Mentioning professional trading names.

Unknown

Well I thought I would comment just saying that if one mentions a trade name for me just says that in my experience this name or named product has worked for me it's not to say it will work for everyone.

I thought this forum was for people with a common interest to pass on their knowledge and experiences if it's not then I for one will go else where just my  view

Fairygirl

Yes - bulkerb - we often name companies we've had good experiences with, as well as the ones we haven't. Simply to give other members the benefit of that  experience. We had a designated thread for it - The Good Guys.

It's totally different from the spam advertising we often see - that's for the mods to deal with once we report it  

Carry on as normal  

Ladybird4

I am happy to hear from forum members in the course of a thread discussion about any companies that they consider worthwhile. I do not consider that as advertising but as a shared experience of reliable resources.

nutcutlet

There's a lot of difference between talking about your experience with a company and posting a free ad for your own company.  

plant pauper

If I want work done on my house I ask around and try to get personal recommendations. If I want to to order, for example, mail order plants, I ask for folks' experience from this forum.

I and anyone with an iota of common sense, realise that the final decision to proceed is mine and therefore the responsibility.

Any advice or recommendations I give will have the caveat..."it worked for me" attached and I assume it from others.

Dovefromabove

As Nutcutlet has said - there's a huge difference between a personal recommendation based on the experience of a forum member, and the attempts by some companies to post advertisements without paying the website.  

As far as I'm aware, there's never been a problem with posting personal recommendations.

I'm sure the GW team would let us know if there was. 

After all, if mentioning trade names was forbidden, it would mean that the Original Poster would have to change his name   and that would never do! 

punkdoc

The artist formerly known as Dove from Above.

Dovefromabove

michael mpc

hi hortico and all who answered I assumed that that was the idea of the site to tell others of there good companys and bad  so we don't fall in same trap as dfa and a lot more of other members me  included have had bad dealings   with some (so do I understand that we can not slag bad companys ) let me know as now I am confused   yours Michael  

NoraW

Hello HORTICO,

As others have said, most of the time it's glaringly obvious when someone's advertising, as opposed to offering genuine advice gained from customer experience, good or bad. There are obvious signs we look out for, including the forum favourite 'C-H-E-A-P-K-I-T-C-H-E-N-S', but sometimes we do need to do a little more digging. Thanks to our eagle-eyed members (who can spot advertisers far better than we can), we're able to remove advertising once alerted via the report button. Our spam filter also removes some threads automatically.

Feel free to post any relevant, balanced thoughts on customer experiences. You can share bad experience but please be respectful and ensure you're following the forum's Code of Conduct, and please no 'naming and shaming' - don't publish any full names of e.g. customer service representatives or sales assistants. 

B3

Maybe a gold version of the spam tin opener key