Is buying online a bit of a 'con' ?

[druid]

Just wondered about the experiences of members here re buying goods online!
We are led to understand that it is much cheaper to buy online yet I have found in a lot of cases that it is sometimes as cheap or even cheaper to buy locally instead, my main interest at the moment concerns buying books online, I have been looking for books on Photoshop 5.5 and am very disappointed to find that in many cases the major online book traders are charging the full retail price plus post and packing! One of the books I was looking for is Adobe Photoshop 5.5 classroom in a book, retail price £34.99 which is the price most online book shops are selling it for and apart from Streets on line are also charging an extra £2.50-£3.50 P&P, other computer books I have looked for are a couple of quid off but extra for P&P, which kind of defeats the advantage of buying online!

I would be interested to hear other experiences of online shopping and can anyone suggest a genuine discount online bookshop, most seem to offer a few popular lines as a 'catch-all' and charge up for the rest.

John.

[onomatopoeia]

I tend to buy several books if I place an online order. My copy of DNS & BIND was considerably cheaper from Amazon and would have been even if it had been a single item.

[Magnum malum]

I buy everything I possibly can online (I hate shopping) and I think I have saved many thousands of pounds. The profit margin on books isn't large so the savings won't be great unless it is on special offer.

[silvergrandee]

So far this year we've bought an electric cooker online which saved some £240 off the RRP, various small electronic gadgets such as a digital camcorder & a couple of digital stills cameras, all of which were around 30% -40% less than the RRP even allowing for P&P. This morning a carrier brought a mains adapter for one of the cameras - still about 25% cheaper than our nearest store @ 80+ miles away. I also buy bedding (sheets etc.) online, bought the car insurance on Sunday....it goes on and on. No regrets & no disappointments. The only books we buy are dog-related & they come from Amazon, which managed to get a new audio CD here today after ordering it last Sat. night. It's generally a simple case of fishing around till you get the cheapest price for what you want.....the new washer/dryer bought online should be here soon, saving about £150.

Dee

[Bluetack]

i just ordered an Epson 680 for 49 quid! seem good value to me!

[Synergy Blades]

John (druid; so many Johns!) - the classroom in a book series appeared on Adobe's site, for free, a month or so ago - don't know if they're still there but I did go through them when they were up.
Buying online is great because some books I've ordered, I wouldn't have been able to get through stores.

[druid]

I had a look at Adobe, but I couldn't see the series there now, I feel that £34.99 is quite a lot for this book and so far I haven't ordered it.
It is right what you say, it is not easy to get some books locally and it is easier to order them online.

Mag, I am not sure about low profit on books, I often buy a book at high price only to find about 12 months later they are offered in Book sale at a massive discount, for example I bought CorelDraw 9 from Waterstones at £32.99 and for the last few months Book sale have had a stack of them at £9.99! Someone must be making a few 'bob'


John.

[pudds]

The search engine here http://www.price-guide.co.uk/books.htm is useful.
Best price i've found is £32.49 inc. P&P at http://www.swotbooks.com/webapp/commerce/command/ExecMacro/Swot_Books/macros/SwotPriceSearch.d2w/report?searchon=ISBN&bookisbn=020165895X
Have you looked in the newsgroups?
There are sometimes ebook versions floating around.
Search for ebook,e-book and emanual in your list of newsgroups.

[pudds]

Forget that. You can get the lot from
http://www.adobe.com/education/classroom/cib_photoshop55.html

[druid]

That's great, thanks Pudds, (and thanks Synergy for suggesting it) I do like to have a printed book as I don't like reading much from the screen, but at least I can D/l and see if it's worth the cash, I am busy D/l from Adobe now!

Pudds on another matter, I have tried twice to signup to your discussion forum, once as druid2uk and a second time as druid and although it accepts me and says that the password will be emailed to me I never receive the email? Any ideas?

John.

[squidgy]

I think that often it's a con. Yes, I have bought stuff on web before, but I think of it in much the same way as buying stuff over the phone. I have had stuff delivered to me, I have pre-ordered tickets for things and have also bought unlock keys for shareware software.

