Edward Thompson

Mon 16 Dec 2013 06:32pm

In reply to other experts I have e-mailed Rated People and have received no response whatsoever, I pay a monthly membership fee for this site and if this is the only way I can air my views and numerous others to go by the response to try and get a reply then so be it. There is 'No sour grapes' , I don't rely on Rated for the bulk of my work but I know there are alot of tradesmen who do, if they cancel my membership I won't be crying over it! I am simply asking for a lead that is worth the money paid for it,no more no less. You can't make statements regarding improved job leads without having evidence to back them up and have the gall to say 'you asked us to get rid Of 'Report a Lead'. If these changes had been trialed prior to the removal of report a lead and definite improvements in the reduction of dud jobs could be proven then they might have a case but it wasn't was it! It's purely to make more money simply as that! Why hasn't someone from Rated come forward with a response? If it was my business I would have answered straight away! The trouble with this country is theres too many sheep prepared to be eaten by the big bad wolf, it takes afew shepherds to look after them! It wouldn't happen abroad!

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Gary Finnie

Mon 16 Dec 2013 09:30am

Edward Thats now THREE days they have ignored us !! I wonder how long it will be now !!

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Alan Morris

Mon 16 Dec 2013 02:25pm

H Edward while I totally agree with you as I said on your previous posting I don't think an open forum like this is the place to air your views email them direct and ask them to contact you to discuss it

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Andrew Coote

Mon 16 Dec 2013 01:59pm

Edward I am a tradesman on here. I have been a tradesman here since 2008. and I am director of my business. As such the following observations are from one who is a customer without a vested interest. I don't necessarily like having to use internet sites where I have to pay to buy a possible lead but it is extremely useful to fill in odd days or weeks in our work schedules allowing us to pick the jobs to suit the gaps. It is best used as one of a range of marketing strategies to ensure enough business is generated to make my company profitable. I am a member of this one because my experience is that it was far better for tradesmen, and much better value than sites like MyBuilder. Like trading with any other business, I have to accept that the people running Rated People have the right to change rules/terms/prices as they see fit. I have a choice, accept it or walk away and use someone else. You have the same right. If you believe they have made some wrong decisions, by all means tell them, and if you don't like the response go elsewhere. But posting this in Ask An Expert is unnecessary and just looks like sour grapes. If I was in charge of Rated People I would probably just delete such posts. So by all means send them an email and rant at what you see as injustice, and you can always post your thoughts as a thread on specialist internet forums for tradesmen. But I somehow doubt that you are going to get anywhere posting your criticisms here. Kind regards Andy

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Jeff Adams

Sun 22 Dec 2013 11:39pm

The question i would like an answer to is When i want to speak to Rated People . I keep being told that we are a call centre. I have contacted the site numbers and emails and at one time it took 7 months for a reply. My question is we as tradesman get rated. I have challenged Rated People several times to put a rated after every response. Strangely no reply . Still nothing like setting an example is there Rated People

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Michael Tucker

Sat 28 Dec 2013 01:49am

Hello Edward, Just have to send an email in to express your concerns and move on. Regards Michael

