Joy of Christmas

The benefits of doing your Christmas shopping online are obvious: no traipsing around stores, no waiting for the bus and no crowds.

But now Which? has confirmed that shopping online can also save you money. The consumer group surfed the internet for the best deals on Christmas presents and compared them with prices on the high street. The research found that online shoppers can save more than £1,000 on a shopping list of five popular items and achieve savings of up to 29 per cent on televisions and 23 per cent on hi-fi music systems.

The Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG) expects online Christmas spending to smash the £10 billion mark for the first time this year. Average online spending for presents is expected to increase by 57 per cent this year, to £376 for women and £365 for men.

Jason Lloyd, of Moneysupermarket. com, the price comparison website, says that the rapid take-up of broadband in people’s homes has helped to fuel the increase in online shopping. However, he advises people shopping online for Christmas presents to plan ahead in the same way that they would on the high street.

Mr Lloyd says: “Create a list of things you want to buy to prevent you from window shopping online. And to save time when shopping, visit a number of comparison sites to make sure you find the best deals. Also be aware of the delivery times. For some presents it could take up to 28 days.”

To compare prices, online shopping robots, or “shopbots”, search thousands of online retailers to come up with a table of the best prices for your chosen product. Then you simply click through to the retailer’s website, buy direct from the retailer and have the purchase delivered to your door.

There are plenty of shopbots to choose from. Kelkoo.co.uk, Shopping. com and Pricerunner.co.uk are generally regarded as the main players for searching all products. However, it can be worth searching all three because each of them lists differing numbers of products from various retailers. Other shopbots specialise in certain products, such as Bookbrain. co.uk for books and cdscan.co.uk for CDs and DVDs.

“Shopbots tend to have commercial relationships with most of the shops they list,” says Martin Lewis, of MoneySavingExpert.com. “So if you click through to a retailer, it is likely that the shopbot website will either be paid per click or via a small percentage of whatever is purchased.

“This is not a problem, provided that the results are presented fairly, without bias and do not add anything to the price you pay. However, it does mean that each shopbot may cover a different range of retailers.”

A quick trip to the nearest high street shows the savings that can be made on the internet. An Xbox360 core system console costs £249.99 in Woolworths, but a Kelkoo search reveals that the same console can be bought for £179.99 at Laskys.com, a saving of £70. In Woolworths a Dirty Dancing Twentieth Anniversary DVD costs £14.99, but cdscan.co.uk lists a number of sites, including Play.com and HMV.com, that sell this DVD for £12.99 with free delivery.

When using a shopbot or online retailer remember to take postage and other costs into account. If you are buying a washing machine, for example, some high street stores take your old one away and install the new one. So if you are buying online, check that you will receive a comparable service.

As well as finding online bargains, shoppers can earn a cashback on the money they spend by using sites such as giveortake.com, quidco.com and topcashback.co.uk. These sites earn commission on users’ online purchases when they click through to partner sites. They pass that commission back to users in the form of rebates or cashback payments. So once you have found an online bargain, it is worth checking if these sites will give a cashback on your purchase.

Which? recommends that shoppers take a few precautions to avoid being ripped off on the internet. It suggests that you look for a customer services number and postal address on the site and call to check delivery times and costs. If you buy a product that costs more than £100, use a credit card because it offers more protection than a debit card.

Use a secure website to enter your card information. Look for a padlock symbol in the bottom right-hand corner of the browser window and check that the website address begins with “https://”.

Look for a physical address and telephone contact details.

Check the seller’s privacy and returns policy.

Click on the padlock to check that the seller is who it says it is and that its certificate is current and registered to the right address.

Sign up to MasterCard SecureCode or Verified by Visa. These are secure payment systems developed by Visa and MasterCard for safer online transactions. When registering for these services a cardholder chooses a private password for use when making a purchase using their card over the internet with a participating retailer.

Never reveal your Verified by Visa or MasterCard SecureCode password to anyone else.

Bree Hackel, left, does all her shopping online, from groceries to Christmas presents.

The 24-year-old business development executive from Fulham says: “Online shopping is easy and I can do it in my lunch break. It is also easier to send presents to my family in Australia. I can order a gift from a website, choose a card and wrapping paper and they will deliver it.

“When I buy things for myself, I normally have them delivered to my workplace. They generally take a few days to arrive and I have not had any problems with items not turning up. Most of the stores have pretty good returns policies.”

Miss Hackel usually searches a number of websites for the cheapest price before making a purchase and also uses the product search facility on Google to find what she wants. Her favourite shopping sites are HMV, the fashion store ASOS, Tiffanys for jewellery and Topshop.

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