GREENSBORO, N.C. — Anything and everything can be counterfeited. When the Government Accountability Office (GAO) bought items to see what was real and what was counterfeit, the counterfeited items included Yeti travel mugs, Urban Decay cosmetics, and a phone charger.
“We do it to ourselves. We love a great bargain and we just don't think there could actually be something wrong with the product. Online you’re looking at it and the pictures online look great because they stole it from the site and it's hard to know whether it's legit or not,” said Lechelle Yates of the Better Business Bureau of Central and Northwest North Carolina.
In this video: Lechelle takes viewer questions about online shopping scams, shady businesses, red flags to look for.
Anything and everything can be counterfeited. Here's a list of the top seized items in 2018:
Here's the thing, sometimes we're buying something we don't actually use ourselves so we don't know what the fair price should be. Is what you’re seeing a good price or a price so low it has to be counterfeit?
TRICK #1: FIND THE FAIR PRICE
It's worth it to take the time to Google the item and see what other sites are selling it for. If the price is way lower than all the others, that's a warning sign.
TRICK #2: IS THIS AN AUTHORIZED RETAILER?
“Scammers are smart and they set up websites that look very real, very much like the website for the designer product you’re looking for. You can check to see if the reseller is actually an authorized retailer/reseller. Go to the name brand company and look to see who their authorized resellers are,” said Yates.
TRICK #3: LOOK FOR COMPLAINTS
Google the website name and the word ‘complaints’. If someone has been ripped off by the site you’re looking at buying from, they're going to post about it.
Of course, it wouldn't hurt to look up the website with the Better Business Bureau either.
DON’T MISS THIS: PROTECT YOUR PURCHASE
Use a credit card, not a debit card, even if you use your debit card as a credit card. When you use a credit card you can dispute the charge with the credit card company. Getting a charge reversed is a whole lot easier than trying to get money back into your debit account.
In this video, Lechelle answers text questions about contractors, how to get work in writing, and when you should pay them.
