Online shopping is here to stay. With more and people joining the legions of people who have been at it, the said industry is not only booming but its changing the spending and purchasing power consumers world wide.
Everything is sold online. From clothes and accessories, to patio furniture covers and even outdoor furniture themselves – every product imaginable is probably housed in an online shop or two. The rise of this new age shopping is not with a price tag. Over the years, many have been victims of online fraud. Credit card numbers of shoppers were collected and used inappropriately in some instances.
Aside from the convenience that online shopping may offer, it is always be best factor in safety of transactions and the quality of buying experience. Though these are both difficult to find in a virtual platform, there is no doubt you can find it – you just have to know where to look. And it’s definitely in here.
Scroll down further to find practical tips on how to shop online safely.
- Only trust a trusted site
There are only two types of websites in the World Wide Web – the unsecured and the secured. From the sound of it, you’d definitely want to use the latter one for online transactions that involve money. Secured sites generally use SSL (secure sockets layer) to encrypt transactions. The easiest way to find out if a website is encrypted is through its URL. Secured sites make use of an https:// instead of a regular one without the “s”. Also, the presence of a padlock icon is another safety sign.
- Satisfaction customer ratings are your best friend
This is very important if you are a first time visitor to a site. If you do not have a family or a friend who has tried that website before, comments that provide feedback about the site will be most helpful to you. Having satisfied and repeat customers are great indication that the site is trustworthy. A little research about the company or the site can save you from a lot of possible headaches caused by preventable mistakes in the long run.
- Don’t be too generous with information
No seller needs your birthday and social security number to complete any purchase. If these types of personal information are requested of you even if you are only making small purchases, then it should raise a red flag. The site might be maintained by scammers. Giving out your birthday might seem harmless but remember this – it’s one of the four basic must-haves for any scammer to steal your identity and conduct transactions on your behalf.
- Get to know the site’s policies and guidelines for purchases and privacy settings
Many people are guilty of not reading the fine print, me included. And I know you most probably are too. Going through this tedious step can save you from that oh so shocking moment when you get a ballooned bill with sky high shipping charges. Knowing privacy policies are important as well. With the rise of a more intelligent breed of marketers, companies often feed them our personal information, buying preference and among other important data to market research companies. Telemarketers and spammers can get their hands on this valuable information too and might run after you. Maintaining an email account to be used for shopping purposes is a great idea as well to keep your personal email free of junk.
- Choose credit card
This may seem like a crazy tip, but trust me – you’ll want to use the plastic when you go shopping online. Credit cards better protected under the law against fraud. Debit cards and paying in cash may help you in blowing off your budget but credit cards can help you sleep better at night knowing that you’re not doing a shopping in another part of the planet.
- Clean as you go
This last tip is especially important when you are using public computers to carry out the purchase. Make sure to log-out of the site and delete the browsing history to avoid tracing your actions online.
That’s it! Those are the only things you’ll need to remember when purchasing online.
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