In last one decade we witnessed a new trend which has been emerged due to the vastly spread of internet among the masses, is that they are converting their shopping way from physical to virtual. Firstly, people had to visit the stores and buy whatever they want, grocery or something else, etc. But now, they go to a website and add the specific thing to cart they want to buy and pay the bill, then within few hours or two to three working days things came to there specific address they had given. While this service has provided many facilities to people, a section of thugs has also started fraud in it, due to which this sector has also become infamous. There are some who order things online and then don’t pay or return the item undelivered, causing huge losses to the seller. Which is very wrong, it should not happen at all. Along with this, there are some sellers who try to prey on the simple and gullible public, using many methods.
Some of these methods are that, for example, a person orders something, which we assume is a book, so the bookseller sometimes does not send the book, but instead of it he sends some another book, which is not required. Or sends the book whom quality is not good, sometimes the seller shows one thing in the picture and later when the parcel arrive home it turns out to be something else. Sometimes the seller send parcel after skipping one of the things, so at home, something else comes out of the parcel, not what was ordered.
I only gave example of book, but this happens mostly with many things. I personally witnessed this thing, that’s why I felt the necessity to write on this issue. Sometimes I go to online bookstores, I mean, book store websites, and see books and their prices. If a book touches my heart so order it, many times I faced this fraud, which I discussed above. Once I ordered three books and paid after collecting books, it was a cash on delivery service, so I paid later, after collecting books. When I arrived home and opened the parcel, books quality was very low, I was so much disappointed, but said nothing and kept the books in shelf.
Once another time it happened to me, when I ordered books, so checked the parcel there in the post office, I felt that there is only book in the parcel and I had ordered two, there on the parcel, price was of two books and inside only book was present. So, I didn’t receive the parcel. Once it happens to me when I had ordered a pair of body sprays, when I opened the parcel there were two bottles, but one was expired.
This kind of fraud always happens, sellers think that once the parcel is opened, it can’t be returned anyway, so sending the wrong item is no problem. The money comes anyway. With the same brazenness they commit fraud. For stopping them doing such fraud the main thing is to make the public aware to avoid such frauds. The second things is that, the governments should make policies related to the online shops, today after the advent of social media every one has the opportunity to do something like selling. So, the thugs have also got the opportunity.
Banning such many people is also a difficult task. So, to avoid this, it is important to spread awareness among the public and teach them how to avoid these types of online frauds. First, do not buy things from the websites which are not famous, or have the public recognition. Always use official websites for shopping. Verify the websites. Use secure payment method and do not pay in advance to the sellers which are unknown or not very much known. When ever face this type of frauds, go their review section, and review it, to make for others that in this website frauds happen. Before shopping, read the return or the refund policies, make sure from some other sources that the seller is authentic. Using these and other such tools can avoid the online shopping frauds.
The author can be reached at awaisahmadk3@gmail.com