'I needed a dress for a friend’s wedding and ordered four from a shop on social media app TikTok. My order was around £150.
'As a Which? employee, I tried to do my due diligence and research the company before buying. It had a good number of positive reviews and the website looked legitimate, but 10 days later the order hadn’t arrived.
'Initially, the customer service team was helpful, telling me they would contact the courier and refund me the shipping cost. Another five days later, the order was showing as ‘delivered’, but the tracking image was nowhere near my address.
'I followed up to tell them I still hadn’t received the dresses. I then had an email saying they would refund me, but I’d have to pay up to £30 to cover shipping! I didn’t hear back again, so I filed a chargeback claim with my bank, Nationwide. It issued a full refund within a week.
'How could I have spotted that this was a scam, though?'
Natalie Turner, London
Chiara Cavaglieri, Which? senior researcher, says:'An unusually low price is an easy way to get your attention, so check listings for the same item to get a feel for prices, and assume the worst if it’s considerably cheaper.
'Other red flags include:
'It can be helpful to also check whether the retailer is using stock photos. You can do this by using reverse image searching tools such as Google Lens.
'You can use our free tool to start a claim.'
undefinedsource https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/i-was-scammed-by-a-fake-tiktok-shop-a12jr8f6aILD