Who Are You Buying From? - Who Are You Dealing With Online?
Most of us have probably bought goods on the internet. Amazon is undoubtedly a popular favourite and every high street retailer now has a web presence.
But if you're looking to buy something a bit more specialised, you may have to look further afield. So how do you know if the company you are about to deal with is legitimate or not? And even if they are, how do you know if your money will be protected and the goods safely delivered?
Unfortunately, we don't have all the answers but there are a few simple checks you can do before clicking on the 'Buy Now With PayPal button'. (Click here to see why PayPal is not always a good idea.)
Friendly advice
However, before you do that, you could check online forums and Google the company's name to read other buyers' opinions of the company. They say there's no recommendation like that of a friend and this is a good way to discover recommendations.
If you don't have the time, or possibly the inclination for forum browsing, or if you can find no references to the company online, there are some simple checks you can easily do yourself that will take only a few minutes.
What you want to establish is:
- Where in the world is the company located
- How can you contact them
- What methods of payment do they offer
First stop is the company's About Us and Contact Us pages. Between them, they should give you the company's address, telephone number and email address.
Unfortunately, many sites simply don't give you this information. Even so-called reputable companies may not put their number on the site or else hide it among some small print (stand up PayPal). What's more, an increasing number of companies use premium rate telephone numbers to dissuade contact!
In addition, many companies do not put their email contact address on the web and use instead an email submission form. Most of these are easy to use but some require you to register first, an added hassle you could probably do without.
Now, if you come across a website and it has no address, phone number or email, is this a company you really want to deal with?
Who's That?
If the company is not based in your native country, you can often tell by the pidgin English on the site, particularly if the company is based in the far east.
If you want to check further, you can look up the domain registration using one of these sites:
whois.domaintools.com/
www.who.is/
www.dnsstuff.com/
This should tell you the name of the registrant, their registered address, the type of registration (individual or business), the date it was registered and the date of the renewal.
But beware. Many far eastern companies will register a .co.uk domain, for example, to give the impression that they are based in the UK. Even if the domain has a UK registration address, it doesn't mean that the company exists in the UK.
Check the registration date and expiry date. If the domain is newly registered, the company may not have been going very long.
If the domain has only been registered for a year instead of two years or longer, what does that suggest about its long-term plans?
Depending on which whois service you use, you may also discover the email address of the administrative contact, which will likely be the registrant.
Although these checks aren't foolproof one way or another, they only take a few minutes to do and may well provide the information you need to make a decision about whether or not you want to deal with the company.
Although buying over the internet gives you a far greater choice, and often price advantage, over walking the high street, you need to be on your guard and make sure you are dealing with reputable companies.
