Black Friday has come and gone. Cyber Monday is history. Yet, online shopping continues in full force. Various reports suggest that online shopping has increased dramatically this year, likely due to the increasing usage of broadband connections in the home, and the draw of huge savings secretly located on the Internet if you can just find the right combination of coupon codes, discount websites, and wholesalers online. However, as always, when it comes to personal finance what you don’t know can hurt you. Make sure you understand all of the details regarding online shopping for bargains. Otherwise, you may get burned.

Amazon Makes Online Shopping OK

Not long ago, online shopping was the exclusive providence of very specific people, typically techies, and ultra-bargain shoppers who linked together in electronic discount finding groups reminiscent of the old coupon clubs. A few appearances on Oprah by folks like "Coupon Mom" helped drive online shopping and deal finding to the forefront of the American consciousness. But, what finally pushed online shopping over the edge from the wary, angst filled, activity it used to be to a common shopping method used by teenagers, little old ladies, and the technological inept alike was the legitimizing factor of Amazon.com.

When Amazon burst onto the scene a decade ago, it was a revolutionary idea. Selling books online meant that not only could Amazon offer deep discounts on books, but it could also stock many more titles than local booksellers could on their shelves. Even the big national chains like Barnes & Noble and Borders couldn’t compete with how many books Amazon sold. The offer to order a book for you began to pale by comparison. Instead of waiting for the bookstore’s regular shipment of books to include the book title you were looking for, you could order the same book from Amazon and have it delivered directly to your house right away.

For a while, books, were one of the things that was OK to purchase online. There were many things that made them safe. First, any book Amazon.com sells is exactly the same as the books on the shelves at Barnes and Noble. In other words, there is no concern about quality or some sort of bait and switch scam. Secondly, shipping costs were relatively low. The savings offered on the price of the book was larger than the cost of sending it in the mail, which meant a good deal, was still a good deal even with shipping. This was no small factor as online pet supply websites found out when it turned out no one was interested in buy 50 lb. bags of dog food online due to the ridiculous shipping costs. Finally, Amazon had good customer service. Products could be returned, and exchanged, and over time, the company became a household name, erasing the fear of giving out your credit card number online.

Once Amazon started selling products beyond books, the barriers were officially broken, and online shopping was a common thing among all groups of people.

Not All Shopping Websites Are Like Amazon

Unfortunately, this familiarization with online shopping via a retailer like Amazon has made many Americans let their guard down when it comes to buying online. It is important to remember that not all merchants are Amazon.com. In fact, precious few are. That means that you need to find out all the facts about who you are buying from FIRST before placing an order, no matter how great of deal it is.

Top Things To Know About Online Shopping Websites

1. Return Policy – Not just that they accept returns, but the details as well. Who pays for shipping? How long is the return period? If it is also a brick and mortar store, can you return items to the store? Is there a restocking fee? Most importantly, under what conditions can something be returned? Many sites allow returns, but only for defective items. That means if you don’t like it, or it isn’t what you thought it would be, then that is just too bad.
2. Shipping and Handling Charges – Even on Amazon.com you have to be careful of this one. Amazon lets anyone sell on their website. Unfortunately, it sorts prices based on the cost without shipping. That means that the vendor who sells for $9.99 plus $8.95 shipping is listed as cheaper than the vendor who sells for $12.99 plus $2.99 shipping.
3. Is It Really Amazon – Speaking of Amazon. The website doesn’t always make it easy to tell if you are buying a product from Amazon, or from some third-party using Amazon as a store front. It matters because they have very different return policies and shipping time frames.
4. Who Is It?  – Amazon isn’t the only website that makes it harder to see who you are actually doing business with. Don’t check out the main website to see if they are legitimate, check out the actual seller. There is a big difference between how legitimate eBay.com is and how legitimate one of its storefront sellers is.
5. Privacy Policy – Will your name and address be sold on lists as a sucker who buys stuff online from unknown websites? You can never know for sure, but make sure you check the privacy policy to ensure that the vendor at least cares enough about their customers to make it look like they care.

Lastly, never forget that identity theft and credit card numbers are tasty targets for scammers. Protect them as much as you can by not signing up or registering for websites with your real name and address until you are actually ready to make a purchase. Whenever possible, use a temporary credit card number for all online transactions to avoid nasty surprises later.

The Internet is a treasure trove of useful information, but it can also be a swamp of deceptive or unhelpful websites as well. Internet sites that list great deals on products and services are a good way to help save money during the recession. However, you need to find real deal listing websites and not just websites that offer regular prices and normal sales with commission-based links. That makes those websites money, not you.