Mostly, though, I admit that for the retailer, it's about striking when the iron's hot. For that reason, if I want any sort of hardware or clothes or other physical commodity, I always check the local stores first, and the phone or web is a last resort. The only way to "strike when the iron is hot" for e-shopping and telesales for me is for things that can be used immediately without waiting for the postman or courier, for example, shareware software registration keys that you can use immediately. :)

(In fact I happen to work in a call centre, but I'd never dream of ordering the stuff that I'm supposed to sell over the phone, for precisely this reason .... you have to wait for the courier to come round!)

It's not so much about saving money, though, I decide in advance how much I'm prepared to pay for something, and if any retailer can beat it, I'm quite happy to pay more than the lowest price to have the product more quickly.

[druid]

Originally posted by pudds
The search engine here http://www.price-guide.co.uk/books.htm is useful.


Thanks for that too Pudds, just what I have been looking for! You can now go to the top of the class, LOL

John.

[Magnum malum]

I happily waited three weeks to save £1000 off the price of my TV
And I can wait a week to get a pair of Calvin Klein Jeans for £30 instead of £80. My copy of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire arrived at 8.30am on the day of release.

Oh yeah and Jungle once credited my account twice for £300 of wireless network cards that I sent back. I love online shopping:lol

[druid]

Don't get me wrong, I am not against buying online, in fact I would in some cases prefer it, but I feel that to encourage people to buy online then it has got to be cheaper or offer a much better deal than buying locally.
Just like Squidgy says, in a lot of cases it is no different to just ordering over the phone, some online sellers have just put their normal wares on the web and at the same prices as they sell in any other way.
If you buy something locally then it is generally much easier to sort out any problems than if you buy something on line, and for the that extra 'hassle' then the online seller must surely make an extra effort to encourage us to buy online. Sadly in the case of a lot of companies they think they can just 'shove' their goods online at the same price as they sell in their stores and we the 'mugs' will flock to buy them!
I would suggest that in the USA online buyers get a better deal!

John.

[Magnum malum]

Hey the web is global, get stuff from the States. I found your book for $36 in the States. And there is no import duty on books (the bane of buying anything else from overseas)

[druid]

Nick, have you bought books from the USA? I have in the past seen books on US sites that are not available here but I have so far been dubious (should that be scared) to order!

John.

[TheScotsman]

I agree that buying online is great.
Most recent purchase was Angela's Ashes by Frank Mccourt - I heard him on Desert Island Discs on Friday:lol , ordered it Saturday morning and it arrived on Monday - £4 plus postage.

I agree that if you want something instantly it is a pain to wait for delivery and also if there is no-one home for deliveries. We are fortunate that our neighbours are always home so take in the deliveries.

But how often are purchases needed instantly? Buying online saves so much time compared to going into the nearest town and trawling around the few relevant shops to compare prices. Sod's law says you have to go back to the first shop you started from cos it was the cheapest:lol

Take into account petrol costs, parking costs, refreshments costs (especially if you are taking children:D ), vehicle wear and tear, not to mention STRESS:lol , and the delivery charge seems quite cheap:lol

Must be time to order another music cd - now what was that site:lol :lol :lol

[druid]

Originally posted by TheScotsman


Must be time to order another music cd - now what was that site:lol :lol :lol

Well when you have found it let me know, because I have not found any good deals in buying cd's online either! Lol.

John.

[Magnum malum]

I hven't bought a book from the states, but I have bought DVD's (Pantom Menace on order:) and got the Matrix whilst it was still in the cinema here.

And clothes from Victoria Secret for the wife. Never had a problem even with returns.

[Magnum malum]

http://www.cd-wow.com/ for CD's. take a while to arrive but very cheap.

[Jill]

My CDs from CD-Wow didn't take long to arrive, especially considering they were post marked Hong Kong or something. But were genuine CDs with the Warner Brother's cellophane wrappers on. Excellent firm to do business with and no postage charges that I can recall :)

[TheScotsman]

Jill

As I posted a few weeks ago, cd-wow are excellent value and great if you collect Hng Kong stamps:lol

Just be careful to check the track listings before you order, cos they sell non-uk versions which sometimes have different tracks from the uk versions (the uk versions are often labelled Limited Edition, and may contain an extra couple of "bonus" tracks, or maybe even a new single may be added after the album's original release.

[squidgy]

Going back to what Magnum Malum says ... you say you saved £1000 on a TV, but to be honest I can't imagine myself spending over £1000 on a TV to start off with anyway!

