海角大神

Time for a confession here.

The single biggest challenge I have when it comes to avoiding unnecessary purchases is avoiding them online.

I think there are a few reasons for this.

First, I don鈥檛 have a chance to talk myself out of a purchase. In a store, I typically have several minutes between when I pick up the item and when I鈥檓 actually at the checkout purchasing the item. I often use that time to try to talk myself out of the purchase.

At an online store, those several minutes are reduced to several seconds. The time from putting an item into your 鈥渃art鈥� to actually buying the item is drastically reduced at any well-designed e-commerce site. That leaves you with less time to actually decide whether or not to go through with the purchase, and the inertia of actually having the item in the cart often carries through until the item is bought and paid for.

Second, the process of paying is typically more convenient. If you have, say, an amazon account, you likely have your credit card information stored there. You don鈥檛 have to get out your wallet. You barely have to move to pay for an item. You just click 鈥� and it鈥檚 there.

Third, the access to online information often encourages you to buy. You鈥檙e sitting there at a web browser with a wealth of information at your fingertips. You鈥檙e able to research the item. Typically, because you鈥檝e already decided you鈥檙e at least highly interested in the item, the information you find mostly just serves to reinforce that idea, at least in the short term.

Those three things, added together, knock down most of the defenses I have against impulse buying in brick-and-mortar stores. Given that I鈥檓 also at home during the weekdays to receive packages and it鈥檚 easy to see why online ordering ends up being a weakness.

What can I do to defend against unnecessary online purchases? I have a few things that tend to work pretty well.

First, I don鈥檛 store my credit card information in online sites. For me to go ahead with a purchase, I have to actually dig out my credit card or other payment information and fill it in manually.

This tactic tends to buy me the 鈥渟everal minutes鈥� that I need to talk myself out of an unnecessary purchase. I can use that time when I鈥檓 digging out my credit card, studying the card to figure out what the number is, typing in the number, typing in the security code, grumbling when I get an error message telling me that the number is invalid, typing the number in again because I realized I couldn鈥檛 tell the difference between the worn 6 and the worn 8, and finally getting through. During that process, I鈥檓 quite likely to convince myself that I don鈥檛 really need the item.

Second, I use the 鈥渨ishlist鈥� feature of sites heavily. Often, instead of putting an unnecessary item into my online 鈥渃art,鈥� I鈥檒l just add the item to my wishlist on that site. My wife knows where many of my online wishlists are, so she sometimes trawls them for gift ideas, knowing that they鈥檙e full of items I have an interest in but won鈥檛 spend the money on (which means it鈥檚 a good gift idea).

Not only that, it鈥檚 also a way for me to give a product purchase some additional thought. From time to time, I鈥檒l clean out a wishlist on a particular site and if something still seems strongly compelling to me, I know then that it might be worthwhile. The surprising thing is that I don鈥檛 have that feeling for the vast majority of wishlisted items that I look at later on.

Finally, I get really into comparison shopping and price sniping. Instead of just buying an item I desire, I鈥檒l wait until it shows up at a price I鈥檓 willing to pay for it. I鈥檒l use tools like to find items at the right price for me.

Often, during this process, I鈥檒l eventually realize that I don鈥檛 want the item. Even if I do still want the item, I鈥檒l know that in the end I paid less for the item.

This happened recently when I purchased a GPS unit for my father as a gift. I wanted to get him one with certain features, but we also happen to have something of a gift-giving budget. Rather than just buying a low-end one or blowing my budget, I waited patiently using some automatic searching tools (like the one linked above) until the right item came up at the right price (it took about five months).

These three tactics together have gone a long way toward curbing my online spending on unnecessary things.