Shopping safely online – A new consumer guide by the ESC

More than 26 million Britons shop over the internet, with electrical products accounting for more than one in ten online purchases.
Although most website shopping is trouble-free there are risks, particularly from the growing sale of counterfeit products online.
Substandard or counterfeit electrical products can damage much more than your wallet. They can cause fire, injury and – in the worse case scenario – even death.

To help consumers avoid potential pitfalls on the web, we have produced The Safe Shopper’s Guide to buying electrical products online.

In the run-up to last Christmas, newspapers reported that £320m was spent via the web in just one day – ‘Mega Monday’, as the press called it.

Part of the reason for the huge growth in internet shopping is the potential to bag a bargain. However, there has also been a corresponding increase in the number of counterfeit goods being sold on the web.
While there has been a significant amount of publicity around fake designer goods, little has been heard of the hazards of counterfeit electrical products. These are often substandard and potentially dangerous, so we are concerned that consumers could be putting themselves and their families at risk.

We therefore decided to produce a short, simple guide to provide all the basic information people need to buy electrical goods safely online.
The guide offers ten top tips to keep safe when purchasing goods via the web, advice on what to do if you get a ‘problem’ product or are sent counterfeit goods, and an outline of consumer rights.

A survey of 2,000 people’s online buying habits was also undertaken, to inform the guide and determine the kind of information shoppers might need. Some of the outcomes of the research were quite literally shocking.
For example, we found that:
Almost a third (30%) of respondents claimed to have had a problem with electrical goods bought online.
27% said the item either didn’t work or broke after a month.
16% said the problem caused an injury or fire.
Of those who bought an item from outside the EU, an even higher percentage – 26% - said the item caused injury or fire.
Price was the main driver for people buying electrical products online and we understand that, particularly in these financially difficult times, cost is a major concern. However, with the high number of problems reported in our survey, it’s well worth following the basic precautions set out in our guide.

Click HERE To visit the Electrical Safety council's safe shoppers guide for electrical products online