Secure Shopping - Sage Meditation

You can shop at Sage Meditation with confidence. We have partnered with Authorize.Net, a leading payment gateway since 1996, to offer safe and secure credit card transactions for our customers.

The Authorize.Net Payment Gateway manages the complex routing of sensitive customer information through the credit card and electronic check processing networks (see an online payments diagram). Sage Meditation adheres to strict industry standards for payment processing, including:

128-bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology for secure Internet Protocol (IP) transactions.
Industry leading encryption hardware and software methods and security protocols to protect customer information.
Compliance with the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard.

For additional information regarding the privacy of your sensitive cardholder data, please read the Authorize.Net Privacy Policy.

If you prefer, we can process your transaction by phone, fax or mail. Call us at 1-800-231-0574 during our regular business hours of 9am to 5pm Central [Chicago] Time, Monday through Friday. Please call us for faxing instructions or to mail us your order.

www.sagemeditation.com is registered with the Authorize.Net Verified Merchant Seal program.

Other Safe Shopping Considerations

How do you know you are shopping with a safe website? Here are a few things to look for before making a purchase from a website:

Does the website appear Trustworthy? - A trustworthy website is neat, easy to read, easy to navigate and has links to Contact Information available on every page of the website. If the website is laiden with advertising and links that take you away from their website, one should question the motives of the website.
Does the website have complete Contact Information? - A trustworthy website will have a Contact Us page that is accessible from every page of the website. The Contact page should have the following information:
- Phone numbers including a Toll Free Number so that you are not charged long distance fees
- A physical address and not just a PO Box. The business may use a PO Box for mailing purposes, but a physical address should be shown. We show our physical address so that we are fully available to our customers.
- The name of a contact person. This is optional, but a deeper level of trust can be felt knowing the name of the person responsible for the business.
- The hours of operation including the time zone. This information is important so that customers know when they will likely reach a real person.
- An email address. If you do not have time to call or cannot call during regular business hours, an email address should be available so that you can contact the business at your convenience. Be sure to allow their email address to email you. You may need to add them to the allow list of your spam blocker.
- A contact form. If you use webmail or otherwise want to send an email without using your email program, a contact form should be available so you can contact the business without an email program. Again, you will receive an email reply, so watch your spam and junk folders for the reply
Does the website have a Privacy Policy? - The website should have a Privacy Policy that clearly outlines how your personal information is used to handle your order. The business should never sell or share your personal information with other businesses.
Does the website have a Return Policy? - The website should have a Return Policy that clearly outlines how returns are handled and your responsibility when it comes to returning products.
Does the website explain how your order will be Shipped? - The website should have a page explaining how shipments are handled and how shipping is calculated.
Does the website allow you to add items to the shopping cart AND calculate shipping before requiring you to enter your personal information? - You should be able to add items to the shopping cart and see what the shipping will cost before having to give any personal information. Sage Meditation does not require any personal information until you are ready to check out.
Is the business a member of the Better Business Bureau? - Sage Meditation is a member of BBB Online (see the logo on the left margin). This agency allows customers to report problems with the business and shows new customers whether the business has ever had any unresolved issues with customers.
Are the Better Business Bureau logo and other Security Logos clickable and do they link to information about the website and business? - Some websites will simply copy and paste logo images on their website to fool visitors into thinking the website is safe. All security logos must be clickable and open a new browser that confirms the website is a valid website that is authorized to use the security logo.
Does the website have a secure checkout? - The first indication that a website has a secure checkout process is that the Address at the top of the Internet browser begins with https. If you do not see these letters in the address on a screen where you are about to enter your credit card number, the website may not be secure. Give them a call.
Does the website request unusual information during checkout? - Most shopping websites only require your billing address, phone number, email address, shipping address, and payment information. Oftentimes there are fields for fax numbers, cell phone numbers, and comments. These are typically optional and are not required. Shopping websites should never ask for your Social Security Number.
When you call, does a real person answer the phone or call you back? - Hearing a real person on the other end of the phone is a good sign that there is a real business. Hearing a friendly person on the other end of the phone is even better. The person answering the phone should identify the company and who they are. They should also offer to be of service to you.

Indications that have little or nothing to do with Website Trustworthiness

Page Rank - If you have the Google Toolbar installed in your Internet Browser you may be able to see Google's page rank on a scale of 0 to 10. New websites oftentimes have a rank of 0 and the rank increases as more people visit the website and as the website grows. The rank is a rank of traffic and relevance. Relevance has to do with whether the website offers what it says it offers. If a website says it offers Meditation Cushions, but much of the content is about house plants it's relevancy will be low and the rank will be low. Most websites rank from 3 to 5. The most popular websites achieve higher ranks and only Google's website ranks 10. Since businesses can buy traffic throug pay-per-click advertising, traffic ranks are not a good indication of trustworthiness. If you visit a website regularly and it stays around month after month, this is a better indication that it is a legitimate business.
The website says they are trustworthy - As business owners we all try to gain your trust. We want your business and we tell you as much as possible about our business so that you will feel good and safe about purchasing from us. If a website has nothing more to say about itself aside from "we are trustworthy" and "buy from us now", they may simply be interested in selling you their products quickly and may not be there for the service after the sale.

Finally, go with your gut feeling. If something doesn't seem right about the website take the extra time to explore these points or give the business a phone call. If you don't feel any better, you may want to explore another website to make your purchase from.

Tips for Safe Shopping

Here are some pointers to protect yourself when shopping online:

Use only one credit card for online shopping - If you use the same credit card for online shopping and the card number gets "hacked", it will be much easier to manage the situation. Keep the contact information for the credit card next to the computer and have a plan established to quickly manage fraudulent use of the credit card. If you use more than one credit card, you will wonder if you need to report fraudulent use of all your cards when something happens.
Set up a separate email account for online shopping - Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) will oftentimes allow you to have more than one email account. You can also create a free email account on Yahoo or Hotmail. Create an account just for shopping. This will help you avoid Spam to your personal email account and help you manage receipts and communication from the websites where you shop.
Do not enter your social security number into a shopping website. Some websites such as the IRS website, Student Loan websites, and other government websites may request this, but shopping websites have no business requesting this information.
Do not enter your bank account numbers into a shopping website UNLESS the website shows that it is authorized to process checks for payment. If you choose to use check payment with websites, you might consider opening a separate checking account at your bank for this purpose. Most banks will help you set up a separate checking account for this purpose and can advise you on other measures to ensure that your money is not taken without your control.

We at Sage Meditation want you to be safe while shopping online. We hope that this information has been helpful to you.