COULD you be paying too much for your Amazon purchases?
It’s possible to save hundreds of pounds a year by using the online retail giant to buy your everyday household items – but only if you are able to spot what is a true bargain.
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Rosie Taylor reveals how to avoid getting stung on the site.
Weigh up need for speed
IF you need something quickly, it’s easy to order it on Amazon in a few clicks – but you could be paying over the odds.
Sun Money found a number of everyday items cost more on the site than elsewhere.
For example, Kiwi shoe polish was £2.90 in the top result on Amazon when we searched and around £2.60 to £3.99 from the site’s other sellers – but it only cost £1.30 from Ocado.
Compare prices before you buy by looking up the product on Google Shopping, Idealo or Price Spy to see how other retailers compare.
Cleaning products and other household goods are often cheaper in supermarkets, so you’re often best off picking them up on your weekly shop to save on delivery charges.
If you do buy from another online retailer, don’t forget to factor in delivery costs – if you have Prime and get free delivery, you could still save on the total price by shopping at Amazon.
Bear in mind other retailers might charge more or the same but could offer other benefits which make shopping there a better deal.
For example, a Kindle Paperwhite bought on Amazon only comes with a one-year warranty, but the same one bought from John Lewis comes with a two-year warranty.
Make the most of Prime
DON’T get caught out by accidentally signing up to Prime membership.
You pay £7.99 per month, or £79 per year, for benefits including next-day delivery, special offers and access to Amazon’s video and music streaming services.
Amazon promotes signing up to Prime at the checkout as a way of getting next-day delivery, so read the small print carefully before clicking any links as you might unwittingly be joining.
The first month is free but you’ll then be charged. If you do want Prime membership, you can save £16.88 by paying annually instead of monthly.
Couples can also save by using Prime Household, which enables two adults with two separate accounts to share Prime benefits for the same price – saving couples up to £95.88 per year if you pay monthly.
You don’t need to live at the same address, but you must be willing to share payment details with one another.
If you like to order takeaways, you can link your Prime to your Deliveroo account to get a year’s free Deliveroo Plus, meaning no delivery charges on orders over £25.
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Track prices
PRICES on Amazon go up and down all the time, so you need to be savvy to ensure you buy goods when they’re cheapest.
You can use a price tracker like CamelCamelCamel to see how the price of a product has changed or to check if other retailers are selling it cheaper.
For example, Sun Money found Amazon was selling a pair of Bose wireless headphones this week for £169 – described as a special deal with 15 per cent off the RRP of £199.95.
But a search on CamelCamelCamel revealed they had been on sale for just £120 in April, so this week’s deal wasn’t that great.
If you add products to your Amazon wishlist, you can get notifications or emails when the price changes so you can grab them when they cost less.
And if your item comes in different colours, it’s also worth checking the prices of each as some can be much cheaper.
We found a grey Swan retro coffee machine which cost £89.98 but in blue it was more than £10 less at £79.57.
Subscribe and save
IF you sign up for regular deliveries of items you use all the time – like pet food or laundry tablets – you save five per cent on the cost, and this goes up to 15 per cent if you have five or more subscriptions to the same address.
Parents can save up to 20 per cent by signing up to a nappy subscription.
You can even use it to save money on one-off purchases so long as you remember to cancel.
Compare prices first to ensure it really is a deal as they can change by the hour.
When we first looked, “a monthly pack” of Pampers nappies cost £21.78 for 198 nappies at the regular price. With Subscribe & Save the cost was £20.69.
But Tesco had two packs of 100 for £19 with a Clubcard – saving you £1.69 plus giving you two extra nappies.
Not to be outdone, Amazon later cut its price to £17.82 for one pack and £16.93 for a subscription beating Tesco’s price.
Reap returns and refurbs
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AMAZON sells items which have been returned but are in perfect working order, as well as refurbished electrical goods, through its Amazon Warehouse and Amazon Renewed pages.
You can get up to 50 per cent off Warehouse items. We found a Henry Xtra vacuum which had been returned, for £94.01. The regular price is £158.
Amazon Renewed features electrical products which have been inspected, tested, look new and come with a one-year warranty.
An Apple 13in Macbook Pro on the Renewed site was £499, a huge saving compared with a new one at £1,162.47 on Amazon.
But many of the items are quite old so check the model you’re buying as devices like smartphones can quickly become too old to use with the latest apps.
‘I have saved £600 from discount codes’
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BUSINESS owner Kyle Frank uses Amazon at least once a week – mainly to stock up on toiletries for himself and stationery for his vegan skincare company, Frank’s Remedies.
He estimates he has saved up to £600 in the last year by using discount codes and special offers.
One of the North Londoner’s best finds was a code for £90 off a dishwasher, which he managed to buy for £269, down from £359.
“It’s really hard to find on the site but every customer has their own special promo page with special offers tailored to them,” says Frank, 26.
“I find mine by logging into Amazon, then Googling ‘Amazon personalised codes’ which takes me to the right page.
“There are loads of offers there for money off products I regularly buy.”
When Kyle searches for a product, he also checks the “Today’s deals” box in the search filter options to find special offers and sorts the results by “price low to high”.
“Usually you won’t get the best deals on the first page of the search results, so you need to filter them to get the best ones,” he adds.
Amazon responds
AN Amazon spokesperson said: “We work hard to provide customers with great value, thanks to low prices all year round as well as a number of fantastic seasonal deals, and fast delivery.
“Sellers set their own product prices in our store and we have policies to help ensure they are pricing competitively. We actively monitor this and remove offers that violate our policies.”
- Amazon’s prices frequently change so it is possible some prices on this page may be different at the time of reading.
