Since certification increases the number of service providers, consumers would have more choices than ever. Certification promotes consumer confidence and encourages expansion. Bottled water, for example, successfully competes with the tap water supplied by many local municipalities. Many consumers are dissatisfied with the taste of water that they get from public utilities or object to the health hazards of added chlorine or fluoride. Vendors obtain third-party inspections to certify that their bottled product is superior to tap water or that supplied by the competition.
Reports are usually available on request so that consumers can comparison shop.
If we woke up tomorrow to find ourselves in a libertarian world, we'd find a great deal of consumer protection already in place via voluntary certification. Of course, if we wake up tomorrow to the status quo, we need to be very wary of compulsory government licensing.