Martin Lewis has shared a clever way to get discounts when doing online shopping, saying now is a good time of year to deploy the tactic when placing an order. Savvy shoppers have reported it works at retail giants such as Morrisons and Asda.
The 'basket bluff' trick explained
Speaking on his BBC podcast, he drew attention to the "nice sneaky trick" which he has dubbed 'basket bluff'. Mr Lewis said: "I've talked about it before, but it does work really well, especially at this time of year."
Now is a good time to try this if you are doing your Christmas shopping early, as it does take a bit of patience. Mr Lewis explained: "Go and put your shopping in the basket online. And then don't do anything. Do not complete."
He said you not completing the transaction will often prompt the retailer to offer you a discount, to try and get you over the line.
Retailers where discounts have been secured
Mr Lewis told fans: "You'd be staggered at the amount of times that within a couple of days, they send you a discount for that shopping basket." He listed some of the big-name online shops where people have secured discounts in this way.
These include:
- Lloyds Pharmacy
- Waitrose
- Furniture Village
- Argos
- Asda
- Virgin Wines
- Dorothy Perkins
- Sainsbury's
- Princess Cruises
- Next
- MANASOS
- eBooks
- Morrisons
- Avenue
- Virgin Media
- Boohoo
- Evans
- Biogena
- Emma Bridgewater
- Cotton Traders
- JD Sports
- Ocado
- Boden
- Tesco
- Very
- Deliveroo
- Brandalley
Success stories from shoppers
The consumer champion had some success stories to share from people who had bagged some basket bluff discounts. A woman named Kaye said she had got a 20 per cent discount when buying a vacuum cleaner.
Another savvy shopper, Charlie, held fire on buying a wedding dress from ASOS. They got an email offering them 20 per cent off, reducing their bill by £37.
