“Crowning achievement of a 5-year existence”
The Dutch public have named ConsuWijzer.nl the ‘Best Government Website’ for the second time in a row. This was announced by the organisation behind Website of the Year, the most important online public’s award. Pauline Bijlenga, head of ConsuWijzer: “This is the 5th year ConsuWijzer has been in existence. In the course of that period, the site has been visited approximately 8 million times. This public’s award is the crowning glory of our work.”
About ConsuWijzer
ConsuWijzer actively helps consumers with advice by telephone or mail. It has done so half a million times in five years. At the website of ConsuWijzer, consumers can find sample letters for the submission of a complaint to a company. In the past year, 500,000 letters were downloaded. In addition, the website offers scripts for practicing conversations with the shopkeeper and comprehensible legal information.
In five years time, the visits to the website increased from half a million to 2.2 million annually. Since the site increasingly offers more information, advice, and assistance for consultation and download, the annual number of telephone calls is declining: from 83,000 five years ago to 57,000 last year.
Each year, ConsuWijzer receives approximately 100,000 questions and complaints from consumers about their rights. These constitute important signals for the three supervisory authorities behind the counter: the Netherlands Competition Authority (Nederlandse Mededingingsautoriteit, NMa), the Netherlands Independent Post and Telecommunications Authority (Onafhankelijke Post en Telecommunicatie Autoriteit, OPTA) and the Netherlands Consumer Authority (Consumentenautoriteit). They can act when companies do not observe the rules, e.g. by imposing a fine. At 1 January 2013, the three supervisory authorities will merge into the Consumer and Market Authority (Autoriteit Consument en Markt).
Website of the Year
Website of the Year is the foremost and largest online public’s award of the country. In the period from 19 September up to and including 28 October, the Dutch people were given the opportunity to rank their favourite websites in 21 categories on content, navigation, design, and intent to recommend. The website with the highest quality score wins the award for the Best Website of the Year. The award for the Most Popular Website goes to the site with the most votes.
