I came across a web site at http://www.publicpeoplefinder.com and
noticed that they have a page rank 0 out of ten.. Should I feel safe
about ordering from them? they seem to have alot of good feedback from
others that used their services. Can you help.

I wanted to find my father and they gave me some names and emails of some
others that ordered before. They told me to contact them and they will
tell you how they feel as they ordered before. All said great things about
www.publicpeoplefinder.com. Can you please help on this page rank bar on
googles toolbar?? Thanx

Jennifer132...

I would not base my opinion on doing business with a website based
upon Google Page Rank.  The algorhythm used for determing Page Rank is
based, from what I understand, upon several factors including number
pages that have links to a certain website, content, etc.  A new site
will have a low page rank as well as certain specialized sites.  Now,
with that being said, let's take a look at publicpeoplefinder.com and
see what we can find out.

There are a couple of things to look for before doing business with a
website that you are not familiar with.  The first thing I do is check
contact informtion on the site.  On publicpeoplefinder.com, they have
both a mailing and physical address listed as well as several
different phone numbers.  When I ran the phone number through Google,
it came up with a company called Magnums Investigations in the same
city as the address listed on the website.  That being said, it also
came up on several other websites as the contact number:

http://www.easytolocate.com/
http://www.lostpeople.com/
http://www.yourpeoplesearch.com/
http://www.nationwidesearch.com/
http://www.telephonesearches.com/

and others.  This isn't that uncommon a practice as businesses want to
have as strong a presence on the web as possible and each of these
sites offers roughly the same services.

Being that they are listed as detectives in West Virginia, I checked
the licensing requirements for PI's in that state.  Their requirements
are fairly standard and you can learn the status of Magnums
Investigations with the state by sending an email to
licensing@wvsos.com or calling 304-558-6000.

Using a whois search, I found that publicpeoplefinder.com was
registered in January of this year, which may help explain why the
Page Rank is low as it has not been active for that long.  I also
checked nationwidesearch.com as that appears to be the main site for
Magnums Investigations.  That site was registered in 1998 and has the
same contact information as all the other sites.

Next, a good stop is the Better Business Bureau.  I have to admit that
up to this point, I would have said that all signs are pointing
towards you being able to trust in this company for your
business...until now.  In searching the BBB online, it seems that
Magnums has an unsatisfactory record with the BBB due to
non-responsiveness to complaints.  There have been 5 complaints in the
last 12 months, 7 in the last 36 months.  You can see the results
here:

http://search.canton.bbb.org/nis2/newsearch2.asp?ID=1&strBCode=02820000&ComID=0282000005001027

I want to point out that I am not recommending one way or the other
whether or not you should do business with this company.  I simply
want to show you the resources available to you to learn about a
company before dealing with them.  The BBB report concerns me a bit,
but they may have a reasonable explanation for the complaints.  I
would definitely check with the WV PI licensing commission and see if
they have any additional information regarding Magnums prior to
working with them.

I wish you luck in the search for your father.

Regards,

-THV

Search Strategy:

whois search
BBB online

Hello,

I went ahead and ordered from them and in less than 6 hours later they
provided me with a full report on my father.

They told me that there was not a land line / phone number in his name
but they told me that he had a cell phone but needed an addition fee.
I paid the additional fee and they sent me the number within a few
hours.

Well I have to say thanks to public people finder
http://www.publicpeoplefinder.com as they found my
dad.

Tonight I called him and he started to cry and told me that he has to
pull off the road to talk. We talked around 15 -20 mins and it was
great. He told me that when her got home he would call me back. He did
just that. He told me that money was not good and he only had a cell
phone and no home phone number.

But this is great and I cant thank public people finder enough. I'm
not sure about what you said about the BBB my guess is that they are
very busy and get alot of customers and you cant always make everyone
happy. But they made my day when they found my father.. Address, and
cell number to boot.

Well I cant say enough about them.

Thanx for your help again.
I will use googles answers again.

Thank you
Jen

Jen..

Congratulations on finding your father and I am glad everything worked out for you.

-THV

Thank you again so much. I'm just glad that http://publicpeoplefinder.com
worked. If you know anyone else that could use there please feel free
to send them my way I will be sure to give them my whole story of
finding my father.

Thanx