What the grades mean.
Applied the same way every time, to every company, including ours.
The named client confirmed the facts, supporting documents were checked, and payment records confirm the relationship and how long it has run.
The named client confirmed the facts, and supporting documents such as contracts or statements of work were checked.
The named client confirmed the facts from a company email address. No supporting documents were provided, and the record says so plainly.
A grade certifies exactly what was verified, and nothing beside it. Relationship evidence — contracts, payment history, tenure — grades the relationship. An outcome figure is graded on its own line, by its own evidence and method, and is never upgraded by the strength of the relationship around it: a claim of "revenue grew 42%" beside a Fully Verified two year relationship is still only Client Confirmed on the number unless the number itself was evidenced. Where a record mixes the two, each part shows its own grade.
Free pilots, pro bono engagements and commercial partnerships are recordable. The facts are real and the client's confirmation carries the same weight. Two rules apply: the record must state the nature of the relationship plainly (a free sprint reads as a free sprint, a partnership as a partnership), and because Fully Verified exists to prove a paid relationship that endured, unpaid work grades at Evidence Verified or Client Confirmed. A record that let free work read as paid client work would be the register lying by omission.
A countersigner may add one sentence in their own words. It is shown apart from the verified facts and marked as their words, never as a finding of the register. The register writes none of it, offers no templates, and may decline a sentence that asserts facts not on the record or makes outcome claims. The sentence is optional in both directions: clients are never required to write one, and records carry no penalty for its absence.
"They took over a migration two previous suppliers had failed to land, and it has run without incident since."
Describes the relationship, consistent with the record
"Straightforward to work with, and the leads were genuinely qualified."
Opinion, clearly the client's — allowed
"We renewed without going to tender."
Their own decision, told in their words
"They tripled our revenue in six months."
Outcome figure — publishable only as a verified claim with method
"They also run our operations in Germany and France."
Asserts facts not on the record — put them on the record instead
"The best agency in the UK."
A market wide superlative is a claim about every other supplier, not this work
Where a claim contains an outcome figure, the figure is always and only the client's confirmation, with the method stated. Grades above Client Confirmed apply to the relationship and engagement facts, never to outcome figures, and every such claim says so on its face.
A record may carry value statements: what the engagement generated, saved, or optimized for the client, in time, money, or risk. These are written by the confirming client, never by the vendor and never by the register, are optional, and are treated as outcome figures under the rule above.
- Facts only. Opinions, ratings and reviews are never recorded.
- Nothing publishes unless the named client confirms it.
- Results claims publish only with the method shown: what was measured, over what period, against what baseline. No method, no publication.
- Nothing negative is ever recorded about anyone.
- Evidence is read, graded, then deleted. Client documents are never stored: the register keeps only a digital fingerprint of each file and the facts that were checked, so what was verified can be evidenced later without the document.
- Records are permanent. A verified historical record is never edited, hidden or removed, whatever the vendor's later relationship with the register. Its status is always shown honestly: current, corrected, or not reconfirmed. Nobody can pay this register to rewrite history.
- Claims are rejected where the client will not confirm or the facts do not match the evidence. Rejection figures are published quarterly.