Shopping Eagle

Great offers on a huge selection of Books, Stationery, Magazines, dvds, Music, Gaming, Gifts and Cards delivered FREE to stores.

The emphasis is firmly on bestsellers at W H Smith’s straightforward and accessible site. Ebook readers are particularly well catered for with a separate homepage, complete with featured titles, and a wide selection of titles throughout the subject range plus information for those new to ebooks. Click Features to find a small selection of interviews, extracts and magazine style articles or to search the archive for past features. There are links to Smith’s Education Zone, a website aimed at both parents and teachers, and to The Internet Bookshop (www.thebookshop. co.uk), a slimmed-down version of this site which includes bargain books on its subject pages. Navigation at this site is both quick and simple.

Littlewoods Direct was launched nationally in 1996, offering direct sales of a full range of merchandise at some of the lowest prices in home-shopping, Littlewoods Direct is a direct-to-the-customer catalogue offering optional flexible credit facilities, providing easy ordering, 7 days a week by telephone, online, fax, textphone and post. Littlewoods Direct was also previously known as Littlewoods Extra, and also LX Direct. The LX Direct name was dropped mid-March, 2007.

With a much bigger range of products than some similar catalogue stores, you will find close to 40,000 products available from the Littlewoods Direct website, with categories including clothes, electronics, appliances, home & garden, gifts & leisure and many others. You can also request your free mail-order catalogue from the website too - with more than 1,000 pages of offers. If you do already have a mail-order catalogue, then remember that you can save time at the website simply by entering the product codes found in the catalogue, which will take you directly to the correct pages.

Littlewoods Direct is owned and operated by Littlewoods Shop Direct Home Shopping Ltd, who are also responsible for several other catalogue brands too, but each brand is slightly different, so take your time to look around, and you may find special offers on one site which are not available on the others. The popular Janet Frazer brand you’ll also find available at Littlewoods Direct, which is also available at Marshall Ward.

Most products ordered from Littlewoods Direct can be delivered next day, and the delivery charge, which may vary, is usually very low. You can also return unused goods, should you decide you not to keep them, free of charge within 14 days.

What is Additionsdirect.co.uk?
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Additionsdirect.co.uk is the online facility to the Additions Direct Catalogue. It began life as the inspiration of Argos who wanted at the time to branch into the clothing market as well; however, it did not go all that well for them. In January 2004, Argos eventually decided it was time to sell the company so the Littlewoods Home Shopping Company purchased it from Argos and own it to this day. Although another home shopping catalogue it does offer slight variations to the other Littlewoods Catalogues available.

What do they sell?
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As with all home shopping catalogues, Additions Direct offers a huge variety of products, which would be impossible for me to list so I am going to do brief category descriptions.
Women: - They sell all sorts of women’s clothing, footwear, nightwear, sportswear and lingerie. They also stock perfume, accessories, jewellery and watches.
Men’s:- All sorts of men’s clothing, footwear, nightwear, underwear, sportswear, aftershave, accessories and jewellery/watches.
Children’s:- They have a somewhat limited selection of clothing and accessories for children from newborn to 16 years of age, plus accessories for bedrooms and nursery’s.
Sportswear: - This is an addition link and section to all the various products and branded sportswear available.
Home and Garden: - This section covers everything from furniture for the lounge and dining room to the bedrooms plus the entire home furnishing ranges, a limited selection of garden furniture and accessories and DIY products are available.
Electronics:- This section sells everything from mobile phones, sat nav, telephones, sound systems, TV’s, DVD players, VCR’s to PC’s and gaming.
Appliances: - This section is where you can find all your large and small household appliances as well as home wares.

Ordering / Payments
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Ordering from Additions Direct is very straight forward as with most internet shopping facilities, first thing you must do is register an account. This can be done on a credit card basis or you can apply for the Direct Plus Account which is a credit facility offered by Additions Direct. Add the items you wish to purchase from Additions to you shopping basket and then when you have finished placing your order you can view your basket at anytime from the link found at the top of the screen of any page. When you are checking your order from your shopping basket, you are able to edit your order if you need to and delete any unwanted items, before you proceed to the checkout. When you are happy with your order, you then continue checkout by clicking the checkout link, which will take you through the payment process of your order. You will need to have either a Credit Card or Direct Plus account to complete your checkout order and are requested to complete all the details requested as you proceed through the checkout. Once you have finished the checkout procedure you are sent to a printer friendly webpage with an order number for you to print off for your own reference, however you will also be sent a copy of the invoice to the email address you supplied during the checkout procedure. The site offers payment by all major credit cards and for other options of how to pay there are full details in the help section of the website.