A real hot deals website will have deals from all over, not just certain stores and shopping sites. Coupon codes and free shipping codes will be included for free on deal postings without having to register or being directed to another site.

Also, most of the best deals websites have a forum where users can post comments and discuss the deals. The forums are a great way to see just how good a deal is, whether you find it on that site or somewhere else. Deal site users are savage and they will quickly point out the flaws in any deal that looks good, but has a catch.

As an added bonus, some of the most honest, hard hitting reviews on the Internet can be found in these forums. Don’t look for reviews, just look for commentary on the deals. If there is a great price on a TV, you can be sure that there are plenty of users weighing in on whether or not it is worth the money, even at the discounted price.

Here are some great deals websites that I’ve been using over the last few years that always seem to come through with the best hot deals out there.

Top 4 Hot Deals Websites

1. Slickdeals.net – Only the best deals make the front page, but there are hundreds posted each day in the forums. Users can vote thumbs up or down to help rank deals.
2. Gottadeal.com
3. DealNews.com
4. Woot.com – Woot only offers one deal a day, so it can be hit or miss whether there is anything you want. But, for the 2 seconds it takes to check every day, you will find some of the best deals online. They do offer a lot of refurbished products, though, so make sure you read the whole description and decide is refurbished worth it.

Do you have other hot deal websites that you use to save money?

You want to travel, but with the recession, you want to travel cheap, or travel for free.  Here is one way to help.  United Airlines offers a non-flight way to earn free Milage Plus points without flying that can add up fast and help get you those last miles you need to get a free flight.  Its a dining rewards program called United Mileage Plus Dining.

The best part is that it is really easy and you don’t really have to do anything once you set it up.

Basically, you go to Mileage Rewards Dining website and create a Dining Rewards password to go with your United frequent flyer miles number.  Then, you register your credit cards with the dining miles rewards program by entering the credit card number, expiration date, and so on.

Once your credit cards are registered, then you earn miles whenever you eat at a participating United Mileage Plus Dining restaurant if you pay with any of the credit cards you registered.  That’s it!  It couldn’t be any simpler.

You don’t have to remember a coupon, you don’t have to remember to tell the waiter, or give someone your Mileage Rewards number or anything.  It’s all electronic behind the scenes.  You pay like normal, and voila, free points in your account. As a double bonus, this has nothing to do with the regular credit card rewards points you are earning.  So, for example, if you buy dinner with your Capital One Rewards Credit Card, you still earn Capital One No Hassle Miles for the dinner PLUS the United Miles.

For each dollar you spend, you get one free United frequent flyer mile.  But, from now until June 30th, you get double points on the Dining Rewards program so that is 2 free miles per dollar spent eating out at restaurants.  Depending on the kind of person you are, this can add up to big points.  Eat out twice a week at $40 each and that is 160 miles earned per week without flying anywhere!

If you take clients out for meals, try and setup your meetings at restaurants in the program and you can earn points for those meals too.  Pretty soon, you’ll be setting up your free vacation.

There is no cost and no charge to register your credit cards, so I registered every credit card I have.  I never even look at the list of participating restaurants.  I just go out to eat where I want to eat and just by coincidence hit rewards restaurants all the time.

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I’ve been meaning to get a big comprehensive review of the various deals available on TurboTax, TaxACT, and other tax preparation programs, but frankly, there are so many and they are changing so fast that I can hardly keep up.  So instead, let me just throw it out there.  You can save a ton of money by buying your tax software and taking advantage of a sale.

Every year, everyone from Best Buy to Office Depot to Staples offers great deals when you buy your tax prep software at their store.  The deal isn’t necessarily on the price of the software, and if it is, it is usually on the basic version that may not handle everything.

Although, just a quick tip about TurboTax.  I got a free offer to use TurboTax basic online.  I own my house, and I run my own business and everything I needed was in the TurboTax basic version even though it kept asking me to upgrade to TurboTax Deluxe to make sure I didn’t miss out on any deductions.  Folks, the “hidden” or hard to find tax deductions usually are not going to apply to you unless you have very special circumstance.  In that case, you probably already know about them.  So, try the Basic version and if it doesn’t work out, you can go to Deluxe.  Or, even better, if it is just one extra piece, you can fill that form out manually.

Back to business.

Free Anti-Virus, Free Security, Free Internet Protection, and More

Back to the deals.  The biggest deals you will usually see come in the form of other software packages and programs you can get for dirt cheap, or totally free when you buy your tax program.  Usually TurboTax and TaxACT are the ones that get this treatment.

