This anecdotal exercise demonstrates an extremely valuable and useful tool available to all of us when dealing with a merchant or charity that is either new to us, or that we have dealt with in the past. The BBB has an easy to use website that provides a wealth of information on companies, charities, and consumer issues. It should be noted that the BBB website has some excellent consumer news resources, as well as information on identity theft, and other consumer issues.
On the top-left corner of the site in the section “CHECK IT OUT” are links which connect to the BBB search engines for either company reports, or a dedicated site at www.give.org where charities can be checked for reliability and honesty. Clicking on the link “Business” opens the “Business Information System” (BIS) where a company can be checked out based on either its name and city, phone number, or web address. Once the information is entered, if a record is found, the user is redirected to the website of the local bureau that has the record on file. I tried referencing companies by each of the three methods, and the system was quick and efficient. Information listed about a company includes its name, address, and phone number, typically followed by the history of the business, its owners, website address (if any), and then a section on “Customer Experience”. If the company operates under more than one name, the aliases are listed, as well as the names of the company’s managers. It is the “Customer Experience” section that is the most telling, because this is the section that notes if there had been complaints, the number, and how they were resolved. It is also telling about a company’s reputation if the report says that, “…this company has an unsatisfactory record with the Bureau due to unanswered complaint(s).” Personally, I typically choose to avoid doing business with any company that has this notation on its BBB record. There are also links at bbb.org where complaints can be filed, as well as a link to locate local BBB offices.
Charities can be checked from the link, or directly at www.give.org. Give.org is a project of the BBB Wise Giving Alliance. As I type this, there is a warning at the top of the web page about some of the alleged charities raising funds for tsunami relief. On the left side of the give.org page is a link for “Charity Reports”, which connects to the alliance’s “National Charity reports Index” where hundreds of national and regional charities are listed in alphabetical order. Charities that are strictly local in operation are generally not listed here, but on the website of the local BBB chapter.
Clicking on the name of a charity opens up the BBB report on that charity. The report lists the date, name, and aliases for the charity. I found it most interesting that several of the charities, including some of the widely advertised religious charities, operate as a single charity, but under a variety of different names.
The listing will state whether or not the charity meets the BBB standards (links to the standards are listed on the main give.org page), fails to meet standards (the standards that it fails to meet are listed), or “Despite written BBB Wise Giving Alliance requests in the past year, this organization has not provided current information about its finances, programs, and governance”, which would make me very reluctant to contribute to that charity. If a full report is available, the site lists the budget of the charity. When the full report is listed, I personally find the salaries of the executives and the fund raising expenses very interesting. There are a handful of charities listed where almost all of the funds collected go to the salaries of the executives, and fund raising expenses, with little or no money going to the stated cause. In a few other cases, the executives own the fundraising service, for which they receive commissions in addition to their administrative salaries! These charities can provoke some interesting ethical considerations, so it is wise for a donor to check out a charity at give.org or his local BBB website before donating.
A fine example of a local BBB website would be the Southeast Texas chapter at www.bbbsetexas.org. Local BBB websites typically offer a tool to check out local companies and charities, as well as to file complaints.
Be both a wise shopper and a wise donor, and check the BBB websites frequently.
For more information on the Tulsa Computer Society click here