Delivery
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Delivery from Additions direct is fast on some items and can be delivered within 48 hours depending on the time of you ordering, but there is a £3.50 delivery charge on all orders no matter how big or small. Certain items can be delivered the next day if order before 1pm and providing the item is in stock, but this service carries a £6.45 delivery charge. You are also given an option to specify a delivery day, but again, be warned this also carries a £6.45 delivery charge.

Credit Facilities.
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As I said earlier there is a credit facility available from Additions Direct called the Direct Plus account. This allows you to have items on credit and pay for them over a selected period of time, however it is very important to know that this service charges a massive 29.8% APR. This can work out to be very expensive. They do offer a facility for you to pay over three equal instalments without any interest on the interest opt out plan but this is also subject to status.

Catalogue requests.
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You can now collect a catalogue from all larger Boots Stores if you prefer, but there is a facility on the website for you to order one to be delivered to your door. This is free of charge and there is no charge for catalogue delivery either.

Returns and Refunds.
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Should you have any problems with your order you are able to contact the customer services to arrange for them to collect the goods to be returned, but it is extremely important to read all there returns guides before even placing an order, as you have to be aware there are guidelines for unacceptable returns. Simply call the FREEPHONE automated customer service number 0800 096 6093 or speak to an advisor on 0870 413 6000 to make arrangements for collection. There are no charges for returning an item. Refunds will either be credited to your Direct Plus account or Credit Card depending on your payment option you used to pay for your goods. All items are on 14 day free home approval, but there are some exceptions.

Help and Advice.
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This site offers an excellent help section that will be able to provide you the answer to any questions you may have with regards to shopping with Additions Direct and this link can be found at the top of every webpage clearly showing the word HELP. It will allow you to find out everything you need to know about returns, privacy policies, accounts, credit and much more. It will also give you all the contact details should you wish to either telephone them, write to them or email them.

Security.
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Additionsdirect.co.uk boasts a 100% secure shopping feature on there online store, they state that this is possible because they use the following features. They use SSL (secure sockets layer) in there ordering and payment facilities and that all transactions are processed by there secure server in an encrypted format for added security. This process will also be securely closed immediately after the transaction payment has been processed for even more added security. Full details of this are available from http://www.additionsdirect.co.uk please see the privacy and security links available from the webpage’s help section. The site security is governed by IMRG Senate, which also governs all Littlewoods Shop Direct Home Shopping Limited companies as well as many other leading internet-shopping organisations.

Other Site Features.
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This site also features a sizing guide to help you work out the size of clothing you wish to order. There is a women’s size guide, a men’s size guide and a children’s size guide. In addition, the site gives you access to a curtain-sizing guide to help you know what size curtains you will need to fit you window requirements. There is a site guide for everyone to be able to use to help them navigate the site easily and this is available in a link from the help section.

No matter what I need to buy, my first port of call is always Kelkoo. This website has saved me so much time and money it’s untrue, it brings together all the prices from different websites onto one easy-to-navigate page. You can pretty much be certain that the prices on offer are the cheapest you will be able to find and it even lets you know if there is going to be a cost for delivery.

Kelkoo also carries reviews of the shops that sell the item you are looking for - I find this especially helpful because even though a shop may be offering the cheapest price, the fact that it only has a 3 out of 10 score would make me think again.

The only thing that I can think of that could be improved is the way there are multiple listings for each item - Dealtime, another ‘Kelkoo-esque’ website, groups items together and says something like ‘available for £9 to £14′ which in my opinion is a slightly better system (the website on the whole is let down by having fewer items than Kelkoo).

Ignoring this one little bad point, the service is pretty much perfect and there is nothing else left for me to say except give it a go and see how much money and time you could save.

Which? does more than just test washing machines. We campaign to get a fairer deal for all consumers and publish expert, unbiased information to help you make the right choice, whatever you’re buying.

The Site

The Harrods web-site is quite smart looking using a colour scheme or primarily white, dark green and black. This gives off the classy, sophisticated look that one would expect from Harrods.

