Getting accurate, reliable answers to these kinds of questions is the name of the game if you want to be a smart consumer. Being informed is especially important if you're shopping for a big-ticket item like a house or a car, or when there is a risk to your financial security or safety.

Until now it has not been easy to get answers to all of these questions in one place. Now you can go to the Canadian Consumer Information Gateway, at http://ConsumerInformation.ca.

The site contains clear, concise consumer information from nearly 300 departments and agencies of federal, provincial and territorial governments in Canada. It is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It's the Canadian consumers' ally on the Web, helping you to protect yourself and become a more confident and more effective consumer.

The site is easy to navigate as it has both a powerful search engine and a menu of familiar topics to help you. You'll also find useful help files to answer your navigation questions on-line. If after your search you still need more information, the site lists e-mail addresses and phone numbers for a host of partners' and province-specific, consumer-focused organizations.