Saving Money on Textbooks

Are you still buying textbooks at your university's bookstore? If so, you are definitely paying too much. As an MBA student, I know the huge expense books can be each semester. However, you can significantly reduce your costs by purchasing your books online.

You will save the most money when you buy used textbooks. When I first starting shopping for books online, I was very apprehensive about purchasing used books. Since, you cannot judge the condition of the book for yourself and most books are sold by individuals, it is hard to tell what type of service you will recieve. By using the following tips, you can confidently purchase used books online.

Check the Seller's Rating
All of the major sites selling used textbooks have a user feedback/rating system to rank the sellers. Pay attention to the negative feedback a seller has recieved. If the seller is consistently getting bad marks, your best bet is to avoid them. Be careful not to discriminate against a seller that has one or two negative feedback ratings. Sometimes negative feedback scores are received because of unreasonable or uninformed buyers. Try to buy from a seller who has a positive feedback rating of 98% or higher.

Read the Seller's Comments
A seller's description of the item is the only way you have to judge the book's condition. Read the comments carefully. Don't buy a book if the seller has left ambiguous or no comments(except if the book is new).

An example of a good description: "Light shelfwear, highlighting/underlining in 2 chapters only. Good, usable book."

An example of a bad description: "ISBN:0787968331 Satisfaction Guarantee"

Plan Ahead
If you order your books a few weeks before your class starts you can avoid paying for expidited shipping. Most professors have their place their book orders a few weeks before the class starts (shame on those who don't). This leaves pleanty of time for your books to arrive via the cheapest shipping method.

In my experience, most sellers do not offer expidited shipping. I have been forced to order books later than I would have like a few times and have had some trouble getting seller's to ship books expidited after I have paid for it. If you do need to pay for faster shipping you may want to email the seller in advance to make sure they will honor your request. If the seller doesn't respond to your email within 24 hours, buy from someone else.

Know Your Rights
Most companies offer guarantees for the used books sold on their websites. The guarantees protect the buyer in case the seller will not resolve an issue. You can file a claim if the book you receive is a wrong edition, damaged, not as described, or lost in transit. Make sure you know the terms of the guarantee before you place an order.

Your credit card company will also step in to help with merchant disputes. If the merchant will not resolve an issue to your satisfaction, call the number on the back of your card. Ask to speak to someone in the disputes department. They will usually issue a temporary credit and contact the merchant for you to get a permanent chargeback. Contacting your credit card company is a sort of exteme measure. Don't call them unless you have completely run out of options with the merchant.

Good Sites to Buy Textbooks
I tend to purchase most of my textbooks at either
Amazon.com or Half.com. Other good sites to buy from are Alibris, Powells, TextbookX, Valore Books and Walmart.

Amazon.com - Coupons
Standard shipping $3.49 per item
Free shipping on orders of $25 or more that are filled by Amazon.

Half.com - Coupons
Standard shipping $3.25 per item

Alibris - Coupons
Standard shipping $3.49 per item
Shipping Discounts available if you purchase more than 1 book from a single seller.
Free shipping on orders over $49 of eligible books.

Powells - Coupons
Standard shipping $2.95 for first item + $1.oo per additional item

TextbookX - Coupons
Standard Shipping $2.99 per item
Free shipping on orders of $49 on orders fullfilled by TextbookX.

Valore Books - Coupons
Standard shipping $3.49 per item

Walmart - Coupons
Only new books
Standard shipping $.97 per item