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Dalton Thompson

Tue 17 Dec 2013 06:04pm

Hi Edward, Thank you for posting your questions to us. As an active tradesman in the last year, who has answered more than 20 questions and accumulated 13 five star ratings, you are a valued member of our community and we value your feedback. Please find replies to your queries below. 1. The quality of our job leads continues to improve for a number of reasons. For one, we remind our homeowners that their job submissions are actually purchased by tradesmen. This was an initiative put in place last year based on feedback from our tradesmen. Also in response to tradesmen feedback, we initiated a major overhaul of our jobs forms. Since January, we have improved the quality of information captured. In fact, our job forms today capture more information from homeowners than ever before. These improvements were based on interviews and focus groups with tradesmen spanning more than a year. So this last year has been all about rolling out new job forms - in response to direct feedback from the trade community. Lastly, we are now in the process of rolling out more than 150 cost guides across our many trades which will help homeowners provide more accurate budget estimates. This too, was an initiative in response to and in consultation with our trade community. The aim of all of these initiatives is to help our tradesmen know more about what they are getting before they purchase, just as it is to help the homeowner submit a request for quote/work that best reflects their real intent. At the same time, despite asking more questions of homeowners, more jobs have been submitted than ever before (now running at almost one million per year). As a result, our tradesmen are winning a record number of jobs. Tradesmen understand that they will not win every job, and that success on Rated People comes with time, experience and some level of investment. Some leads are better than others, just as some leads result in customers for life (at very little relative cost). The average performer on Rated People wins 1 in 4 leads, with many tradesmen winning 1 in 3 or even 1 in 2 jobs. They also return 20x to 30x their investment over time (even higher depending on the trade and season). For tradesmen who believe their win rate is below average, we offer some helpful tips here: http://www.ratedpeople.com/c/tradespeople/checklist and video advice here: http://bit.ly/1bXmuIx 2. Over the years we have received feedback from thousands of tradesmen about their frustration that we do not do more to help them chase the homeowner (if they are un-contactable). Our tradesmen have also expressed frustration at the report-a-lead process, in particular regarding when a homeowner denies a credit request. In response to this feedback, we decided to replace the report-a-lead process with a service that would address these complaints. The new ‘Request a Callback’ feature now allows us to ask the customer to contact you directly. We are hopeful that this creates a better outcome for both the homeowner and our tradesmen. We will be monitoring it closely, collecting feedback and - if further improvements are warranted - we will make them as swiftly as possible. 3. We have reduced lead prices across-the-board by 10%. We took this action, as we indicated we would, on 11th December. A lead priced at £30, is now £27, while a £10 lead is now £9. We implemented these price reductions equally across all trades at the same time as this was deemed to be the fairest approach, rather than distinguishing between categories. We also introduced price reductions via our new tariff bundles over the summer - offering savings via annual membership plans with inclusive lead credits (with savings of up to 40% on leads). 4. There will be no redundancies as a result of this change as we are committed to increasing our investment in improving our service, not reducing it. As we continue to invest in improving our service to tradesmen and homeowners alike, we need to hire more and better people. Since 2011, we have tripled the number of homeowner jobs on the Rated People platform (from less than 300k to nearly 1 million). The changes to the report-a-lead process itself were actually an automated process wherein you submitted a request that triggered an email and SMS to the homeowner, who then confirmed your request. Our staff only got involved when a tradesman contacted us to contest or complain about the outcome. This activity only made up a portion of a support agent’s time – time which they can now better allocate towards handling other issues. 5. Absolutely. We regularly survey our customers and review the feedback that comes into our support centre. The initiatives to improve job lead quality to help homeowners provide better budgets and filter out the timewasters, are based on our tradesmen's feedback (these three being top concerns). We also used feedback from homeowners’ to drive certain initiatives. Some, for example, felt "uncomfortable" when asked by a minority of our tradesmen to indicate that the tradesman had not quoted for the job when in fact the tradesman had done so (in many cases also winning the job). In fact, direct customer feedback revealed that some of our tradesmen were reporting almost every lead that they purchased as "bad" when in fact this was not the case. The act of encouraging homeowners to deny that they were able to make contact with them also became an issue of concern, for obvious reasons. This is not the kind of brand we stand for, nor is it something that the vast majority of our trade community stand for. It is unfortunate that the report-a-lead process was subject to this abuse, when in fact it was created to benefit tradesmen. We similarly hope to benefit our trade community by continuing to improve the quality of our job leads, by lowering prices as we have done, and by introducing the report-a-callback feature. 6. Rated People was set up to help both homeowners find better quality, local tradesmen and tradesmen grow their businesses and win work. The industry has changed significantly over the years. Unlike traditional directories where you wait for the phone to ring, Rated People helps tradesmen find work when and where they need it, all year around. It is also more measurable, in that you know what you are getting in return for what you are investing. Most of our tradesmen return 20x their money on what they spend on leads. They also win customers for life. Some leads, of course, may not lead to work immediately, but a high proportion will at some time lead to something and then many of our tradesmen have repeat work and referral work all from that one lead. To date, we have had more than 2 million jobs posted on Rated People. The homeowners that come to Rated People do so because they see the value of a community with more than 300k ratings. It helps them understand more about who they are hiring before the work starts. We thank you again for your questions and your feedback. We would also welcome you as part of a tradesman product development panel we will be looking for formally put in place in 2014. In the meantime, we hope our replies have in some way helped you understand the rationale behind the recent changes and our approach. Our tradesman and homeowner community are very important to our success. In fact, they will define it. Thank you again for your input. Best Wishes, The Rated People Team

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