Almost always, an antivirus program is one of the programs you can get, along with Internet security applications, and things like clip-art, business programs, print shop like publishing programs and so on.  If you get TurboTax the deal can also include a deep discount on Quicken and QuickBooks.  That way, you can get your budgeting and business bookkeeping software at a big discount.

This is how I get my anti-virus subscription for free every year.  I check the ads in the Sunday paper each week and when they have a free McAfee or Norton, or whatever, I buy my copy of TurboTax and uninstall my anti-virus software and then re-install it with the new CD and key, and voilla, free brand name anti-virus software, and it is totally legal.

Check out this Sunday’s paper and see what you can find.

Tis the season for the local news and assorted newspapers to break out their annual “How To Save Money On Christmas Shopping By Using the Internet” articles.  They were lame five years ago; they are lame now.

Without further ado, Finance Gourmet presents the Real Deal Guide to Saving Money on Holiday Shopping With the Internet series.

“Hi.  My name is Brian, and I’m a dealaholic.”

Dealaholic

A person who is addicted to great deals.

There, I’ve admitted it.  Don’t worry, I won’t be moving on to any of the other steps, because I love deals and I don’t want to stop.  I’ve developed some tips and tricks that anyone can use to find great deals, even if you aren’t super Internet savvy or a high-end computer geek.  (We are purposely ignoring any of the complex or time consuming methods.  These are the methods that are worthwhile for event the casual deal hunter.)

Best Great Deal Sites On The Internet for Finding Good Deals

The TV news will send you to SmartBargains.com and maybe Overstock.com.  Then, of course (yawn), you can find good deals on eBay.  They might also mention a coupon site, or shopping.com, or my personal favorite, “Hey, did you know that you can use Google to search for products and pricing?”   Nooooo.  Really?

Don’t get me wrong, all of those sites can be very useful, but they are the no brainers of online deals.  If you want real deals, you want sites that are dedicated to deals.  Sites that have large, vocal, online communities who won’t stand for a “deal” that was posted because someone bought some advertising or wants to move some slow merchandise.  In other words, you want sites that have real deals all the time.  These are those sites.

Top 10 Best Christmas Holiday Deal Websites

1. Slickdeals.net  – Simple clean front page with only the best deals of the day.  Search the “Hot Deals” forum for great deals on specific items.  (Note that it is DOT NET not DOT COM).
2. Dealnews.com – A full page of deals every day, each one the best price they could find.
3. GottaDeal.com – Another page jammed full of deals from around the Internet
4. DealLocker.com – Looks like just a coupon site (it has good ones), but look for the Secret Amazon Discount Tool which allows you to search Amazon by category, keyword, and discount range (10% to 90% off).  Most importantly, it allows you to limit your results to items eligible for Amazon Prime which means they are also eligible for free shipping and the Amazon return policy.  No more “great deals” from some affiliated merchant with $9.99 shipping on a $2.14 item.
5. FatWallet.com – Slightly irritating for making you register, but you can find some good deals and if you want to put in the effort, get some cash back too.
6. DealCoupon.com – Run by the DealNews.com people, it lists online coupon codes.  Use it to find free shipping for your deals!
7. XPBargains.com – Mostly just technology stuff, but if that’s what you want, these guys come through.
8. DealCatcher.com – Deals sorted by site.  So, if you need a deal at a certain store to use that gift card, go here.
9. BFAds.net – The website that started all the lawsuits.  They post the sales for the day after Thanksgiving before they come out so you know whether or not that great deal you found today will be a great deal later, or if you should wait for the holiday sales to start.
10. BeatMyPrice.com – So, you think you’ve found the best deal out there?  Check and find out!  At BeatMyPrice.com you input the item and the page you found it on.  If they find a better price, they’ll tell you.  If not, your price becomes the new “best” price and those who come after you will find it.  See, buying gifts and helping others, now that is what Christmas is all about!

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There are a lot of how to save money articles going around these days.  I guess that is what people think about during tougher economic times.  I stumbled across a pretty great one today.

SooperCard

For those of you not from one of the mountain states, King Soopers is a grocery store.  The chain is owned by Kroger whom you may know better.  Anyway, way back in the day, just like all the other grocery stores, King Soopers started a shopper card program where you got savings by using your card.  The card is called a SooperCard.  Now, like a lot of other people, I gave them fake information when I signed up because I was suspicious and didn’t want them selling my name or tracking how many Pop-Tarts I buy.

Several years later, I’m a financial professional and much more astute on how the world of business works, and I now know that at best I was being naive.  After all, the three credit bureaus gladly sell not only your name and address, but your credit score (not the exact score, but you can buy a list of people with over a 700, for example) and how you use credit which is way more invasive than anything the grocery store can ever figure out about you.  I mean, yes it is embarrassing to buy Pepto Bismol, but everyone does it, so not a big deal.

