Ensuring the integrity of panel responses from commissioned web-based research

![CDATA[Recently, there has been a growth of research agencies offering researchers a suite of services such as scripting; hosting and access to potential respondent panels; delivery of data; coding and tabulation. These businesses offer the promise of data tailored and delivered to the researcher’s requirements in considerably less time than could be usually achieved by the researcher acting independently. This approach turns the researcher into a research manager needing to qualify agencies and their panels, specifying guidelines and monitoring the process. Given the scarcity of prior literature addressing the challenges arising from the use of such agencies, a four step process is outlined that can be used to try and restrict problems arising in panel recruitment and survey responses.]]