If you ever get involved in a conversation with people about buying glasses online and mention how much cheaper they are than high street opticians, you can see their eyes fog over as they express their reluctance to buy glasses over the internet. They seem to find it hard to give an actual reason but if you pursue the matter it eventually emerges that they feel that buying glasses on line is simply not safe.
However it’s not that they have concerns about using their credit card with internet glasses companies as most people now shop online for something or other. Rather it seems to be that glasses are unique to the individual. Firstly you have an eye test and this results in your prescription. Then you choose your frames and go back to your high street optician two weeks later to collect the finished article.
Buying glasses online is actually not so different. You go to a High Street Optician and have your eye test as normal, this is the bit of the process that checks everything is fine with your eyes, and you end up with a prescription. What you now do is visit a glasses online company, enter your prescription details, and choose a pair of frames. Your glasses normally arrive through your letterbox within a couple of weeks.
So the differences between buying glasses over the internet and from your High Street Optician are not that different after all, particularly when you learn that most High Street Opticians send the glasses along with your prescription to an optical service company who make and fit the lenses, just like your online optician will.
But what if I get the prescription wrong when I enter it?, I hear you cry. Well the better glasses online companies employ opticians who check all orders. If anything looks odd they will contact you to double check. Finally if when you get your glasses you change your mind, or just don’t like them the glasses online company will give you your money back. Will your High Street Optician do the same?