Top centre of the each page is the Harrods logo in dark green with the sign-in and search boxes to the right and a home button to the left. Below this is a black bar with links to the various departments within the site. Each department then has sub-departments so if you are browsing or looking for something specific it is easy to use. This as I mentioned is on every page and makes navigation much easier.

Down the left hand side of the home page is set of links to things such as news and history. The history section is short but very interesting and well worth a read if you are looking round the site. There is also a recruitment button here which allows you to learn about working at Harrods, search for jobs and apply online.

The Products

Contrary to popular belief Harrods does not exclusively stock hyper expensive products. They have a large range of items from fridge magnets and biscuits to fabulous handbags to toys to household goods and cosmetics.

Of course you get the truly expensive items for instance around Christmas they were selling a solid platinum golf club, (a putter to be exact), for a startling £15,000. I tend to buy the bears from around the £10 mark to about £30 as special gifts for birthdays, christenings etc as it is not only a lovely gift but a collector’s item too.

The range of alcohol is varied from Harrods own to high prestige brands on offer again from around £10 to many thousands. I love Harrods port and I always get a bottle in at Christmas.

There is a range of Harrods tourist style items such as bags, magnets, umbrellas and tins of biscuits; again these make lovely gifts and keepsakes. Prices start at about £4.95.

The prices for each product are given in pounds sterling, euros, American dollars and yen.

Ordering

When you see a product you wish to buy you simply click on the photo of the item to be taken to a page with more information. You select any applicable options such as colour, size etc and the quantity. You then click and add that item to your basket. To review your basket you simply click on the basket button and then you can choose to checkout.

To check out it asks you to register with the site. This is mainly for the purpose of direct marketing however you may choose not to receive catalogues or emails if you wish. Registration is easy and free; you simply fill in your details and the jobs done.

Then as expected you enter your payment details and they are processed by secure servers. You will then receive a confirmation of your order via email and another when it is dispatched. I really like the despatch emails as they give you an idea of when it will arrive and so you do not have to sit around waiting.

Receiving your Order

I have always received my order within a couple of days and it is always really well packed. The items are individually wrapped in thick brown paper, the spaces inside the box are packed with polystyrene or corn starch chips and it is contained within a brown box printed with the green Harrods logo. The box is very sturdy, (I have used my first box from 2003 to store my Christmas decorations in and after 3 years and 3 moves it is still as sturdy as ever), so your items are sure to arrive in good condition.

I would have expected prettier or more luxurious packaging from Harrods but it isn’t really a problem and does look fairly smart.

Customer Service

I have never had a reason to return anything to Harrods so I do not know how the returns process works and if it is efficient etc but I did once order an item that was advertised at the wrong price due to a web site fault and I received a call the same day advising me that it would cost an extra £3.00 and asking if that was okay. I was really impressed as you’d think Harrods would expect you not even to notice £3.00!

The lady who rang me was very well spoken and polite so I cannot her fault her any way.

Misco.co.uk is one of Europe’s largest suppliers of computers & electronics to consumers & businesses.

Visit Misco.co.uk today for unbeatable low prices on over 15,000 top brand products including LCD TVs, MP3 players, digital cameras, printers, desktop PCs, laptops, wireless networking, PC components and much, much more.

The littlewoods site can be accessed using the address www.littlewoods-online.co.uk. SImple! When the page comes up, ususally a pop up advertisement appears too. Dont immediately close it, as they sometimes have a super special offer, that you dont see anyhwere else.! At the moment it is advertising the sale on branded products!.

To use te site you have to be A) a littlewoods customer and B) registered to use the online facility. If you are not just fill in the relevant forms and hey presto!

The first page of the website is full of special offers, Top 10 buys of the week etc. To read more about the offers, you just have to simply click in the relevant spot! Easy peasy!

The actual design of the site is ok but the colours are so bright and varied that it tends to clash a bit. But never mind, no-ones perfect!!

You log in using a numeric and alpha-character combined reference number and then chosen password.

There is a search facility to enter the catalogue number of your choice or to write an item you wish to find. There is an account facility to see how much you have to spend, how much you have already spent, pending items, payments made and due payment dates. YOu can also set up direct debit payments or make credit card payments to pay your monthly amount. Porducts are bought over 20, 40, 50 or 100 weeks. 100 week items are charged at approximately 29% which is extortionate but all other payment options are usually interest free. They can be checked when purchasing an item.

