Please be aware where you spend your money

[KronosPerformance]

I'm not just a vendor but I'm also an enthusiast and a consumer myself. I know this isn't the 1990s and pretty much everyone is comfortable buying from people online and I completely understand that. There is a great deal of Legitimacy online and people are extremely comfortable buying from anyone who is online.

But with this comfort comes a great opening to get scammed, ripped off and experience a bad service.

What I'm getting at is with the influx of vendors coming on this site and even anywhere else on the internet, there are key things that you should REALLY look out for. Now granted, even if they have all of the above, you of course could still get scammed or ripped off but your chances go down significantly vs someone who doesn't mean most of what I am listing.

1. Do they have a website? It takes a lot of time and effort to make and design a website. Ever been to a website that looks like complete hell? I'd be weary of that. To me that means someone just slapped together a website with some template and put it up. It doesn't show the effort to make the customers experience good while they are browsing your website.

2. Whats their physical address or PO Box address publicly listed? Believe it or not, this is important. What if you need to return something? What if you need to contact this person because you are having an issue. Heck, what if you need to report this person to some form of authority? Even if you don't need to do any of the above, people who scam give less information purposely.

3. What is their contact phone number? This is something that is important now and days. It fits together with the physical address but for more of an immediate reach out to this person.

4. Are they associated with any organizations? This may not be something as important but its something that is a bonus in possible legitimacy. For example, we are members of SEMA and we make it known as well.

5. Do they have a store policy or return policy? This is extremely important. Even when setting up with a credit card merchant for ourselves, they want that information before they started accepting credit cards for us. That tells you something. You get your item in the mail, its not what you wanted and need to return it...do you know how long you have to return it? Do you assume you have 30 days to return an item? This could lead to you being upset because the person won't accept your return cause you waited too long etc etc. These policies are out there to protect us as the vendor and you as the consumer. If the return policies are confusing, you can always spark the question with the company but at least look at them. Scammers more than likely won't have this.

6. Do they accept credit cards? This isn't extremely important but from my experience, even setting up with Credit Card Merchants so they will help you process credit cards, there is a bunch of information they want to verify your business and like stated above they want to see your store policy as well, they want copies of your certificates from the state, your tax id number etc etc. The point I'm getting at is that if someone uses only Paypal for example, ANYONE can setup a paypal account in a matter of minutes and could literally be anonymous. Yeah paypal MIGHT help you fight a purchase but your bank definitely will especially if you have fraud protection on your debit card or credit card.

This is not at all to say "We are great buy from us" or to point fingers at anyone in particular but these are things that we follow for a reason and is important no matter where you buy from online. I feel that people become so comfortable throwing their money in any direction that they don't think about what if something goes wrong. Just cause you have one good experience doesn't mean that the next 5 will be great or go smoothly.

I hope this is helpful to the members on here.