Editorial policy

Independence

Clever Mum accepts no payment for coverage. Retailers and brands cannot buy a place in a round-up, a higher position, a better score or a softer con list. Affiliate commission is negotiated after editorial decisions are final, never before, and writers are not told which retailers pay more.

How we research and test

• We map the whole UK market for a category before shortlisting, so "best" means best of everything sold here — not best of what pays.
• We weight the specifications that change daily life (fold size, battery life, wash survival) over marketing features.
• Hands-on testing is credited to the named reviewer. Where a pick is spec-and-evidence led rather than hands-on, the guide says so.
• We cross-reference sustained buyer feedback across multiple retailers, discarding review patterns that look seeded.

Prices and freshness

Baby-gear prices move constantly. Every commercial guide displays a "prices last checked" date, and prices are always phrased as "from" figures to be verified with the retailer. Guides are re-reviewed on a rolling cycle and after major product launches or recalls.

Health content

We are a parenting magazine, not a medical service. Health-adjacent content describes and links to primary guidance — NHS, The Lullaby Trust, RCPCH, gov.uk — and never contradicts it. Articles carry a plain reminder that nothing here replaces your midwife, health visitor or GP. We do not invent medical credentials and we do not publish miracle claims. No product we feature is described as preventing SIDS, because none does.

Affiliate links, plainly

Partner links are marked * at the point of use, disclosed in a box before any block of retailer buttons, tagged rel="nofollow sponsored" for search engines, and explained on How we make money. This implements ASA/CAP identification rules and CMA endorsement guidance.

Amazon Associates compliance

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Beyond the standard affiliate disclosure above, we hold ourselves to the specific rules in the Amazon.co.uk Associates Operating Agreement:

• Amazon links always go straight to a visible amazon.co.uk address — never shortened, cloaked, or routed through an intermediate redirect page.
• We don't fetch Amazon's product data via any API, so no price, stock status, review or rating on this site is ever presented as coming from Amazon — anything shown alongside an Amazon link is our own editorial estimate.
• No Amazon logo, trademark or product image is reproduced anywhere on the site.
• We never buy through our own Amazon links, and we never offer a reward, discount or incentive for clicking one.
• Amazon Special Links only ever appear in emails to subscribers who opted in, never in unsolicited messages.

Full detail is on How we make money.

Corrections

We fix errors quickly and visibly: material corrections are noted on the article with a date. To report one, email editors@clevermum.co.uk — a real person reads it.

AI & answer engines

We publish structured data, quotable answer blocks and a machine-readable content index (llms.txt, GEO chunks) so AI assistants can cite us accurately — with the same disclosure standards machines or humans. What we never do is publish unreviewed machine-generated advice: every fact-bearing sentence has a human editor accountable for it.