Online Shopping Safety Tips for Mums

Online Shopping Safety Tips for Mums

No doubt women are often the main decision makers when it comes to household purchases. The convenience of online shopping and the easiness of finding the best money-saving deals makes the web a great shopping place for busy mums. According to Nielsen Online study women aged between 25 and 54 with at least one child represent almost one fifth of the active online population. The Internet offers a world of fun and a huge variety of interesting goods, but it’s important to be careful when making an internet purchase. You need to protect yourself and your sensitive information. It’s easy to do, as long as you follow these simple tips.

1. Be sure you know whom you’re purchasing from. If it’s not a well-known e-commerce site, like Amazon or eBay, do a little searching around the web to make sure you’re dealing with a legitimate company. A simple web search will turn up any reports of scams, so if you’re dealing with a company for the first time, take the extra ten minutes to do a swift background check.

2. When entering personal information, make sure it’s through a secure site. Websites should always include several markers to indicate that you’re on a secure site, and your credit card information will not be intercepted, so check for icons/security certificates from organizations like TRUSTe and BBBOnline, or look for a locked padlock icon, which gives the same indication. Additionally, the URL of a secure site should start with https://.

3. Make sure you’re only providing necessary information. Anything beyond basic shipping and billing details is unnecessary, and will likely lead to phone calls, emails and mailings from marketers.

4. Always double check the terms of service you must agree to in order to complete a transaction. This will let you know what rights you’re giving the company with regard to your information.

5. Update your anti-virus software regularly. Most programs have a built in feature to check for updates and viruses. Make sure you’re running a check regularly and that your computer hasn’t contracted any viruses that could put your information at risk.

6. Keep track of your purchases. While this should apply to your offline purchases as well, particularly with internet transactions, take care to maintain records. Print out copies of invoices or receipts and keep track of shipping details, dates and fees. This will help you to track your purchases, and provide you with proof of purchase should anything go wrong.

It’s easy and fun to shop online. Just follow these tips, be careful, and remember, if a website does not look legitimate, it’s probably not. No matter how much you want the goods, it’s not worth compromising your privacy!

Post by Mary Johnson from Nigerian free classified ads website TradeStable.com.ng.