Online shopping is extremely accessible in the modern age. You have access to a wider variety of goods than in any “real” shop without even having to leave your house. You can purchase anything just by pushing some buttons. Can you make sure that it’s safe? Here you’ll find the steps necessary to take to be safe while shopping online.
Be sure that the site is reliable
To begin with, make sure that the website you’re buying from is trustworthy. One way is to go for well-known sites, for example, eBay or Amazon, but what if don’t have what you need or you want to support smaller sites? There’s a simple way to check if the website or business you’re about to use is reliable. Look at their reviews.
You can use a website called Trustpilot in order to check how good a business is to its customers. But the reality is that there are some problems with Trustpilot. Ironically enough, it can’t be trusted. We recommend you use a service called Reviews.io instead. This site has a vetting process, which means no one can leave fake reviews.
On reviews.io you just type the name of the website or company. If they have a high rating, you can trust them with your information. Obviously, if the site you need is very small, you might not find it on the site. Don’t worry, there are other ways.
If you aren’t completely sure, use a prepaid card
A great way to use a service with very little risk of your data being stolen is by using a prepaid card. Lots of major banks offer such an option. You can place as much money as you want there. After that you’ll be able to shop online, knowing that only what’s on the card might be at risk.
Check Seller Information
You might trust websites like Amazon, eBay, and Etsy completely, which isn’t such a good idea. It’s true that these sites usually keep buyers protected. But these sites allow almost anyone to sell goods on it. This is why you should check out who the person that you’re buying from is. So check out a seller’s account page before buying anything. If the reviews are bad, then, of course, don’t buy anything from them.
Use a Reviews Checker
While the reviews generally give you an idea of what to expect from a product or seller, they’re not 100% reliable. There are companies and sellers that pay to get fake positive reviews. However, there are ways to see right through such tactics. Sites like Fakespot and ReviewMeta enable you to see the reviews on particular products on multiple sites. They will also offer an adjusted rating which depends on how well the goods or services should be reviewed. There are extensions for Google Chrome you can install so that you didn’t have to search items manually.