Along the top of the page there are links to the different categories: Ladies fashions, Kids Zone, Mens, Sport, Interiors, Electrical,Garden nd DIY, Latest offers. Each link has a drop down menu from which you can choose the relevant catgeroy for yourself, ie? Kids zone has Clothing and Footwear and Nursery. When on eof these links is clicked on, more options drop down, such as teen wear, toddler wear, babaywear etc.

The actual range of products is very good. They tend to do budget ranges, a middle of the road range and a luxury ( expensive range!) You do have to be careful, though, as some of the lower prices ar still higher than in Argos etc, but you probably get the difference back in commission!

The site is very easy to navigate. When you chose an item that you wish to purchase, simply click on it, chose the size, colour and payment option and delivery address and you are taken to a checkout page. Here you chose whther the item is for yourself or a customer. You can chose to continue to shop or checkout.

After your first £150 of payments received back by Littlewoods, you begin to receive cashback for every pound you spend, 12.5% for goods or 10% cash in the form of a cheque. Good eh! Makes your shopping seem worth it when you see the pounds add up!

I do not have any problems with this site at all. I usually find, also, that if I order before six in the evening, my delivery man is knocking at the door at nine next day! Super speedy!! If you do not like the online site there is a telephone line to ring order sin on. Open 8 til 8. I just prefer to be able to browse through the pages for hours before making a decision!

The Littlewoods pledge to all of their customers extra safe shopping is included in the Customer charter. ELements discussed are listed below:
satisfaction guaranteed - guarantee that no matter what your needs, you’ll always leave completely satisfied

Littlewoods uses industry standard encryption methods to deter hackers. ‘Encryption’ turns your information into a special code that only Littlewoods’ computers can unscramble.

A commitment to quality - pride in our commitment to quality. one of the UK’s largest home shopping facilities by maintaining the highest standards.

Hassle-free customer services - Everyone at Littlewoods is extensively trained to ensure that you always receive a service that matches the quality expected

Data protection and privacy policy - they use a search using a credit reference agency, which will record the search. Any data supplied when placing orders will be used for running your account , credit purpose and market research. You can chose to have your detials kept private from third party companies.

You can pay for your products on line. Simply look at Your Account, and pay according to your monthly payment. You have a minimum amoun you have to pay. You can pay as much more as you wish! Just like a credit card statement really. You can see other transactions made and how much commission you have as well as contact Customer services by email. Payment can be made on your debit or credit card. Just enter your details and within a couple of days the transaction will show on your account. So easy!!

Customer service Guide Contents

A guide to how to shop - a step by step guide to using the shop should you have any problems.

FAQs - Use this section to view the frequently asked questions on ordering and returning goods, site security and our privacy policy.

Measuring guides - Find out how to measure yourself before you order.

Financial services - Details of the range of financial services and easy payment options available.
Extended Service Plan - protect your electrical purchases
Extra Care - protect your monthly payments and all your purchases.
Budget Account - for those large orders - spread the repayments over 100 weeks
Furniture protection plan - Protect your furniture for up to 5yrs for accidental damage and stain protection.
RAC repair cover - Pay weekly for the reputable service and road side assistance.

A very reliable mailorder online service. I have no problems at all. Have a look and see for yourself!! Thank you for reading!

How I Stumbled Across The Jungle
I have been using Amazon for years. As a forever student, I am always buying my books for school from this website. it saves me having to go into town, search shelves for books that half the country are also searching for, only to find that the last ones of the copies i want was sold 5 minutes previously and the next delivery is not due til next Monday, but they won’t have the books i want because they are currently out of print. Trust me, this is no exaggeration and after suffering the same plight two years in a row, I knew I had to find a new solution, cause I weren’t about to think of book buying earlier than what i was doing already…It would mean I start studying far earlier than planned and lack a social life for 10 instead of 9 months of the year.
The Sign-up Process
The signup process is really easy. As with most sights these days, you give them a whole bunch of info such as name, DOB, address, etc and you register at least one card with them so you can make your purchases as and when you want.

I get a bit suspicious using my card online but feel Amazon is safe because even if you’ve logged on, you will need to re-enter your password at the checkout before your purchase can be finalised.