But then again, since I happen to live only five minutes' walk away from a town-centre shopping area, petrol and parking charges aren't anything I have to worry about, unless I'm getting something really big like a sofa. I'll occasionally pay the £1.50 bus fare to go to the out of town shopping area though. :)

In fact, I reckon that's also the same reason that I don't see much point in satellite or cable TV, because there are video and DVD libraries within easy walking distance. Which is odd, because it only tends to be town centre locations that have cable TV anyway ... :p

But I certainly don't buy locally merely for a belief in market / employment protectionism ... I regularly hop the channel to buy my fags and booze! :D I firmly believe that if a trader who prices things too much can't cut it because of cheap import competition, then stuff them, they ought to get a proper job like the rest of us instead.

[pudds]

Pudds on another matter, I have tried twice to signup to your discussion forum, once as druid2uk and a second time as druid and although it accepts me and says that the password will be emailed to me I never receive the email? Any ideas?

Thanks for pointing that out. Furbs had that problem too but i couldn't find out what was wrong:(
Anyway it's sorted now and emails are being sent fine:) I've disabled that feature now anyway so that you haven't got to wait for a temporary password to be emailed to you :)
I've also upgraded to the latest version of ikonboard and fixed a few CHMOD errors on the cgi scripts.
Finally the board is now accesible from my domain www.pc-helper.net

Thanks for prodding me into action.:lol

[Furby]

I have bought a few things online without any trouble at all. Most recently bought 150 quidsworth of RAM from Crucial - ordered saturday morning - and on Monday morning at 7 o'clock postman was knocking on the door for a signature :lol

Bought thermal paste and case badges and a few other goodies from the overclocking store - ordered them early hours monday morning (around 2am) and they where here this morning with the first post too.

Bought some cd's and a static wrist strap from jungle on Monday - still waiting.

Bought around four-hundred quidsworth of PC stuff on Saturday from Redstore - not heard anything yet, mind you it does say 2 to 5 days delivery and there is quite a large monitor in that order so I suppose it is not something the postman can carry is it? I could have paid the extra and had next day delivery, but as this project has to wait until I come out of hospital there is no immediate rush although if they are not here before I go in hospital at the weekend, I will be on the phone first thing Saturday morning.

With the other three places, ALL sent me a confirmation email = ALL sent me an email as soon as the good where dispatched, infact I think the overclocking store sent me three in total and I only ordered 20 quidsworth of stuff.

With Redstore on the other hand - have heard absolutely nothing even though I spent a fortune (not my money BTW) all I have is a number to track the order that appeared after confirmation - no email, no nothing, and youw ould have thought they would have at least sent me a confirmation one!

I have also ordered a few things for christams last year and birthdays and never had a problem and I got all the stuff cheapoer than town too.

[elcid123]

Buying online can be just as much a risk as say mail-order or via the telephone. It will become far more prevalent in this technological age we live, but we must not be Luddites here! It is the physicality that people cannot come to terms with and find it disorientating and disconcerting.

[druid]

Thanks to Pudds & Synergy I have downloaded the whole of the book I wanted (photoshop 5.5 Classroom in a book series)in PDF format and tight though I am I have even pushed myself to print some of it out! All I need now are the exersize image files and I have the lot, Pity Adobe didn't have them for D/l too! LOL.

I must also say in case the peeps here think I am anti online trading, that I do order online and I must praise Streets online for their good service, I ordered a book from them on Monday at teatime and it arrived first thing this morning, I use their ezy buy option, one click and its done,

John.

http://www.alphabetstreet.infront.co.uk/

[Yump]

Originally posted by silvergrandee
So far this year we've bought an electric cooker online which saved some £240 off the RRP, various small electronic gadgets such as a digital camcorder & a couple of digital stills cameras, all of which were around 30% -40% less than the RRP even allowing for P&P. This morning a carrier brought a mains adapter for one of the cameras - still about 25% cheaper than our nearest store @ 80+ miles away. I also buy bedding (sheets etc.) online, bought the car insurance on Sunday....it goes on and on. No regrets & no disappointments. The only books we buy are dog-related & they come from Amazon, which managed to get a new audio CD here today after ordering it last Sat. night. It's generally a simple case of fishing around till you get the cheapest price for what you want.....the new washer/dryer bought online should be here soon, saving about £150.

Dee

Hey Dee - My house is up for sale, wanna buy it?
(May have some difficulties shipping tho' )