Information Quality of Web Services: Payment Account Online Comparison Tools Survey in the Czech Republic and Slovakia

The paper is focused on the comparison and calculation of retail payment accounts. The latest development of digital services within the frame of a FinTech leaves out the product comparison so far and therefore a consumer has to rely on these online tools. Six comparison tools were found and analyzed in two selected countries. The information quality test was performed based on the EU methodology regarding accuracy and full price, relevance, language and concision, detail, uniformity, comparability, and verifiability. The user test profile is a retail mainstream client with e-banking preference. All comparison tools but one failed in the information quality test. Some of them provided a correct result for only 33% of compared offers. Most of the misguiding and incorrect results came from a miscalculation of specific conditional sales issues and ATM withdrawal from other bank’s network service. Only one comparison tool passed with the share of correct and plausible results above 90%. Unsatisfactory results can be explained by the incompleteness of CTs, not being up-to-date issues and by a specific pricing policy different from e.g. United Kingdom or Germany. The last part suggests possible ways how to improve current unsatisfactory situation by creating a test framework that would complement the Directive 2014/92/EU.