The Motley Fool

Time was when The Motley Fool would shout its mission to the rooftops - to Educate, Amuse and Enrich! The Fool has since trimmed its ambitions and now markets itself as an "independent financial comparison" site. In fact, is very much more than that with the Fool School, articles on current financial topics and the discussion boards.

Product Comparison and Switching

The home page is the main access point for product comparison and switching with a detailed guide in each product area.

Credit Cards: Compare and apply for selected 0% balance transfer and/or purchases, standard APR, cashback, rewards and lifetime balance transfers offerings. Alternatively, perform a more comprehensive search from the whole market using the Wizard.

Mortgages: Compare selected fixed rate, discount, tracker, capped, offset and buy-to-let mortgages or use the Wizard to search the market yourself.

Loans: Compare and apply for selected unsecured loans or search the market at large.

Current Accounts: Compare and apply for current accounts or search whole market.

Savings Accounts: Compare and apply for regular savings, notice cash ISA and children's accounts, or search all accounts.

Insurance: Life, mortgage protection and critical illness quotes from selected insurers. Motor, home and travel insurance quotes through confused.com.

Utilities: Compare dual fuel, gas and electricity tariff and switch suppliers online.

Fool School

Get Out of Debt: How to How Out of Debt, How Credit Reports Work and County Court Judgments.

Property & Home: Home Buying, Mortgages, Remortgaging, Buy-to-Let Basics.

Retirement & Pensions: Pensions, Wills and Probate.

Investments: How to Profit from Shares, Investment Terms Explained, How When and Where to Invest, ISAs and Investment Funds, Investment Clubs. A share dealing service is available through the Halifax.

Other topics that are somehow not part of the Fool School curriculum include the Women's Resource Centre (marriage, children, separation and divorce), Taxes (income tax, National Insurance, CGT, Inheritance Tax, wills and probate, tax rates, stamp duty) as well as the trademark Miracle of Compound Interest and Ten Steps to Financial Freedom.

Overall the site is very nicely laid out and pleasant on the eye. Comparison tables are clear, interactive and comprehensive .Guides are generally authoritative and well written although occasionally not quite up to date. For instance, the Pensions Guide has not yet gotten round to explaining the new "simplified" tax regime.

The really irritating thing about this site is that it conceals most of its best content. From the home page you would think that it is a product comparison site. You have to go into the site map to discover its riches and to discover the Foolish Community in the discussion boards.

Most of all one misses the old sense of adventure. The free model portfolios have almost disappeared. Only a High Yield Portfolio remains, quietly tucked away under Value Investing. The Qualiport is now called Champion Shares and costs £149 a year (current special offer £99), while Beat-the-Footsie and the anti-valuation metrics Rule Shaker portfolios are no more.

Gone is the brash, iconoclastic and self-righteous Fool. In his place stands a competent, self-effacing establishment man who is reluctant to go out on a limb.