“Mommy, before there was Amazon, where did you shop?” my son asked me a few years ago.
“We went to the store,” I laughed.
The question made me realise how much online shopping had become part of our lives.
Amazon was the first online store I ever shopped from. In fact this was my first order.
It was 1999, before I was married. I ordered a book and two VHS tapes.
Fifteen years later, online shopping has only gotten bigger.
Even though many global brands have been opening in Manila, I still prefer to buy things online for its convenience. No traffic and no “out of stock”.
Five years ago, not a lot of Filipinos shopped online. This has totally changed.
Last year, MasterCard made an Online Shopping Behavior Study of 14 Asia Pacific countries. They found that while the number of Filipinos that shopped online remained constant at 40.2% compared to 2012, those who made at least one purchase in the last three months grew by 2.6%.
Music downloads (41.4%) and app downloads (37%) were the Filipinos’ top online purchases.
They also spent for personal, educational and professional development websites (27.6%), travel (27.2%), computer software (26.8%), airlines (26.4%), home appliance and electronic products at (25.6%), fashion and beauty (24.2%), personal care and beauty care brands (21.6%).
Entertainment is also popular with purchases from movie theatres, restaurants, and food delivery service (at 22.6%).
The three considerations for online shopping were security of payment facility, price, and convenient payment methods.
Other factors included the reputation of the website or seller, delivery or shipping costs, speed of transaction, and a good exchange or return policy.
One card program that addresses online shoppers’ need for a convenient, secure and quick way to pay online is the MasterCard Virtual Card.
A MasterCard Virtual Card is a MasterCard account number that is issued to a MasterCard credit or debit cardholder.
This allows you to manage a separate card account number for Internet use only—and you limit credit line and amount of purchases.
You can provide family members with unique accounts for online purchases and track online and retail purchases separately.
Unlike a physical plastic credit, debit or prepaid card, the MasterCard Virtual Card will not be accepted for face-to-face purchases or at in-store card payment terminals.
This was designed to protect your primary credit or bank account details from identity thieves by not having to expose information while making payments online.
So convenient, you can even apply for a MasterCard Virtual Card online or through the websites partner banks:
BDO
BPI
EastWest
Metrobank
RCBC
Security Bank
One of the setbacks I’ve had with online shopping is that one of my main credit cards always flags down my online purchases as fraud. They decline the order and bug me on the phone at odd hours to check if I made an online purchase. By getting a MasterCard dedicated to online shopping, I can avoid this inconvenience. 
