19 July 2011 by Dafydd Vaughan. 1 Comment.
The Royal Mail provides a major public service across the UK – it handles millions of items of mail every day. Its operating licence requires it to publish a number of data sets on its performance on a regular basis. For example, it is required to publish information on its delivery targets (quality of service) [...]
2 May 2011 by Dafydd Vaughan. 2 Comments.
Late last night all CF Labs sites were taken offline following a serious hardware failure at our remote hosting centre. Our supplier has worked to replace the faulty equipment and bring our services back online. This work was completed at around 2.15pm this afternoon. There are however a few outstanding issues with some of our websites: [...]
22 March 2011 by Dafydd Vaughan. No Comments.
In 2005, South Wales was hit by a major outbreak of E.coli O157. A total of 157 people, mostly children, became ill and five-year-old Mason Jones died. Following the outbreak, a Public Inquiry developed 24 recommendations aimed at preventing further outbreaks. Consumer Focus Wales has taken on the task of monitoring the implementation of these [...]
3 February 2011 by Dafydd Vaughan. 1 Comment.
Yesterday we released an updated website for publishing UK and European product recall notices. The changes we’ve made at RecalledProducts.org include a refreshed look, enhanced statistics and an improved recalls importer. The biggest change you’ll notice is the design of the site. It’s more of an evolution of the design than a brand new look [...]
28 January 2011 by Dafydd Vaughan. No Comments.
Today is European Privacy and Data Protection Day. It’s a day for governments, businesses and campaign bodies to promote the importance of keeping control of your personal information. This makes today a great chance to talk about how StayPrivate.org protects the information you give to us. Data encryption When you sign up to StayPrivate.org you [...]
15 December 2010 by Dafydd Vaughan. No Comments.
CAPTCHAs (or Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) are the distorted images containing text that you sometimes find at the end of forms when logging in or registering for various services online. These images are generally used to make sure that it is a human submitting the form, not an [...]
13 December 2010 by Dafydd Vaughan. 1 Comment.
Earlier this year, we released a rebuilt version of the Consumer Focus Energy Price Comparison service (EPC). The EPC was inherited from Energywatch – a predecessor to Consumer Focus and provides an idea of the cheapest energy costs for each supplier based on a number of factors. These include usage type (high, medium or low [...]
9 December 2010 by Dafydd Vaughan. No Comments.
Over the past few months the Energy team at Consumer Focus have been working to develop a way to publish information about the way energy suppliers handle complaints. The aim is to provide people with additional useful information which can be used when deciding which energy supplier to use. The team has been compiling quarterly [...]
7 December 2010 by Dafydd Vaughan. 1 Comment.
A little while ago the Community and Public Services team at Consumer Focus commissioned the Plunkett Foundation and the Social Enterprise Coalition to compile details of post offices owned and operated by communities. The data includes contact details, core activities, company type, their relationship with Post Office Ltd (POL), details of the services provided, information [...]
4 October 2010 by Dafydd Vaughan. No Comments.
What is happening? We will be upgrading the Consumer Focus website throughout the day on Wednesday 6th October Thursday 7th October. During this work, there may be holding pages in place and the website may be unavailable for short periods of time. We apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. More Detail The [...]
Consumer Focus is the independent champion for consumers across England, Wales, Scotland and (for postal consumers) in Northern Ireland. We operate across the whole of the economy, persuading businesses and public services to put consumers at the heart of what they do.
www.consumerfocus.org.uk
