Frugal Intuition

Internet shopping can be a wonderful thing.  As someone who absolutely hates the mobs  hustle and bustle related to holiday shopping, I consider it a lifesaver.  You will not find me up at 4 in the morning standing outside some store in the cold on Black Friday.  No siree.  The more I can avoid the crowds when shopping, the better.  And, of course, online you have the world at your fingertips.  You can do price comparisons at multiple merchants with only a few strokes of your keyboard and clicks of your mouse.  The internet truly offers the best in comparison shopping.  This is a great tool for the shopping savvy and allows you to save beaucoup bucks if you do it right.

It’s just so convenient.

But there is one particular aspect of online shopping that irritates me to no end.  It is the bane of impulse shoppers everywhere.

1-click ordering.

Merchants across the internet have this capability.  If you’ve ordered from them before and they have your credit/debit card information on file, as well as your address, you can go from browse to bought in the time it takes a web page to load.

This is very very bad.

Why?

One-click ordering removes your time to think about the purchase.  For impulse shoppers, this is very very very bad.  Because one of the biggest keys to overcoming the impulse to buy is having time to think about it.  One-click ordering takes out all the middle steps of adding to your cart, reviewing your cart, entering your payment information and your shipping info.  In theory, if you click on it and the order is placed, you should have time to cancel it before it gets processed–IF you go right then to take care of it.  But most people don’t.  They’re still cruising on that high of “oooo, I bought stuff” (because, come on, admit it–you love shopping).  It isn’t until down the line when you’ve already received the purchase and then your credit card bill comes in that the buyer’s remorse starts to set in.

And then there’s the issue of accidental clickage.  Have you ever noticed that on Amazon, the 1-click purchasing button is right by the Add To Wishlist button?   My husband has “accidentally” ordered several things over the years because he “accidentally” clicked the button and didn’t realize it in time to cancel the order before it processed.  You notice my skepticism about this…but I’m not going to go there.

Well if I order something accidentally, I can just return it.  No harm, no foul, right?

Wrong.

These days more and more companies are charging a “restocking” fee.  They don’t want their products back.  Companies are not in the market for customer service.  They’re out there to make a profit.  If you need to return a purchase you “accidentally” made or even one that you legitimately need to return (such as ordering clothes that turned out not to fit properly), you will not only likely get hit with the cost of return shipping, but you may get hit with a restocking fee of up to 20%.  And if you make the mistake of sending your product back via an untrackable shipping method, there are some companies out there who will claim you never sent it back and you won’t get your refund at all (which brings up the issue of follow up, but I’ll tackle that in a future post).  There are also some companies out there where there is no return policy.  Many times clearance items cannot be returned.

So what am I supposed to do?

Most vendors have a place in your account settings to turn off 1-click ordering.  By all means do this.  But what I find is even better?  Don’t save your card information to that vendor website.  Yes, that means you have to re-enter your address and payment information for every purchase, which is a PITA and takes more time, but the name of the game is becoming AWARE of your spending habits.  If you jump through all those hoops every time you buy, you’re more likely to actually think about the purchase and, hopefully, will make a smart and conscious decision about whether or not to buy it.

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