Top 10 Drawbacks of Online Shopping

Every other revolutionary idea comes with a baggage. Sometimes, certain drawbacks of those ideas remain veiled behind the glitzy appearance of the entity itself. The path-breaking online business idea of purchasing through the World Wide Web was initially propounded by e-bay and Amazon in the year 1995. Online Shopping broke down the physical barriers between the sellers and the customers, making every other item available to people from all over the world at the click of a mouse. Internet made a massive expansion and a technology boom was unleashed upon the world by the year 2000. In countries like India though, the trend of online shopping took some time to develop. Flipkart can easily be called the portal that first made online shopping viable for Indian people. From books to gadgets to clothes, every thing can be purchased online. If one manages to have a tie-up with a dependable courier company, one is almost ready to set-up a successful online shopping service, provided the content is good.  With great vantage comes greater anxiety. The same is applied in case of online shopping. So, if you are about to place your maiden online order or even if you are a pro in online shopping, read the below mentioned points carefully, before proceeding in your venture. Here I present 10 Drawbacks of Online Shopping. You can always thank us later.

 10. Internet does not come free of cost

 

Many of us have a specific internet scheme, as a result of which, we have to shell out a fixed amount at the end of every month. The scheme allows us to have unlimited internet access in return for the fixed amount of money but what if somebody does not have such a scheme ? In that case, every time you open a page on an online shopping portal to choose a specific item, you get charged for it. Make sure that the internet usage cost does not topple the price of the purchased item itself. Be economical and be wise.....

 9. Shipping costs

 

Many websites deliver your orders without charging the shipping cost but many of them do not do that. A number of websites, as a part of a smart marketing gimmick, do not include the shipping cost while giving out the price of an item. It may be minutely mentioned at the end of the screen which many would not even notice. The valuable gets delivered at your house and you are asked to pay more than what you are prepared for. You have no option but to oblige with it. Shipping costs in most cases raise the price of an article and you may end up buying it at a rate higher than the market price.

 8. No hanging out with friends and family while shopping

 

Usually when we go out shopping to a market-place, our ambling does not remain restricted to shopping of only one kind. Maybe we are trying to select a top but our roving eyes may get enamoured by a chunky piece of jewellery put on display. As a result of that, we end up buying both and a lot more. In case of online shopping, that cannot be a possibility as you do not have more than one screen to concentrate on each time. Shopping for clothes and jewellery is usually a full-day plan. We eat at our favourite food-joints and indulge in a lot of gossiping besides shopping. Unfortunately, online shopping does not offer such a thing so far but who knows online shopping and hanging out simultaneously may become a reality soon. Till then, we have to wait.

 7. Deprives you of tangibility

 

That moment when you touch and feel the thing you want to own, it is something irreplaceable. In case of clothes and shoes, you can touch the item and understand how good or bad a material it has been made of. When it comes to gadgets, during a real shopping experience, you can try them out and know if they are working properly. Online shopping makes it extremely difficult to exchange items as well, in case of discrepancies.

 6. Makes you lazy and fat

 

With the advent of a new phenomenon called online shopping, people who have an access to the internet, hardly show an inclination to venture out of their house into the open. You order your favourite pizza and it gets delivered at home. Then, you go on to order your basic necessities like clothes, furniture, books etc via internet and in turn remain restricted to the four walls of your house. Less activity means more calories and in a few months, you will find to your dismay that you have turned into a couch potato. Take that shopping bag and go out if you want to remain fit.

 5. Lack of options

 

What do we do when we like a particular thing but we are not totally impressed with it? At that moment we ask for variety in terms of more colour options, shape and size. You can wear a piece of garment and check if it fits you but with online shopping, that option seems like a distant dream. In online shopping, you do not get the same item spread out in varied forms and shape, vying for your attention. Sometimes being spoilt for choice is quite a coveted thing.

 4. Deceptive pictures

 

I am sure that many of you must have faced a situation where you have been delivered something, which is a distant-cry from what you were expecting it to be. This happens because pictures of items on online shopping portal are often deceptive in nature. What may appear to have a matte texture in the picture may actually turn out to be quite glossy and shiny in reality. If you do not keep a copy of the confirmation e-mail sent by the company and of the code number of the ordered article, things may turn out to be quite difficult for you in adverse situations.

 3. No bargaining

 

It is a major disappointment when you enter a shop and there are boards with words like ‘fixed price’ scribbled that are splashed all over the showroom. Bargaining makes for an interesting part in your entire shopping experience. It gives us immense pleasure when we manage to convince the seller to give us our desired object at a lesser price. A sense of triumph and victory settles over us. Online shopping does not offer us that liberty to bargain and we are bound to buy the item in the quoted price.

 2. A never-ending wait for the product to arrive

 

You enter a shop. Choose an item of your choice. Pay the bills at the counter and the item is yours. After all of it, you walk into your house with gaiety with your possession in hand. The story with online shopping is slightly different from the one narrated above. Different shopping portals promise to deliver your goods by a certain time but it often gets delayed. If shipped from overseas, it can take more than a month to reach its destination Even if it does not get delayed, you will not be able to take hold of it the moment you set your eyes on it.

 1. Risky credit card purchase

 

It is pertinent to do online shopping from a reliable and a trusted web portal. A number of these web portals ask for payment through a credit/debit card. Now your credit/debit card number is one of your valued assets and should be well-guarded. In case a fraudulent person gets hold of your credit card or account number, you may run the risk of being duped and cheated monetarily. Hence, it is advisable to purchase items from a particular site only after checking its privacy policy thoroughly and making sure that the portal is authentic and can be held accountable in case of discrepancies.