Are your online purchases legitimate? How to avoid buying counterfeit gifts

Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Holiday sales may exceed $1 trillion, raising counterfeit purchase concerns.
Thirty-six percent of buyers report purchasing counterfeit gifts, says a recent survey.

SALT LAKE CITY — For the first time ever, holiday sales are expected to top $1 trillion dollars this year, according to the National Retail Federation. But, not for the first time, many of those gifts will be counterfeits.

"The odds are high," warned Frank Cullen, executive director of the Council for Innovation Promotion. "And that's particularly true now that we have this real explosion in online shopping."

A new survey found 36% of gift buyers say they've either knowingly or unknowingly bought a counterfeit gift. And U.S. Customs and Border Protection has said it seized over $7.3 billion worth of counterfeit goods in the last fiscal year. That's nearly six times the value of fiscal year 2020's haul of $1.3 billion.

Counterfeits aren't just limited to handbags and watches. We see knock-off clothes, smartphones and tablets, car parts like brake pads and airbags, toys, prescription drugs and more.

"If anything's a popular gift item, it's probably going to be counterfeited by someone," said Cullen.

He said not only do bogus items hurt business's reputations and bottom line, but they also fall short of manufacturing and safety standards.

"You're either going to get something that's subpar or not quite what was expected," Cullen said. "Or worst case is dangerous or possibly even deadly."

To avoid counterfeits, he said be skeptical if you find an item is selling for much cheaper than the going rate. Same goes if you find a product or toy online that's sold out everywhere else you've looked.

Stick to familiar websites or buy directly from the real item's manufacturer. And scrutinize social media posts touting products.

"Don't just click on anything," said Cullen. "Everyone should make sure that they're really checking out the people they're doing business with."

If you've wound up with something that's counterfeit, report it to the item's original brand as well as the Federal Trade Commission. Cullen said many reputable retailers will work with you on a refund if you wound up with a fake item.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.