[adrian marsh]

Anyone else see CAT getting a bit of a going over in the Daily Mail today? Not a good write-up at all.

[derek west]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2671559/Can-trust-website-claims-banish-cowboy-workmen.html

[clive ware]

I thought the boards would be all over it!
I have to say though, I have been in Checkatrade from the very first edition.
So I am quite pro CAT.
But... There is a local carpet cleaner to me who I wont mention, (and I am more than happy to reccommend local carpet cleaners if I cant carry out work when custies want it) who is a right cowboy outfit. Used to run HomeCare!! Every customer I have come across who have used them have really not been impressed and yet his Checkatrade rating is higher than mine!!. One of my neighbours had a leather suite cleaned by them and the cleaner knocked over his bucket of cleaning solution all over the uncovered carpet. Another cleaner was sent out to clean the said carpet (which I had cleaned 2 weeks earlier - she didnt realise I cleaned upholstery!!). I then got a call 10 days later from my neighbour who said the carpet smelled funny so I popped down and had a look. It stunk and I got the husband to pull the carpet off the gripper to the middle of the floor and it was absolutely drenched still. It shrunk too! I told them to put this on the feed back form but the owner ( or one of the office girls, he wouldnt speak to them) offered a full refund for everything if she didnt leave a negative feedback. So where all the 10 out of 10`s are coming from I`ve no idea.!!

[stuart_clark]

What is cat ?

[clive ware]

Checkatrade for people who cant be bothered to type Checkatrade!!

[Richard Cole]

What is cat ?

They go meow

or it could be Checkatrader

[adrian marsh]

What is cat ?

"CAT" is for people who can't work out it stands for "CheckaTrade"   But lets not get bogged down with that one.  

If a site makes claims, as "CheckaTrade" does, to provide trades people who can be relied upon, then are they not also ripping people off by providing false reference?

[Craigp]

Clive Ware. I think I know the company you mean, real cowboys but have thousands of 10 scores on CAT. I wonder how they do it too.

[garry22]

According to the article, ten was the default score!

There was a real problem getting negative comments / scores to stick (and they rarely appeared on the first page).

Even the journalist that had huge problems had his account show a 10/10 rating despite all of his complaints!

[tony bish]

I know and have seen many negative scores on their site and know people who have had negative comments and sometimes through no fault of themselves ,and as for saying the negative score/comment is down the page ,that is because it is dated in order and if someone does give a low score regardless of where it is on the page then it is reflected in the overall score at the top of the page ie your score will go down from say 10 to a 9 .I think it is reasonable and only right to allow a tradesman to be able to counter comment a negative review as we all know their are some far from fair customers out there who will complain and be unreasonable for no reason and at the drop off a hat  .Yes of course if a tradesperson has done a bad job then they should be marked down and repeat offenders of shoddy workmanship should be struck off ,and no doubt their will always be rogues traders on every site regardless of how stringent the rules are  .But I do think this article does not reflect the majority of Checkatrade members . 

[peter maybury]

I was a member of checktrade for a year and we put a lot of effort into getting good feedback and building it up. One day out of the blue I had somebody put negative feedback up which was unwarranted and not accurate. They slated us for being late despite the fact we do not give firm appointments and repeatedly told the customer, they also accused us of marking their paintwork. The customer on leaving was all nice as pie and had no problems, the feed back was posted 2 weeks after the job was carried out.
Checkatrade did not listen to us, and there is only a limited amount of words you are able to use to defend the complaint, not enough in my view to allow us to directly cover each statement made by the customer.
It was not a nice experience after putting so much effort in the first place especially as the complaint was totally unjustified in the first place.
In the article it says that the complaints procedure is complicated, but any customer can make comments about you that are visible to other customers looking at your feed back.
Peter

[tony bish]

Totally endorse what Peter said .You are to a certain extent at the mercy of certain customers and to say that the procedure is biased towards the tradesperson is in my opinion totally inaccurate ,in fact I would say it is the other way round .I am in a position where I have an overall score of 10 and that is through hard work and effort and certainly not through default  ,but I am waiting for the day when someone takes a dislike to my face or business etc and gives me some negative feedback ,and it only takes one person to push your score right down .I think this reporter needs to do a little more homework before he tars all checkatrade members with the same brush .

[Terry A McDonald]

Its the trades equivalent to TripAdvisor.........open to abuse by anyone that has or has not had a problem with the service you provided but is Ok rubbishing you on a public site.

Personally I dont have to pay to be rubbished, I can leave that to the wife to tell me! 

[Emil Dinev]

I just thought you guys might want to see the Checkatrade founder's response to the article
http://blog.checkatrade.com
It's the top article.

[adrian marsh]

Thanks Emil. That's an helpful article.

Sad that it's so often the case, before changes are made to rectify problems, that it takes a major bad news story in the press or on TV to put things right. I have no doubt that CheckaTrade may have been started with honourable intentions, however this story highlights the danger of taking their eye of the ball.

[tony bish]

Mate I dont think its a question of putting things right as the amount of tradespeople who are registered on checkatrade is a helluva lot and the vast majority are decent hardworking guys who do a good job to the best of their abilities.
You are always going to get some who dont adhere to the rules ,find me a big business without its fair share of bad apples ,as with any business its a fact of life .We dont know the full story only one side and that is the customer,and a reporter at that ,I am not sticking up for the tradesman but as we all know their is always two sides to a story .