Buying on the Net

Deepu(Deepug) is the best person to ask about this.
he has a lot of experience in this.
He says he has ordered many thousands of rupees worth stuff online thru ebay.
Cheers,
Ben

will do
Thanks
Purnendu

Hi,

Very interesting thread this and I also would like to have some information ....

Aniruddha.

I have not bought anything internationally. but so far i have bought an mp3 player(just a week back) on bazee(ebay.in) and have sold a Palm PDA on the same portal.
both transactions have been very smooth with absolutely no problems.
Just don't forget to verify the buyer's credentials and pay in a way in which u can claim buyer's protection scheme(in case anything goes wrong..and it is advisable to get it insured for international orders).
Cheers,
Sachi

Hi All,

I have virtually bought everything off the net ( furniture, audio equipment, household appliances etc...) as there is about a 20% to 30% difference between the net prices & the store prices. Only that I live in the US & therefore the laws are different then that of India.

I am taking the liberty of presenting the do & don'ts I follow while purchasing off the net.

Firstly I do a Google search to find out as much as I can about the specifications & applications about any particular product.

Then I evaluate it against my requirements

Then I find out what others have to say in reviews about that particular product...the good the bad & the ugly.

After I have taken an informed decision I then do a comparative search as to the various sites that offer that item. For Computer parts www.pricewatch.com is a good site to get competitive quotes. For Audio http://www.audioreviews.com/ is a good site for reviews.

After I have selected a couple of sites I then narrow down the selection. Normally sites who don't provide a physical address & telephone numbers need to be shyed away from. In case you run into a problem with no contact details you are in a vulnerable position. Care also needs to be taken about the "status" of the product. Normally the products ( computers parts in particular) are categorized into refurbished (read repaired) OEM ( Original Equipment Manufacturer....read bare bones without any frills) Retail (what one would get in a shop) the prices fluctuate accordingly.

With experience I now have identified the most reliable vendors additionally I go in for the OEM products because they give the best value for money. Also experience has taught me never to go for the lowest price....you know the saying "You pay peanuts you get monkeys !!"

I purchase only from site with an "https" on the payment page instead of only "http" on the payment site. Also I turn on all my security Zone Labs, Microsoft Anti Spyware, Pest Patrol, Norton, Counter Spy, Ad-Aware Pro, Spybot, Microsoft Firewall, while shopping ( paranoid...perhaps I am ....but I better be safe then sorry) I also regularly do a key logger & shield 's Up test to ensure that I am 100% secure everytime all the time.

I have found Visa to be the most reliable card, because they offer the greatest protection of your monies. You need protection at all times while dealing on the net. With Visa should you be overcharged...very rarely it has happened to me...you get an immediate credit of the overcharged amount while Visa conducts an investigation on the overcharge. In some case while I have returned the goods & haven't received a refund after 15 days if I approach Visa they again credit the amount first while conducting their investigations......there are other instances too...I would be happy to get into should there be an interest to know more about card protection and things to do if there is a card number theft... been there before & don't want anyone to go there, but in case anyone does with a little bit of application at the initial stages you could get through unscathed.

I give only a yahoo e-mail address not my service provider address to prevent spamming..... a lot of companies sell your e-mail ID to advertising companies and the last thing you want is to have you inbox full of spam

Also by & large I don't keep my card details on the sites files. You really don't know how secure they are

I keep all receipts for reference and also if proof of purchase needs to be provided to any agency that requires the same.

If one follows the above, they wouldn't fall in the pits that I have fallen in the past.

But this is all in the US, for India it is a different kettle of fish all together....hopefully if things go the way they are being planned by the Distributors of audio equipment in India, we might see a revolution happening on the internet.

I hope the above helps someone sometime.

Thanks,

Regards,

Junia.

Hey Junia,
wow, that was extremely helpful.
i will be appying for my GRE exams in a couple of day and this is going to help me a lot since am going the online registration way.
Cheers,
Sachi

Thanks for the information, Junia.That will surely help many of us...

Aniruddha.

Hi folks,
It's almost six months since the last post in this trail. Has anyone bought anything in this period, especially on ebay from outside India ? I dont yet know how one can make payments for outside stuff. The govt. does not allow it from what I know, or am I wrong. I had wanted to bid for a tonearm, but could not figure out how to send the money through proper channel. Ofcourse one can always ask someone living outside to pay for it. But that is asking for a favour and not really a solution. If anyone has actually bought something, do share the modus operandi with us.
Purnendu

On good way is Paypal, have been using this for the past couple of years. I think there is an option for India also there.

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_registration-run

That way u use a credit card, but it is safe as Paypal manages the payments