IT’S frustrating to spot a dress you love on social media, only to click through to the website and find it is sold out.
It happened to me recently.
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One of my favourite fashion influencers, Yasmin Devonport, showcased a gorgeous blue dress on her TikTok account.
At £120 from Asos, it wasn’t cheap but I could have justified it for a special occasion.
Alas, as often happens with fashion pieces that have gone viral, when I clicked through to Asos it was sold out.
A few days later, I spotted an ad with the video of Yasmin modelling the dress, from a brand called Like My Choice.
I hadn’t heard of it, but it describes its offerings as “the newest boho chic clothes and accessories”.
To my amazement, I found the blue dress on the website, using the same photos as Asos only with the model’s head curiously cropped off.
But this dress was £42 and in stock in my size.
Surely this was too good to be true?
My suspicions were raised by the niche pricing.
The website also had very little information about the brand.
I decided to order the dress anyway, but when it came to putting payment details in, the currency was converted to dollars making the price $54, plus $6.09 for shipping.
When ordering, I was notified it would arrive in six to ten days.
Ten days later it arrived.
To compare what was delivered, I ordered the £120 original dress from Asos in the only size it had left, a six.
At first glance, the dresses looked similar, but side by side the Asos dress was far better quality, and a deeper blue.
The cheaper dress material appeared flimsy compared to the £120 dress.
That said, it looked all right — and when I asked colleagues which they thought was the more expensive, not everyone chose the Asos one.
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However, morally, it did not feel right.
I’d fallen for the photos, which were clearly taken from another site, and the influencer’s TikTok account . . . and I have very little confidence in being able to return the dress.
Lynn Whiteside, 56, from Billingshurst, West Sussex, told me she has found it impossible to return a co-ord set she bought from Like My Choice for £50.40.
She found the material “cheap and nasty” and said: “I sent the company four emails asking how to get a full refund and heard nothing back.
“Eventually, on the fifth email, I told them I had written a negative review on Trustpilot and they replied . . . ”
But Lynn says they would only send a different size, not a refund.
She says “People need to be warned not to shop with this company.”
Other sites are also taking images from legitimate brands, or influencers’ videos, and passing them off as their own.
‘TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE’
Briselle UK claims to be a “French Luxury Dress Label”, but it seems to be taking its images from UK brand House of CB.
Some customers complain of never receiving the product.
One Trustpilot review said: “Wish I’d read reviews. Seems I’ve lost my money as emailed several times to chase and nothing.”
Similarly, Beautley advertises big discounts but appears to be taking images from Aussie fashion brand Forever New.
One dress, the Amari Midi which retailed for £82 on Forever New, is called Amira Paradise on Beautley and £32.95 (discounted from £66) — using the same photos as Forever New.
James Bore, a chartered security professional, says: “The price you pay is usually for the brand, not the manufacture, and while counterfeiters often use cheaper materials and manufacturing methods that’s simply to maximise profit.
“With a bit of work most counterfeits could be indistinguishable from the real thing.
“Genuine brands are left playing whack-a-mole.
“With the difficulty of tracking down the suppliers in many of these cases, brands are largely limited to simply trying to take down listings as fast as possible and trying to stay ahead.”
To sum up, if you don’t recognise the brand that is selling the “bargain” and it seems too good to be true, it most probably is.
- We asked Like My Choice, Beautley and Briselle UK for comments but none of them responded.
HOW TO SPOT A FAKE
HELEN DEWDNEY, consumer expert at The Complaining Cow, tells how to spot a dodgy site:
1 An overly generous discount should ring alarm bells. Firms will not offer 50 to 80 per cent off high-demand products.
Dodgy sites use such offers to trigger an emotional “buy now” response. If something seems too good to be true, step away and take time to think.
2. Check feedback on independent consumer review sites. There may be a series of bad reviews.
Exclusively very positive reviews with little commentary may indicate fake reviews – moderators try to spot and minimise these.
3. Building in a sense of urgency is a common trick. This plays on human psychology, where a potential loss is more important than a potential gain.
A limited offer of only a few hours to buy at a huge discount convinces targets to act before they can become too suspicious.
4. Check the returns policy and the returns address – is it legitimate?
5. Look for poor grammar, bad spelling and sites that try to make it appear that they are based in the UK when in reality they are not.
6. Ignore reviews or star ratings displayed on companies’ own websites unless they can easily be traced back to real people. Genuine reviews on sites will also have pictures and videos.
7. Look for engagement on social media. A fake profile is more likely not to engage with people and have very few followers.
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