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Introduction to Shoe Shopping

Shoes are one of the hardest items to shop for online. As many of you will know, especially when it comes to children, it can be a hassle to find a pair of shoes that fits whilst shopping on the high street. Therefore, shopping online, with no option of 'try before you buy', can make the process doubly difficult.

People's feet vary in width and dimension, making it difficult to find a comfy fit, even if the length is the correct size. Shoes are an item with a high returns rate. An important first step is finding a retailer which has a good returns policy. You should be looking for a twelve day return period.

Using a next day delivery option is helpful. It will provide you with a few extra days, cover any possible hold ups in the postal service, useful if you need to return an item. Every footwear retailer should have a straight forward procedure for allowing you to return an item, so long as the item is in a re-saleable condition.

It's probably a bad idea to order shoes online as a Christmas or birthday present. Unless the returns period is over one month long, you will have no chance of returning the item for an exchange or a refund.

Shoe Sizes

You should expect a retailer to have these sizes instock,

• 6-15, for men.
• 2-9, for women.

Anything above or below these sizes will be difficult to locate. Not only are they difficult to locate, for larger sizes, they can also become exponentially more expensive.

The real difficulty of buying online is that different brands do not stick to exact sizing regulations. When it comes to trainers for example,

• Adidas tend to be small fitting, you will need a half size larger than normal.
• Nike comes close to standard fitting.
• Puma tend to be large fitting, you will need a half size smaller than normal.

It goes to show how difficult it can be to order shoes from the web.