Growing Skeptical About Reseller Ratings

[polygnotus]

It is so easy for a vendor to fake this place out it's silly.

I am a writer by trade and I can spot writing styles easily. I
have spotted numerous reviews posted by the same writer
under different names.

It is essential that the credibility of Reseller Ratings remains
in tack. The only way to ensure this is for them to have an
aggressive policy towards spoofers - both detecting them
and exposing them.

Power is always ambiguous. This place has the potential to
be a powerful resource for consumers. It also has the
potential to be a powerful scam. This is why I'm posting this.

I have used Reseller Ratings for a long time. I have recommended
it to friends and in online correspondence. But I am deeply
concerned about losing this as a resource due to slack
enforcement of posting policy.

Consumer Reports maintains their credibility by not taking
money from businesses. Where does Reseller Ratings get
it's money?

I am merely suspicious now. But you can bet your ass that
if I ever confirm fraud, I will use every recourse available to
bring this place down.

Again, Reseller Ratings has the potential to be a revolution
in Consumer Power. But only if it's honest. Keep it honest.

A.K.A. Tocque Deville

[daveleau]

Welcome to the forum.
Your concern is noted and is being forwarded to the people that matter (I am only a mod).
I know Scott and the staff have gone to great lengths to ensure vendors do not post about their own companies without his knowledge. I believe RR is a great resource and has a superb reputation. It hasn't gotten that way by having a lax staff.
Regards
Dave

As users are initially linked to email addresses, it would be posible for an individual to sign up with different user names. But IP's are regsitered for each post, I believe. So if you think there is any fraud you could email or PM the Reseller Ratings admin staff and they could check which IP's various posts have come from.

That would help to reduce the numbers of fraudulent posts IMO, if they ever occured.

So as an interested party in the veracity of reseller ratings, I believe you should inform the admins of your suspicions and disclose which posts you believe to be fraudulent. That could help develop a more secure policy if needed.

IMO, anyway.

Cheers
Mick

[Mr. Fingers]

I would hate to see resellerratings lose its integrity as well. When Im looking through resellerratings I completely ignore postive posts if was a good experience thats great! What I look at is the negative posts yes no business will leave themselves negative feedback, so that is what I look for, that and comments from the company staff, if its sounds like they keep making excuses I pass them by. Now I suppose businesses could give each other bad reviews, this would be especially be damaging for smaller high quality setups who are just starting out but they could repsond to bogus posts with physical evidence that nothing of the sort ever happened. Its harder to prove fiction than it is to prove fact...Hey now thats a catchy phrase...I suppose I would be the complete opposite of a professional writer... Just admire my grammar to understand that.

[sharder8]

polygnotus --

I'd like to point out that there was a period in which Scott and staff (original RR owners) did not have control of ResellerRatings. It was for several reasons, including the concerns of the members here, that led to Scott getting RR back!

I've notice some of what you are talking about, but when I look at the dates, (of the couple resellers I looked at and saw what you saw) I saw that those seemed to fall in the time period that Scott and staff had NO control.

I applaud your thoughtfulness and desire to ferret out these abuses, but realize that the staff is small and they have already made great strides in improving RR. By providing constructive information and examples where you see these abuses will make it easier for the crew to "cleanup" the abuses and formulate ways to prevent them from happening again in the future.

Harder
Just a member!

[Mr. Fingers]

What you mean ScottW the guy that runs TechIMO controls resellerratings...I never knew that thought it was some other company everyone else links to...its very popular and I think its gaining more followers every day I have recommended it several times. I suppose you learn something everyday. I had no idea techimo was the doorway to resellerratings. I have to say though thats reassuring if the integrity of resellerratings is anything like Techimo then you have nothing to fear. I was wondering why people posted threads like that.

[Dokeman]

i thought they deleted the intries from the time he didnt have it. It was a few months worth of stuff if i remember correctly

[John C. Dechon]

It seems that some old ratings were deleted, others were not. There doesn't seem to be any consistency on that issue.

Lots of valid reviews and good companies were tossed out with the bathwater.

John D.

[Admin RR]

This issue comes up from time to time. Frankly I'm tired of defending myself and the site but I'm always ready to do so. NEVER has anyone had a legitimate reason to question us, other than simple paranoia resulting from sheer boredom (my best guess).

First, you need to read my open letter because I'm not going to repeat what's in there, except perhaps to reiterate a few points:
http://www.resellerratings.com/openletter.pl

1) ResellerRatings was not properly maintained by its former owner from September 2001 to March 2002. Thus, we did not import reviews from that period of time. Any reviews deleted after that point in time did not comply with our published policies - reviews are RARELY removed.

2) ResellerRatings actively prevents and investigates fraud. We have an abundance of automated and manual checks in place to prevent companies from rating themselves and users from posting multiple and or bogus reviews for a company (for starters: we log all IP's, we require invoice numbers, we require registration and unique/verified emails).

3) ResellerRatings does not, and never has, altered a company's rating or removed comments in exchange for compensation. We are an ethical organization interested in helping buyers. Companies pay us for the homepage logo spots and various market research data, as well as for clicks through our dealtime powered search program.

Unfounded accusations could land you in hot water by damaging our site. Unless you have some legitimate reason to question our practices, I would suggest that you not make such accusations in light of that, plus they sort of piss me off since I along with my colleagues work extraordinarily hard to HELP YOU - that's our job.

Scott

[Wanamingo]

I would just like to point out the thread starter is a "writer by trade", yet used the non-existant phrase "in tack" as opposed to the actual word "intact".

I am very glad that Reseller Ratings exists and use it on at least a weekly basis.