How to find Amazon's biggest bargains

Updated

Since it launched in the UK, Amazon has saved shoppers up and down the country money on anything and everything, from birthday presents to big ticket items.

Best deals on amazon
Best deals on amazon



Pic: AFP/Getty

But if you head straight for the homepage, you could be missing out on the very best deals and money-saving bonuses. Here are a few tips and tricks to slash the cost of your shopping even further.


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Search for secret discounts
When you search for a product on Amazon, you don't always get directed to the biggest discounts, whether or not the items seem cheaper than the site's competitors. Happily money-saving guru Martin Lewis has discovered secret areas that offer 75 per cent or bigger reductions. And to make our lives easier, the Money Saving Expert website boasts an Amazon Hidden Discount Finder tool, where you can narrow down your search and find the very cheapest offers on everything from perfumes to TVs.

Is it really a discount?
Just because the 'was' and 'now' prices show a significant reduction, it doesn't mean that the item is cheap. A quick check on CamelCamelCamel, where you put in the Amazon URL of your chosen item, will flag up past prices available on the site, so you'll know whether you're really getting a bargain.

If it turns out that it's been cheaper in the past, invest in a handy tool to track the rapidly changing prices on Amazon. CamelCamelCamel offers one such tool, where you can enter the price you want to pay and it emails you when Amazon matches it, while Zeezaw works in a similar way.

Free delivery tricks
Free super saver delivery is now only available on a minimum order of £10 at Amazon, and since postage charges often amount to around the £3 mark, if you're close to the minimum spend, it could be worth your while to buy more to make up the difference.

For example, if your shopping basket total currently stands at around £8, seek out something small that you need anyway (like batteries or books) and bump up the order to get your package delivered for nothing. Just be aware that third party sellers often won't ship for free, so you'll need to be buying directly from Amazon itself.

Get free vouchers
If you're a big credit card spender and are conscientious about paying off your monthly balance in full, there are cards that give you free Amazon vouchers depending on how you spend. For instance, the Freedom Rewards Barclaycard gives you points at various big name retailers, which can be swapped for rewards. And if you spend £300 or more in the first three months of opening the account, you'll get a massive 10,500 Freedom bonus points, which gives you £30 to spend at Amazon.
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Student discounts
Being a student is notoriously tough on the money front, but with a National Union of Students Extra card, any student can get a 5 per cent discount at Amazon, and 10 per cent off clothing at the site.

Simply log onto the NUS website and grab yourself a personal promotional code, which is usually valid for a whole year, and paste it into the gift voucher box at a wide variety of Amazon departments, including books, music, DVDs, and beauty products.

Have you used any of the above tricks and tips? Let us know below...

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