i order A LOT of goodies from Amazon and as a Prime member, I always get free 2nd day shipping (which mostly means I get it my goods next day as they ship from Reno). Anyway, I thought I’d pass along some tips to get the most out of Amazon.
- If you frequently buy online, you should really consider Amazon as your first destination. And if so, sign up for Prime. Many don’t know this, but you can add up to 4 “relatives” to share your Prime account. If you’re considering doing this, ask them to pitch in $15 – $20 each which makes your cost about the same. This will pay itself off in a handful of orders. Warning: with Prime, you may spend more on Amazon that you’d like – yes, it’s just that convenient.
- Amazon often fluctuates it prices daily. Yes it’s true. And they also provide a 30 day price protection policy. Again, not many people know this. Here’s what I do. When I find an item I’m interested in purchasing, I’ll add it to my cart and if I don’t need it immediately, I’ll wait maybe a week or two to see if the price changes. To do this, just check your cart daily (or frequently) to see if the price does change. When it does, you’ll see a yellow note at the top of your cart stating which items in your cart have either increased or decreased in price. If the item has decreased, great, purchase it now. But wait, you might have added several items to your cart and you certainly don’t want to purchase everything right now. To fix this, click on the “Save for later” buttons for each item you don’t want to purchase right now. This way, they’re still in your cart, but essentially it’s in a backup cart that won’t be used for checkout. If you did end up purchasing the item instead of waiting a couple weeks, make sure you add it back to your cart and use this method to track it’s price for a month. If you notice the price drop, call Amazon at 800.201.7575 and press option #7. Have your order number ready and tell the CSR that the item you just purchased is now selling for a lower price and you’d like to get an adjustment. They’ll do it no questions asked. The 30 days starts once you receive the product, not the date the order is placed. My best price match: I once bought a pair of Nikon binoculars for $149.88, then literally the next day it dropped to $69.88 for a couple hours. I was completely lucky to catch this drop, but ended up saving $80 on the transaction. Sweet.
I currently have a couple hundred items in my backup cart, mostly because I’m too lazy to go and remove something after 30 days, but I like to see the yellow boxes so I leave them in. After awhile, you’ll start to see trends on Amazon’s pricing. Anyway, hope this helps and good luck shopping!
SteveO
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Ann is discussing.
Ann 10:59 am on April 2, 2008 Permalink |
Sweet! Thanks for the shopping tips!