Agencies available on-line

Maybe you would like to know how to check up on a company in California.

Perhaps it is the latest nutrition information you are seeking.

Or maybe you want a list of holiday shopping tips.

A new World Wide Web site that officially opened Dec. 8 provides this information right at your fingertips.

U.S. Consumer Gateway, located at www.consumer.gov, is a new way for consumers to access federal agencies. The site, which Project Director Don Elder says has been quite successful, is formatted like an index.

Information seekers can search topic headings to find out what government agencies to contact for information, instead of looking at individual agency sites, he said.

"It's one-stop shopping," Elder said.

Before the site, consumers would have had to try to find information by contacting many different agencies, he said. Now, visitors to the site can search by topic instead of agency, Elder added.

Topics on the site include Food, Health, Your Money, Product Safety, Transportation, as well as others, according to a Federal Trade Commission news release. Each topic has its own subject areas that are updated daily, Elder said.

And next time consumers receive a call from someone promising them a way to make money by investing in a scheme, they can check the Scam Alert! section of the site, which warns of the latest scams.

Another heading students may find interesting is Buying Smart, which posts shopping tips, consumer complaint agencies and information on credit. From here, consumers can use the site to access the address, phone numbers, and Web addresses of agencies related to the subject.

Sonia Chung (senior-German) said she thought the site could be of use to many students, especially those who use the Internet.

"I like it being on the Internet," she said. "If you have a question at midnight, you can find the answer you need."

Chung said she would use the site to find out nutrition and tax information and had suggestions for additions.

"If they had anything on education and student loans, more students would use it," she said.

Although the site has been officially opened for a little more than a month, Elder said more and more people are utilizing it.

"In November we had 12 to 15,000 hits and that was without publicity," he said. "In December, the site had 775,000 hits."

The Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection led the development of the site and the FTC will maintain it, according to the news release. The site will constantly be changing, he said, adding that he is working on getting the site to link users to other sites that can help them find the information they need.

"We will probably always regard it as a work in progress," he said.