What’s On Offer
The site sells a range of products. For me I am more interested in the books than anything else but have and would continue to use the site to purchase other goods.

There are 11 main sections as follows:
WELCOME - This is the homepage, regardless of whether you have logged on or not. The advantage of signing up is that everytim,e you rate an item or purchase an item, similar examples are recommended and shown on the welcome page (up to 3 examples from each of the main categories)

X’s STORE - This is a little similar to the welcome page but contains more info. It is basically a page of items which Amazon feel may interest you, based on recent searches, purchases, and ratings. It’s really useful because it gives you a reason as to why it has been recommended inthe first place and allows you to state whether you are interested or own it, in which case you can tick the relevant boxes, refresh your recommedations and instantly, new items are added based yet again on your responses. Admitedly, I do try to avoid this area when i haven’t got money to burnm because the recommendations are so spot on that you end up being tempted to buy, buy, buy…

The remaining categories are self explanatory:
BOOKS
ELECTRONICS AND PHOTOS
MUSIC
DVD
VIDEO
SOFTWARE
PC AND VIDEO GAMES
HOME AND GARDEN
TOYS AND GAMES.

Purchasing
The site is extremely up to date and has the latest products in stock most of the time. If the item isn’t available then Amazon usually state why and give an expected availability date.

On purchasing items, there are a range of options available. Most cards are accepted eg Visa, Amex, Mastercard, Solo, literally everything…

You can choose where to have items delivered to and whether to have them gift wrapped and a personalised message sent - I can’t remember how much extra this cost but it was basically a typed message with no care paid to the formatting and so it looked quite tacky. The gift wrapping is decent enough though.

Each time you select an item to purchase you are offered the choice of buying a brand new, unused product or you can be directed to the market place where there are 2nd hand copies available.

I have experienced buying both new and used products. As you would expect with new products they are usually in mint condition. Although on one occasion one of my ‘new’ books had already had the first two chapters worth of exercises completed in pencil, I wouldn’t have minded but when I went to mark them, they were mainly wrong… I would normally have sent this back but had waited so long for it to come in stock in the first place (remember my luck had run out at the shops) that i kept it, made a complaint and received a slight discount, although hardly worthwhile, on my next order.

I would say that it isn’t really worth going for the express delivery as even when it states that items will be delivered in 3-4 days you normally get them sooner than expected. The only time you really need to concern yourself with delivery options is when you have ordered a whole range of products. Amazon will ask if you want to save on postage by waiting for all your items to be available and dispatched together. I tried this once and because one of my books was out of print and not expected for another month, you can imagine how long I was waiting.

Advantages of the Site
The best features of this site are numerous.

The layout is easy to navigate even though there is a lot going on, on each page. The site is extremely fast for the information it is required to generate and there are tabs for everything, everywhere and so you can navigate around with ease.

I love the security feature which means you have to enter your passwords if you want to make any changes, or to complete your transactions, or even to look up the tracking of your items.

There is a superb range of goods, products and services, with many up-to-date items in stocjk and available at RRP prices. Also the community that uses Amazon are very quick to discard of items and so you can often find up to date items in the market place at cut prices (just be sure to look at P&P costs as the seller sets there own prices and can sometimes work out to be more expensive).

The search facility is excellent. I don’t think it has let me down once and there has been many an occasion when i don’t have the full product title or have entered an incorrect spelling and yet the correct suggestions are still proposed. (In fact this would be a perfect phone a friend on millionnaire it’s so fast and so clever).

Lastly I have to clarify a few points about the market place…If you are making one off purchases, then the market place could give you a generoud discount. You can choose how used the product is from the list provided. The ‘Used scale’ uses a great classification scale that includes: new, like new, very good, acceptable and so you can weigh up the state your product is likely to be in. I have only ever bought used books and have gathered that if it says acceptable it has jottings in the margin or creases down the spine, but any other condition is almost as good as new, so you can’t really go wrong.

All in all, this is a site for those of you that don’t have time or are just too lazy to go to the shops. It’s great for buying in bulk cause at least you don’t have to obtain a car or pay out on taxis to get the goods back home and you can track your products every step of the way. You can list a number of different cards on the sight and so you have a range of payment option available to you.

So happy shopping all, I hope you find the site as brilliant as I did!