Is it just us or are there suddenly loads of adverts on TV for comparison sites?

They all seems to be saying the same thing; that they are the one-stop shops that take us straight to the best deals on the market.

But according to a report by consumer group Which?, those of us using the sites could end up pretty confused.

Which? shopped on gocompare.com, Confused.com and moneysupermarket.com for a number of basic financial products such as insurance, mortgages and credit cards.

In doing so, it found the cheapest products varied massively between websites as you can see:

• The cheapest home insurance policy ranged from £51 on gocompare.com to £71 on Confused.com.
• For credit cards, moneysupermarket.com came up with a card with an APR of 6.8%, while gocompare.com's cheapest card had an APR of 12.9%.
• It also proved cheaper to buy directly from providers in some cases. Bradford & Bingley's home insurance policy cost £68 if bought from the insurer's own website, but £72 from moneysupermarket.com, £83 on Confused.com and £100 on gocompare.com.

They also found that making a true comparison based on the information on the sites was also difficult. Some sites did not make clear the amount of excess that you would pay in the event you made a claim, for example, potentially multiplying the cost of insurance.

Which? said we all need to use a variety of comparison sites to make sure we were getting the best deals available with Martyn Hocking, editor of Which? Money saying:

"You need to use two or three comparison sites and check directly with providers to get the best quote, and remember that cheapest isn't always best; it's a false economy if you don't get enough cover for your needs or have to pay a huge excess if you claim,"

Hayley Parsons, chief executive officer of gocompare.com, defended their site saying: 

"There are various reasons why Which? may have found quotes differed from site to site. For example, some comparison sites don't compare as many insurers or products as we do, therefore the search results would be different."

"In addition, there are still some assumptions used by other comparison sites that can mean people get seemingly lower premiums; by contrast we ask every question possible to get an accurate premium that we can then guarantee won't change when you go through to the insurer."

Carlton Hood, chief executive of Confused.com, questioned the research given the small number of test quotes used saying:

"More than one million customers per month visit Confused.com for quotations, and last year 1.2 million people saved money by using the website. It would have been very difficult for those customers to have made those savings without using a price comparison site. On average, customers using Confused.com saved £208 on car insurance and £193 on home insurance."

He went on to say that the price comparison industry was complex and that a constant audit process was required to make sure the most competitive deals were available to customers.

"Our last internal audit found that, in 96% of cases, customers are offered the same price via Confused.com as they are when they go direct. In the very small number of cases where a discrepancy occurs, we bring this to the attention of the insurer and rectify the situation."

What’s been your experience of price comparison sites? Have you found them as helpful as they are made out to be?

Why not let us know in the comments?

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