I Made This Mistake – Paid for Item Not In Stock!

01/03/2010

Online shopping is a very convenient and fast way to get almost anything you need, without leaving the house.

But, if you’re buying from an online shop, please contact the owner before paying. This is important especially if you’re buying form the online shop the very first time.

Some online shop owners, do not update the status of their stocks immediately. This could make you buy something which is actually do not exist!

I have experienced this twice already – with different Malaysia online shops.

I’m talking about online shops with shopping cart facilities. Usually, after you add an item and checkout, you will get an email of invoice/bill from the shop autoresponder.

In the emailed invoice, you’re required to pay the amount before the goods will be delivered to you. This is a normal practise for online shopping.

Once, I bought some cloth pads from an online shop selling breastfeeding and mommy products. I’m not a fussy buyer so I immediately paid after getting the emailed bill.

I expected to get the items within 2-3 days as I always do with other online shops. But, a week passed but I didn’t get the items. The online shop owners also didn’t contact me or anything.

So, I sent her an email. To my dismay, she replied two days later, saying the items I bought were not in stock. There was some delay from the supplier side and she will sent it as soon as the stocks come in.

I was so surprised because even though that was my first time buying from her online shop, but since her online shop was kind of established… I didn’t expect it to be that bad. It took 12 days from the date of purchase to get my items *after constant follow-up from my side*.

Another bad experience was when I bought a Grobag from an online shop. The item was on sale so I bought after selecting my preferred size. After payment was made, the shop owner told me the size that I wanted was not available. And, suggest to replace with a bigger size!

You see, both are examples of what an online shop owners shouldn’t do.

do not update stock availability status
do not contact buyer to inform

If you’re an online shop owner, please do not do the above things. If you do, you will lose a potential good customer forever.

Yup, that was my first and last time buying from the online shops. They have lost a potentially loyal customer like me!

Since then, whenever I’m buying in a large amount (more than RM100) from any online shops, I will email them first asking to confirm that the stocks are available before any payment is done.