Even if you find great deals while shopping online for the holidays, paying shipping fees on every gift will quickly eat up your savings.
Luckily, shipping costs don’t have to be an annoying extra line in your holiday budget. If you start early and take a moment to explore your options, you can evade shipping expenses and route that money toward the many other expenses that come with the holidays.
[See: Prepare Your Finances for the Holidays.]
Check whether your retailer is offering free shipping: Some retailers, such as Apple, L.L. Bean and Zappos, offer free shipping year-round on all orders. Others, including Best Buy and Target, usually offer free standard shipping on all orders during the holiday shopping season (and are doing so this season as well). With these retailers, getting free shipping is easy — shipping costs will be deducted at checkout.
The majority of retailers, though, make it a bit more complicated to claim free shipping. Some will require an order minimum, which varies by retailer. Some will require you to input a promo code at checkout. Many will require both an order minimum and a free-shipping code. So search a shopping-deals site or explore the retailer’s site for this valuable information — you may actually want to pay attention to a retailer’s pop-ups and website banners this time of year.
[See: 9 Ways to Save When Holiday Shopping With Credit Cards.]
Consolidate your shopping to meet the free-shipping minimum: This is where planning out your entire holiday shopping list in advance comes in handy. Because so many retailers require an order minimum to unlock free shipping, you’ll never get free shipping if you spend small amounts at various retailers.
Find ways to cluster your purchases at a couple of retailers. With large retailers price-matching each other during the holidays, prices on similar items will be nearly identical (or just a few dollars apart) at the major players. So stick to one or two retailers, hit the minimum and get the free shipping.
Consider in-store pickup: If you can’t make the order minimum, or a store doesn’t offer free shipping, check whether free in-store pickup is an option. A growing number of retailers are offering it as a compromise for those who like the convenience of shopping online but are willing put in a little extra effort to avoid paying for shipping. Some stores, including Kmart, Sears, Target (at limited locations) and Nordstrom, will even bring your order to your car.
Even if you have to go into the store to pick up your order, you get to skip hunting through the aisles for what you want. Just place your order online and go to the store’s pickup counter to claim your goods. Walmart is even rolling out automated stations at some stores in its aggressive push to encourage store pickup. It also offers a small pickup discount (generally about 3 percent off) for eligible items if you order online and pick up at the store.
[See: 10 Money-Saving Websites to Check Before Shopping.]
Shop on Free Shipping Day (Dec. 15): Free Shipping Day is a mid-December promotional shopping holiday launched by the founders of Coupon Sherpa and FreeShipping.org in 2008. It falls on Friday, Dec.15 this year. On this day, large and small online retailers will offer free standard shipping with guaranteed delivery by Christmas. More than 1,000 retailers participated in 2016, including Crate & Barrel, GameStop, Target, Walmart, World Market and more.
Start as early as possible: Most retailers that offer free shipping do so for standard shipping only. Just a few exceptions (such as Apple and Verizon) offer two-day shipping or faster for free. Standard shipping times vary by retailer from three to as many as 10 business days. So you’ll need to leave yourself plenty of time if you want your gifts shipped for free and have them arrive by Christmas. Also keep in mind that some retailers’ free shipping offers are an even slower tier than standard. Amazon’s free-shipping option, for example, takes five to eight business days while its standard-shipping option takes four to five business days.
If you’re shipping gifts via FedEx, UPS or U.S. Postal Service, the advice to start early applies as well. Gifts shipped via Ground service (the least expensive shipping method) must be in the mail by Dec. 13 for USPS and Dec. 15 for FedEx and UPS. After that, you’ll have to pay extra for these services’ various expedited shipping methods.
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5 Ways to Score Free Shipping on Holiday Gifts originally appeared on usnews.com
