E-shoppers have a world of choice

By DIANA CLEMENT

For Jacki MacKay, loading the kids into the car, using $10 worth of petrol and traipsing round St Lukes is not worth the time and hassle.

So she shops online for children's clothes from France, bed-linen, magazines and books from the United States, and DVDs from Australia.

Like many New Zealanders, MacKay's extensive world travels whetted her appetite for the huge range of goods available to European, North American and Australian consumers.

She recently bought new bed-sheets from EddieBauer in the US. She would have needed to reach deep into her purse to buy sheets of a similar standard here or had to put up with lesser quality.

"The flannel sheets you buy here pill the first time you wash them, so I was really excited when I found that Eddie Bauer shipped here," McKay says.

Unless you have a specific retailer in mind, the best way to find a particular product is to search shopping sites such as Bizrate and Froogle.com in the US, Kelkoo, Dealtime and Checkaprice in Britain, and Pricealert and Buyfast in Australia.

Thanks to the price transparency of these shopping search engines, it is easy to track down a bargain.

Australian online shops are usually prepared to ship to New Zealand. but it is often difficult to find American ones that will.

Many big stores such as WalMart, Target, Circuit City and Toys'R' Us do not appreciate that there is a world hungry to buy their products outside of the US and Canada.

To find out which stores are interested, check their shipping information pages - and read their returns policy while you are perusing the fine print.

For consumers used to a lacklustre New Zealand online shopping experience, the slick operation of stores such as EddieBauer or SendIt will impress.

Consumer magazine found many New Zealand e-tailers to be less reliable and slower than some US and Australian firms.

Books, CDs, DVDs and electronic items are the most popular goods bought overseas by New Zealanders. MacKay devours overseas magazines, which she orders direct from the publisher, saving a bundle.

Oprah magazine, one of her favourites, costs $15 at her local newsagent on the North Shore, but just $7.95 on subscription direct from the US.

The magazines arrive monthly and when she is finished with them, MacKay sells them for $10 each on auction website TradeMe.

In the case of digital prints, it makes sense to have them printed abroad.

Fifty 6x4 prints from New Zealand-based Frogprints cost $42.50 including delivery. The same 50 photos can be printed in the US by Ofoto and posted here for $30.95.

And if you have someone in Europe who can forward your photos to you, German printer Pixum will do the order for $24.88.

MacKay, a marketing executive, regularly buys new books from Amazon.com - but only after checking local prices by calling Dymocks Booksellers.

She prefers to buy DVDs from EzyDVD in Australia, because Region 1 DVDs from the US cannot be re-sold on Trade Me when she is finished with them.

Saving money is just one reason to shop online overseas. The range of goods is much greater and state-of-the-art equipment, videos, CDs, DVDs and books are often released abroad long before here.

For example, the iPod Mini is this year's must-have gadget in North America and Europe.

Apple has not even released pricing in New Zealand and the iPods will not be in the shops some weeks at least.

You should always make sure that electronic items work in New Zealand before you buy them.

If you are looking for an obscure item, such as shaped cloth nappies, you can choose from a handful of brands in New Zealand, most of which have changed little since our parents' days.

Go to North America and Europe and you will find dozens, if not hundreds, of brands of shaped cloth nappies that fasten as quickly as a disposable and use the latest breathable fabrics to keep baby's bum dry.

And if you are tired of your children being dressed in the Pumpkin Patch or JK Kids uniform, there's a world of choice out there. French-based LaRedoute is one option. Upmarket British brands such as Boden also ship here.

Buying from Europe and Australia is not always as expensive as it appears as Value Added Tax (VAT) and GST are usually removed from the price for orders outside the European Union.

Before scouring the world, check if the brands you want are available in New Zealand. Ikea homeware, for example, can be bought from Simplydesign and the popular Early Learning Centre toys are available from Zero To Hero [although not from its website Zerotohero.co.nz].

MacKay always searches TradeMe to see if an item is available here second-hand.

Before you hit Bizrate for your first overseas purchase, you will need to familiarise yourself with the workings of New Zealand Customs. Its website has most of the information you will need - including a list of banned goods that ranges from children's nightwear to tyres.

Goods bought abroad may also be subject to excise duty and GST. The latter is a straightforward 12.5 per cent on everything, but excise can vary from nothing on artists' easels to 19 per cent on adult clothing.

The Customs excise duty list makes interesting reading. Cotton curtain material has no import duties, but silk or polyester curtains command 12.5 per cent.

Electric hairclippers for humans are taxed at 5 per cent, but clippers for animals are free.

Most importantly, Customs will only collect excise duty and GST if the total exceeds $50. So most purchases worth less than $200 escape the clutches of the taxman.

Should your item be intercepted by Customs, you will be sent a letter and will need to pay the taxes before your goods are released to NZ Post or a courier company for delivery.

What frightens many potential online shoppers are fraud and the possibility that goods will not arrive.

Most regular online shoppers find the process relatively safe. The BNZ's general manager of cards, Pradeep Roy, reckons the bank's software picks up 80 per cent of frauds before the card-holder even notices.

And like other Visa and MasterCard suppliers, the BNZ promises zero liability for genuine frauds, and a refund system if goods are not received.

This makes credit cards a better way to buy online than internet payment systems such as PayPal.

Note: To protect your credit cards when shopping online, you should take a few basic precautions.

When paying, make sure the site is secure and the URL on the payment page begins with https://.

A good site, besides using a secure page, will request the extra three digits on the back of your credit card, which cannot be obtained by fraudsters from any printouts.

For more information about online card security, visit My Money Skills, and go to antiphishing.org for safety tips about phishing - unsolicited emails asking for bank account or credit card details and appearing to come from credible sources such as banks.

If you worry that your goods will not turn up, look for word-of-mouth recommendations or see other consumers think of a shop by visiting comparison sites such as epinions.com.

Most retailers depend on repeat business, so few reputable ones will muck you around.