How to Make Sure You Get The Best Bargains, The Hottest Deals, And Avoid Getting Conned When Buying

The Internet has become a popular place for people to buy (and sell) goods. It has its pros and cons compared to more traditional retail outlets like high street shops.

 

One of its biggest advantages for buyers is that it makes comparing prices easy - you can compare dozens of retailers very quickly. You can also see other people's opinions of the product you're considering to find out if it really as good as the manufacturer's blurb makes it sound.

 

At the moment, many retailers are running January sales, getting rid of surplus stock from last year by selling it at discounted prices, to make way for this year's range. There's lots of bargains to be had, but there's also some things you should know if you want to avoid getting ripped-off.

1. SALE! Up To 70% Off!
There's definitely bargains to be had, but when you see a sale with huge percent reductions you need to exercise a degree of caution - sometimes a sale that appears too good to be true really is too good to be true.

 

There's a couple of tricks retailers sometimes use to lure you in - here's two of them:

 

1 - "Up to 70% Off!" - slogans like this have to be true (there'll be laws to prevent untrue claims being made) but they can be misleading - a retailer only needs to put a few products on sale with such a massive discount, possibly even just one product, to make this claim.

 

They could put a few unpopular items into the sale with 70% off, but only give maybe 10% off the items they expect many people will actually buy. The big discount number on the sale poster draws you in, but it might only apply to a very small number of products, which may well be products that very few people will want.

 

2 - some retailers use a rather sneaky tactic. They sell an inferior product at a very expensive price - more than they sell better-specced alternatives for. They offer it at an inflated and unrealistic price for a while (usually not much more than the legal minimum) purely in order to be able to make "massive discount!" claims when they eventually drop the price down to a more realistic level in a sale.

 

Let's use Blu Ray players as an example. One leading UK retailer offered a very low-spec Blu Ray player for £200, whilst at the same time selling mid-range Blu Ray players for much less, around £175, and other low-spec Blu Ray players for ~£100.

 

Why would anyone want to buy a low-spec Blu Ray player when the very same retailer is selling better spec ones for less money, or similarly specced ones for a lot less? They wouldn't - and the retailer wouldn't expect them to (although if a few chumps did buy it, the retailer wouldn't mind one bit!). That product was on sale at that high price purely so that, when the January sales began, the retailer could suddenly drop the price and get a nice big reduction to show on their sales advertising.

 

And that is exactly what they did - after Christmas they dropped the price to £99 (putting it at around the price they'd been charging for similarly specced machines the whole time anyway) but they could now put an eye-catching "50% off!" logo next to it, and not only that but they could also say "up to 50% off in our electricals sale!". And all without reducing the price of anything much below what they'd usually sell it for!

 

This is a sneaky and arguably dishonest tactic, but one it is difficult or impossible to legislate against because the claims they make are true (albeit probably misleading).

 

Awareness of this tactic is the first step towards avoiding being ripped off with the lure of big discounts.

 

One way to try and uncover this kind of non-bargain is to work out the original price - if they are saying "50% off" then work out the original price.... and then compare the product to other products at that price.

 

If it is of similar spec, then you've probably got yourself a bargain.

If it is mysteriously under-specced compared to rival products at the original price then chances are you're being conned. It might still be a reasonable price, but it isn't really the massively discounted bargain it is being presented as.

2. Go Compare!
Outside in the highstreet, especially when it is icy and cold, it can be difficult to compare prices. Maybe the store you happen to be in is charging a lot more for the item you want to buy, but will you take a 15 minute walk to a rival store to see if they have it cheaper? In the cold, and when the rival store might turn out to be more expensive anyway? Probably not, unless its a really expensive item where a 10% price difference would actually be a large amount of money.

 

But online, checking other retailers is just a matter of a few mouseclicks - so it is well worth doing. Check the price of the item from all the main online retailers and see which one is offering the best deal. It only takes a few moments and is will worth the effort.

Make sure you make your decision based on the actual price you'd pay, taking into account any taxes or delivery charges involved.

 

Price comparison sites can be a handy way to check the prices on large numbers of sites extremely quickly and find yourself a bargain - but do maintain a degree of caution with these as sometimes they get commission and don't link you through to the best deals, so always check out the sites of the top couple of retailers directly.

3. Read the Reviews
Manufacturers and retailers have their commercial interests to think about, so take their claims about how wonderful their product is with a large pinch of salt.

 

While they can't lie about the specs of their products, they can use flowery language to make them sound better than they are. Find out what people who've used the product actually think of it by reading user reviews.

 

Read the reviews on the site you're planning to buy from, but also copy the product's name and model number and look it up on other sites or on Google and read the reviews there too.

 

Manufacturers may get their employees to give their products glowing reviews, so try and read a selection of reviews before making a decision about which product to go for.

 

Once you know which product you're going for, use the tips above to make sure you get it from the retailer offering the best deal.

Overall, there's lots of bargains to be had - but finding them isn't always as easy as the "Massive Sale! Huge discounts!" adverts would have you believe.

 

Use the tips here and hopefully you'll avoid the rip-offs and deception and get the best bang for your buck!