Shoppers have been urged to be careful while shopping online for Black Friday.

While Black Friday can be a great day for securing discounts, it is also a day to be vigilant for online scams.

An Post is advising people to be wary of advertised discounts that seem “too good to be true”.

On Breakfast Briefing, An Post’s Product Management Consultant Bruce Richardson said to be careful when shopping on websites you have not used before.

“If you get an email for a website for things like phones or laptops or iPads, etc., and it looks too good to be true, then be very careful, because if you haven't used website before then it could be a fake website,” he said.

“It'll look real, but go and do a few checks.

“Check at the top to see if it has ‘HTTPS’ before the actual website address.”

"Explore websites"

Mr Richardson encouraged shoppers to “explore websites” before purchasing anything from the site.

“Go and look at down the bottom, look at their terms and conditions, customer service… See if they have a phone number - because what you'll find is probably there's a thin veneer over the top, and they will just have done the shopping part,” he said.

If a person has made a transaction which they shortly afterwards believe to have been fraudulent, Mr Richardson encourages immediately phoning your bank.

“Explain to them what's happened, tell them the website that you used, and then you put them on alert,” he said.

“They can see that transaction, and obviously you flagged it if it's a fake transaction, then you should definitely get your money back, because it wasn't through your own fault that you did it.”

Bank phone calls

As well as looking out for shopping scams, Mr Richardson encouraged people to be careful when receiving phone calls that claim to be from your bank.

“If someone calls you telling you they're from the bank, I think what you're actually better to do is take their name, their department or their extension, and then say you're going to call the bank back on the number that you know is actually genuine,” he said.

“On the back of debit cards there'll be actually a number for lost and stolen or fraud or something like that - so you can phone that number.

“It may not put them to write right through to the correct person, but at least then you know it's genuine.”

Consumer protection

Meanwhile, a number of retailers across the country are being prosecuted for breaking sales pricing laws.

The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) has launched proceedings against them.

The shops in the electrical, cosmetics, furniture, clothes and shoes' sectors are due before the courts in January next year.

CCPC Chair Brian McHugh said it is vital consumers are protected on Black Friday.

“It's really important today, on Black Friday, to remind consumers that we are out there making sure consumer protection law has been complied with," he said.

Mr McHugh reminded businesses that it is "really important" to be complying with the law, ensuring that discounts provided to consumers are "real discounts".

Black Friday shopping day sale discount. Image: Alamy