Why Popularity of Online Mobile Phone Shopping is Increasing?

Online shopping for anything is experiencing a steady upsurge in popularity thanks to its more secure, faster incarnation. And of course it’s been made extremely popular because it tends to deliver large discounts, offers free UK delivery and can sometimes even get your phone to you in the next day’s post.

As a resident of the country, where mobile phone signals are rubbish, post is infrequent and the prospect of going to a mobile phone shop involves driving for an hour and a half through misty lanes, I reckon I’m pretty much the perfect target for online mobile phone shopping. So I tried it, with mixed results: I got no phone delivered to me at all and spent three weeks arguing with a customer services department in another country about the fact that they had both my money and my phone. This was a fault of the phone provider, though (the red and white one), not the technology: so I cancelled my contract with the offending company and tried again with someone else.

Plus points:

I could choose from any of the latest handsets, right there (so no driving into town, only to be told that the most popular handset was out of stock and would I mind coming back in a couple of days). I could create a simple account from which I would in future be able to manage all of my transactions through the new phone company. And of course I could have a look through multiple phone options at my leisure, comparing functionality and price.

Minus points:

No-one to talk to. So if you don’t know much about what you want then you have no idea what you’ll get, even after you have tried to sort out the different price plans and phone types on your own!

A word of caution, btw – I am not sure that buying a phone from a company other than your service provider makes a lot of sense, unless you get a spectacular amount of money off – and even then I am inclined to wonder why it is that one or two websites are suddenly able to offer you huge sums of money off immensely popular new technology. There is, I think,. A general rule for web purchases: pretty much all discounted figures for the same item come up at the same price on every reputable website. So if you’re being offered a brand new iPhone, say, at monumental discounts, you probably need to do a little more checking around before you buy with confidence from that supplier.

Buying a phone online is pretty simple for the tech savvy (so anyone who knows what all the different abbreviations mean when you are looking at the tech specs of your proposed purchase). Anyone who needs advice, though, I’d advise to think long and hard before trusting themselves to make an online phone purchase. If you know what you want, fine – but if you are looking at a high tech item and not understanding everything you see or read, you need a shop assistant to get one out for you and show you in person what it actually does.

That said, online shopping is as easy and convenient as shopping can be – and you are protected in all cases by the Distance Selling Laws, which give you a reasonably lengthy (it’s normally 30 days) period of time in which to send an item back for a no questions asked refund. So if you do buy a phone online and decide that you don’t want it, you can send it back for a full refund no matter what the opinion of the site that sold it to you.

The web lets you compare prices and functionality on as many phones as you like – and will make it easier for you to take a look at different tariffs and price plans too. Flip between the sites of major phone providers for a full package – or have a look at independent device retailers if you want to buy the phone without the contract.

About the Author:

Sara Parker is a mobile phone enthusiast and an expert in internet. She has an in depth knowledge about the latest features and updates in this field. She provides informative articles and blogs to her readers about Android phones and also internet dongle services.