How to Maximize Your Savings when Buying Online
Buying online is now the norm when people are encouraged to stay at home. From essential groceries to needs and wants, you have plenty of options when you are online. It’s not always easy to assess whether you really are saving on your purchases online or not, but if there’s one thing for certain, it’s that there are plenty of ways to cut down on the full price of your online purchase.
Here are some of the ways:
Use coupon aggregate sites
For the longest time, the advice has always been to apply coupons to your order upon checkout, but hunting them separately is not always a time-efficient idea. Imagine the frustration of looking for these coupon codes, only to realize they are not even valid anymore. Coupon aggregate sites do this for you now if you add the extension to your browser. They will alert you of the applicable coupon codes and even suggest the best deals.
Buy as much from the same website
Anyone who buys items online, whether it’s sun screen for acne prone skin or accessories for the home office, knows that shipping fees can be quite costly. You think you’re saving on the items you’ve purchased until you proceed to check out and see the final price with the shipping fees included. This is sometimes enough to make you want to rethink your purchase. Rather than succumbing to the high price of shipping, see if you can buy all your essentials on the same website and take advantage of free shipping vouchers, if any. If this is not available, consider if there are price reductions when you reach a certain amount. If this reduction is enough to cover the shipping expenses, you’re essentials getting that part for free.
Buy in batches if it’s cheaper
There is some math involved in the shipping fees of your purchase, so pay close attention to the price when you add each item. If adding a particularly heavy item means doubling the shipping fee, see if two batches will have a lower shipping fee for each. This will depend on the policies of the online store you’re buying from, so one site might compute the shipping fee of a huge order differently. Always be observant of the shipping costs before clicking that buy button.
Ask your friends or neighbors to split the bill
If you’re interested in one particular product but the cost of shipping is too much, see if someone else in your area is also interested. For light items, the shipping fee might be the same if you purchase two or more of the same product. This means you only pay for a fraction of the fee while your friend or neighbor pays for their share. You can also consider buying in bulk if it’s an item you can give away as a gift, in which case the cost you pay for now will be your savings during the holiday season.
Online shopping is part of the next normal, but that doesn’t mean you have to pay full price for everything. Find ways to save wherever you can.
