used to work out the overall rating.
Rule 1: A user, identified by email address, can rate a particular provider only once in a set period.
Any further votes within that period are marked 'invalid'.
Reasoning: This prevents attempts to skew results by voting over and over again by a specific user.
Rule 2: Pattern recognition techniques are used to identify and remove unreasonable voting patterns.
Any votes which are identified by these techniques will be marked as invalid.
Reasoning: Voting patterns which demonstrate an unlikely/unreasonable way to vote indicate
dishonest intentions.
Rule 3: A limited number of votes from a particular IP address within a given period will be allowed.
Reasoning: This prevents attempts to skew results by voting over and over again by a
specific user OR a specific company, and ensures different email addresses cannot be used to mask identity.
Notes:
For rule 1, note there must be a gap of 7 days after your last vote for a particular provider,
whether that vote was valid or not, e.g.
- I vote for AXA on Monday, and my vote is valid.
- I vote for AXA again on Thursday, and my vote is invalid because 7 days
have not passed since my last vote.
- I vote for AXA the following Tuesday, and my vote is still invalid because 7 days
have not passed since my last vote even though that last vote wasn't counted.
- all my 3 votes have been recorded but only one counts towards the overall rating.
Any response which passes these checks will be given a value of 1
in the database table of results, otherwise the value will be zero.
The user will NOT be informed in any way if their response is ignored.
For rule 1, note that a fixed exclusion period is in place once a vote has been cast for a particular company,
whether that vote was valid or not, e.g.
- I vote for AXA on Monday, and my vote is valid.
- I vote for AXA again on Thursday, and my vote is invalid
because the exclusion period since my last vote is still in place.
Each time I vote, I reset the exclusion period to start again, even though my votes are not counted - so I could be prevented
from voting indefinitely if I continue to attempt to vote for the same company.
In this instance, all my votes have been recorded but only one counts towards the overall rating.
Any response which passes these checks will be recorded as valid, otherwise it will be recorded as invalid.
The user will NOT be informed in any way if their response is ignored.
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