GoCompare.com Limited, trading as Go.Compare (formerly GoCompare from 2017 until 2022, and GoCompare.com until 2017, styled as GO.COMPARE) is a Welsh financial services comparison company based in

Cardiff Cardiff (; ) is the capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of Wales. Cardiff had a population of in and forms a Principal areas of Wales, principal area officially known as the City and County of Ca ...

, Wales. Its website provides comparison details for financial products including car insurance, home and pet insurance and breakdown cover. Since 2021 it has been owned by

Future plc Future plc is a British publishing company. It was started in 1985 by Chris Anderson (entrepreneur), Chris Anderson. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. History 1985–2012 The company was ...

. The company's advertising campaign in 2015 was voted as the "most irritating advertisement."

History

Go Compare was established in November 2006 and is based in

Newport, Wales Newport ( ) is a city and Principal areas of Wales, county borough in Wales, situated on the River Usk close to its confluence with the Severn Estuary, northeast of Cardiff. The population grew considerably between the 2011 and the 2021 Unit ...

. The company's founder was Hayley Parsons, who worked for Admiral Insurance for 14 years, and was formerly head of business development at

Confused.com Confused.com is a UK based financial services comparison platform launched in 2001 and specialising in comparison of insurance and financial services, including car insurance, home insurance, energy, van insurance and life insurance. Confused.com ...

. Parsons was replaced as CEO by Jon Morrell following a takeover by insurance company esure in March 2015 It was the first comparison site to focus on features of insurance products rather than just listing prices, which led to the company being invited to become a member of the British Insurance Brokers Association (BIBA). The company, which at the time was 49% owned by insurance company esure, posted a pre-tax profit of £34.7 million for 2011, up 15% on the previous year. On 8 December 2014, esure acquired Go Compare in a deal worth £95 million. In November 2016 the company was the subject of a demerger from esure. In November 2017, ZPG's offer to buy the company for £460 million was rejected. In December 2017, GoCompare announced the acquisition of MyVoucherCodes, one of the UK's largest online voucher code sites, in a £36.5m deal. In November 2020, GoCompare agreed to a £594m takeover offer from

, Britain’s biggest magazines publisher.

Services

GoCompare provides a comparison service for

vehicle A vehicle () is a machine designed for self-propulsion, usually to transport people, cargo, or both. The term "vehicle" typically refers to land vehicles such as human-powered land vehicle, human-powered vehicles (e.g. bicycles, tricycles, velo ...

life insurance Life insurance (or life assurance, especially in the Commonwealth of Nations) is a contract A contract is an agreement that specifies certain legally enforceable rights and obligations pertaining to two or more parties. A contract typical ...

in conjunction with its partners Neilson Financial Services,

home A home, or domicile, is a space used as a permanent or semi-permanent residence for one or more human occupants, and sometimes various companion animals. Homes provide sheltered spaces, for instance rooms, where domestic activity can be p ...

and

pet insurance Pet insurance is a form of insurance that pays, partly or in total, for veterinary treatment of the insured person's ill or injured pet. Some policies will pay out when the pet dies, or if the pet is lost or stolen. As veterinary medicine is inc ...

, and

breakdown cover Roadside assistance, also known as breakdown coverage, is a service that assists motorists, motorcyclists, or bicyclists whose vehicles have suffered a mechanical failure that either cannot be resolved by the motorist, or has prevented them from ...

. It also provides comparison services for

travel insurance Travel insurance is an insurance product for covering unexpected losses incurred while travelling, either internationally or domestically. Basic policies generally only cover emergency medical expenses while overseas, while comprehensive policies ...

, gas and electricity,

broadband In telecommunications, broadband or high speed is the wide-bandwidth (signal processing), bandwidth data transmission that exploits signals at a wide spread of frequencies or several different simultaneous frequencies, and is used in fast Inter ...

loan In finance, a loan is the tender of money by one party to another with an agreement to pay it back. The recipient, or borrower, incurs a debt and is usually required to pay interest for the use of the money. The document evidencing the deb ...

s, credit cards, mortgages and other financial products through preferred providers such as Energylinx and

Experian Experian plc is a multinational corporation, multinational data broker and consumer credit reporting company headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Experian collects and aggregates information on more than 1 billion people and businesses including ...

. On 14 August 2012, the company launched "Covered mag", an online magazine that claims to be "unlike any other financial publication you've ever read".

Advertising

On 19 August 2009, the company launched an advertising campaign featuring a fictional Italian

tenor A tenor is a type of male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. Composers typically write music for this voice in the range from the second B below m ...

called Gio Compario, played by Wynne Evans. The advertisements feature 'Gio' singing about the company to the tune of "

Over There "Over There" is a 1917 war song written by George M. Cohan that was popular with the United States military and the American public during World War I and World War II. Written shortly after the American entry into World War I, "Over There" i ...

" in various locations. In 2015, the campaign was voted the UK's "most irritating advertisement". In response to this reaction, Go Compare deliberately subverted the campaign in July 2012 by running a series of adverts where celebrity guests such as

Sue Barker Susan Barker (born 19 April 1956) is a British former television presenter and professional tennis player. During her playing career, Barker won 15 WTA Tour-level singles titles, including a major at the 1976 French Open. She reached a career- ...

Jimmy Carr James Anthony Patrick Carr (born 15 September 1972) is an Irish-British comedian, presenter, writer and actor. He is known for his rapid-fire deadpan delivery of One-line joke, one-liners. He began his comedy career in 1997, and he has regula ...

Stuart Pearce Stuart Pearce (born 24 April 1962) is an English professional football manager and former player, who was most recently a first-team coach for Premier League club West Ham United. He was nicknamed "Psycho" for his unforgiving style of play. ...

Ray Mears Raymond Paul Mears (born 7 February 1964) is a British woodsman, instructor, businessman, author and TV presenter. His TV appearances cover bushcraft and survival techniques. He is best known for the TV series '' Ray Mears' Bushcraft'', ' ...

Louie Spence Louie Spence (born 6 April 1969) is an English dancing, dancer, choreographer and television presenter, best known for the TV show ''Pineapple Dance Studios (TV series), Pineapple Dance Studios''. He was a professional dancer in his youth, perfo ...

and

Stephen Hawking Stephen William Hawking (8January 194214March 2018) was an English theoretical physics, theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author who was director of research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at the University of Cambridge. Between ...

lined up to "silence" the character of Gio Compario. Marketing officer Kevin Hughes said, "It was risky, but a brand has to listen to its customers." The character returned in July 2015 after an 18-month break, singing as part of what Evans called a "much calmer performance". The character appeared again in 2020 after coronavirus lockdown measures were eased in the UK in July 2020.

Public image

In September 2007 the company admitted that, on one occasion, an unlawful breach of privacy had taken place with regard to the passing on of data provided by customers. It said that this was the result of a breach of contract by a sub-contractor, Performance Direct, and stated that it would take immediate action to prevent it happening again. In January 2008 the site was banned for a time by

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

due to "irregular inbound links". This resulted in its share of search traffic for the term "car insurance" reducing from 17.49% to 2.31%. Gocompare.com was banned again in April 2009. In August 2019 the company received criticism from road safety organisations after debuting an advert depicting the Gio Compario character crashing into a tree and flipping over. The Advertising Standards Authority received over 70 complaints regarding the advertisement.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Go Compare Companies based in Newport, Wales Vehicle insurance Financial services companies established in 2006 Comparison shopping websites Online financial services companies of the United Kingdom 2006 establishments in the United Kingdom