| Car Data Price Fixing |
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There are 3 main providers of HPI / Car Data in the UK, only 2 of these will offer to sell you financial information on a car's financial history. These 2 are Experian and Equifax, bot of these operate under many different brands, such as HPI, The AA and The RAC to name but a few. But ultimately all can be tracked back to these 2 companies. This may not seem to be a problem, but because they restrict other companies from accessing this data, they are effectively creating a monopoly in the Car Data industry. They can charge what they like, because they have created a take it or leave it market, and who can afford to buy a car at £5000 without checking it's financial history first? It wasn't so long ago that Equifax and Experian were selling their Car Data at no less than £35'ish, yet were selling the exact same car data to traders at less than £4 each and still making a huge mark up. It is believed that the actual cost of a car data check is around £2.60. However if more than one person checks the same vehicle, it doesn't cost them any more money because they have the results kept on file. It's a wonder to those in the industry why the competition commission has not investigated the monopoly that these 2 hold in the car data market, as much as everyone else tries to get access to this vehice finance information, they are prohibited by Experian and Equifax who wish to keep it all to themselves and maintain a monopoly. The competition commission should be looking into this, they should be taking action because people don't complete car data checks for leisure, it's a necessary part of buying a used car. We hope all will join in our attempt to get the competition commission to look into this cartel, but we need your help to do so, so we ask that you email a complaint to the competition commission. It's the only way to put an end to this rip off practice |