Anyway, I’m in the store the other day and I hear over the intercom that I can go online and download special coupons and offers onto my SooperCard that you can’t get in the store.  Now, I’ve never been much of a coupon guy.  I know what all the news stories say, but it never really worked out to more than a buck or two on my total bill.  The problem is that I can choose between buying the one can of black beans that I need, or I can buy 3 cans of black beans to save 25 cents.  When you factor in that I can probably get a better deal by just buying whichever brand of black beans is on sale, the coupon thing starts to look pretty worthless.  (I even went to the website of that mom who goes on TV shows and says she saves 50%.  I’ve never seen a site so packed with ads in my life.  I think you send your name and address to fifty advertisers just by thinking about the site.)

But, a special offer that I can get online (I’m there all the time) and just automatically put on my card so that if I happen to buy the right stuff I save money, well, that is something I can get behind. 

Coupons and Deals

Since I have never used the website, I had to register my card.  Since I gave them a phony name and address, I had no idea what to enter to register my card.  So, I updated everything with my current information.  (I gave them a GrandCentral phone number, but otherwise, all legit.)  I did it because not long ago, a salesperson at Borders caught me in a good mood and I gave them my email address after signing up for their Borders Rewards program which, unlike the Barnes & Noble program, is free.  Now, they send me too many emails, but the address I gave them long ago succumbed to numerous email offers, so no biggie.  But, on the bright side, every four to six weeks I get an email coupon for 40% off of ANYTHING, online or in store.  That my friends is worth some spam to a bookstore resident like me.

So, I updated my SooperCard information, then forgot all about it and never downloaded any offers, but today I get mail.  The mail is coupons from King Soopers, not lame coupons, good coupons.  For example, my wife drinks Diet Dr. Pepper.  One coupon is for a free refrigerator 12-pack of Diet Dr. Pepper.  That’s it!  No, “buy one get one free”, no “when you spend over $50”, just free, pure and simple. Also included were $3.00 off in Health and Beauty Department (toothbrushes, shampoo, etc…)  $1.50 off of 2 12-packs of Coke (we both drink that) $1.00 off of All (it starts at like $4.00 on sale and works just fine, so whoo hoo!) and so on.

The coupons are obviously printed on the fly, and every one of them is for something we have bought before, so I assume they are targeted at us and our habits.  How great is that? Instead of digging through the 300 coupons I’ll never use in the Sunday paper for $4.00 worth of savings, I get 20 coupons in the mail for stuff I actually buy that will save me $20 or more depending on how many I actually use.  Heck, I went ahead and put them in my wallet.  That way I’m sure to have them when I end up at the grocery store.

Other Companies

If you know of other opportunities like this, let me know.  I’ll get a list going and post it so we can all benefit.  But, I only want good ones.  Nobody needs another source of nickel and dime savings.

Well, I’m off to Safeway’s website to give them my real information.  Maybe I’ll get some good ones from them too

One of the toughest things about comparing all the different rewards credit cards out there is that the credit card companies aren’t very good about showing you what your points can buy until AFTER you sign up. Go ahead, try and find the rewards catalog for a reward credit card without logging into the site.

Most reward programs sound the same. Earn 1 point for every $1 you spend with some specials here and there thrown in to maybe give you more points at grocery stores, gas stations or elsewhere. The catch though is that it doesn’t matter how many points you earn, what matters is what you can get with those points. Remember Chuck e Cheese and Showbiz Pizza? 10,000 tickets gets you an 8″ stuffed animal. What do 10,000 points get you from your credit card?

Less than two years ago I used 40,000 points on my Capital One Miles Reward card to get $400 worth of gift certificates to Baby’s R Us. I pretty much furnished the nursery for free. It was a great deal. I logged in at Christmas time this year (2007) looking to do the same for a pregnant friend. Imagine my shock when I found out that the rate was now 18,000 points for a $100 gift card, not 10,000. That is nowhere near as sweet of a deal. In fact, I’m looking for a new card to replace this one. But, look at the big splashy front page and all the comparison sites out there and all you’ll see is that $1 gives you 1 point.

So, in hopes of helping everyone, I am collecting rewards point catalogs from all credit card companies. I’ll try and get as many as I can, but I just explained how they can be hard to get, so I’m asking for your help. Download your rewards catalog, or scan the one they sent you in the mail and email it to me at thegourmet@financegourmet .com I’ll turn them into pdf files and we’ll get a catalog going here that anyone can use. Don’t worry, if there is any identifiable information on it, I’ll black it out before it gets posted.