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SO YOU’VE DABBLED in buying goods online through Amazon or eBay and you’re thinking of doing the same with your grocery shopping.
It’s an incredibly handy service to use not only because it’s convenient, but because the chances of you getting distracted or picking up items you hadn’t planned for is all but eliminated. Although if you haven’t done it before, there are a few things to keep in mind first before you hit the checkout button.
Don’t dive in head first
The worst thing you can do is to assume online shopping is exactly the same as a normal shopping trip, but with added convenience. While you can still buy the same range of goods, it’s better to start off small and limit what you buy there while you get used to the service.
For the first few times you shop, limit it to non-perishable goods – avoid anything that has a short expiration date – as you get used to the service. When you’ve dealt with them enough times, you can expand to other goods.
Check to see where they deliver
It makes no sense to shop online if you have to wait a day for your groceries to arrive. Two of the biggest supermarkets in the country, Supervalu and Tesco, have the most expansive range, but still only deliver from certain stores. Supervalu has a map showing you which stores deliver while Tesco requires you to register first before telling you.
It’s best to assume that if you live relatively near a mid- to large sized town or city, you will be covered, but double-check before you proceed.
Budget for delivery charges and other costs
How much this costs really depends on whether you’re using, but all services charge a delivery fee of some kind. Also, in some cases, deals and discounts can (although rarely) change between checkout and order processed. Usually the added expense is small but it’s still worth considering.
Offers are handy, but only if you’re a regular user
Most online shopping services offer discounts and deals for signing up to delivery scheme. If you’re getting groceries delivered to you regularly, then it’s definitely worth exploring what your preferred store has to offer.
Some require you to spend above a certain threshold (€50 in some cases) to qualify for certain deals, but the same rules like any deal apply; it’s only a deal if you had intended on getting an item in the first place, anything else is just an added expense.
Remember it won’t replace everything
Online shopping is an incredibly handy service at your disposal, but there are instances where travelling to the shop is more beneficial. If you’re serious about fruit and vegetables, for example, you might be better off paying a visit to the greengrocer instead or a butcher if you’re looking for prime meat.
Whether you want to or not is entirely up to you, but it’s worth shopping around so you get both the best deal and produce available.
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A precedence has been set with this. Well meaning as it is. Will not other survivors of state ineffectiveness want something similar.
@AnthonyK: At a risk of sounding controversial, I think this should have been dealt with under some form of compensation or redress rather than some blanket thing.
That it doesn’t preclude future settlements is an odd thing.
However, I’m more onboard with the Gov actually doing something rather than nothing for those people it’s completely failed.
maybe hold tony hoolahan to account? no, no, that would be too much to expect of this snide government.
@Niall English: What specifically should he be held to account for?
Are they going to do this for all individuals who have been failed by the state (and how is that defined)? There’s plenty of people who have suffered, including Stardust victims, people who can’t get or afford homes.
The amount of misinformation out there around what happened with cervical check is mind-blowing. The way some people talk you’d swear that the testing service actually gave people cancer.
@Jason Memail: Quite the opposite, it didn’t tell them that they had cancer so they didn’t receive the treatment they needed, in a nutshell
@Brian D’Arcy: That’s absolutely false, and part of the misinformation that’s common on this subject. 1) These women received tests from cervical check which told them that cancer cells were not present. 2) These women subsequently developed cancer, and a review of their original tests was carried out. 3) The reviews showed that the earlier tests missed what may have been cancerous cells, with these reviews aided by the fact that the reviewers knew what they were looking for, since the patients had developed cancer.
@Jason Memail: 4) The decision was made, and this is the real crux of the issue, not to go back and tell those women that the earlier tests missed the potentially cancerous cells, mainly because what good would it do? They now had cancer and knowing an earlier test missed it wouldn’t change that. 5) Overall, the suggestion that cervical check didn’t tell these people they had cancer is demonstrably false, because the only reason the reviews were carried out on the initial tests is because they had cancer, which they knew about. 6) Going back and checking original tests when something like this happens is standard practice, and the right thing to do in order to improve future testing, but
@Jason Memail: 7) you can argue whether or not it was the right decision not to inform people about what the earlier tests missed, but it would not and could not have changed the fact that they now, sadly, had cancer, and 8) Knowing that an earlier test missed something could not have allowed them to start treatment earlier, because it’s in the oast. 9) If you want to know the specifics of it, I’d suggest checking out care2much on Twitter, who has written some incredibly detailed threads on the subject.
While this is welcome and like one commentor said that it should have been done with compensation.
As a survivor of the industrial state/religious run institutions we never got compensation we were give an “Award” as if we won something, we cannot get enhanced medical cards that the survivors from the mother and baby home were afforded, we cannot get a contributary pension even though we had to work in these institutions, we now get another slap in the face by being excluded from theses tax benefits. I live in a council house and am grateful for that, I live with my ill husband and disabled totally dependant 23 year old son was told that I can purchase the house for a minimum of between 60 and 80 thousand euro, cannot get a mortgage as my husband is 70 as the cut off is 69 and we’ve have no where to go to help buy the house so our disabled son would have a roof over his head if anything happened to us.
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