Calling canny shoppers! Win £12 off a £50 order when you try Tesco online grocery shopping like I did.

Photo credit- cnina

I like to think that I'm a bit of a canny shopper. I have to be. I plan my meals weekly, then write a shopping list. Some weeks, thanks to buying special offers to freeze, I've kept my bill down to about £30. Most weeks, it's closer to £50. I go to Costco for various things on top of that, but that doesn't add much to the weekly bill.

I like to shop online when I don't want to trail around a supermarket. It has benefits over being there but there are also downsides too. If I have kids with me, I don't have to drag them out of the toy aisle if I'm sat at home doing the shopping on the laptop but you can't pick up any last minute bargains. I've tried them all but tend to stick to one favourite site.

Tesco provided me with a voucher to try their online grocery shopping, because they have added new features to their website to make shopping easier, so I gave them another go.

They say the favourites feature is better and loads items bought on previous orders and from items you have bought in store when you use your Clubcard. However, my list was disappointingly short, which is odd as I do shop in-store semi-regularly.

What was more useful to me was the fact the items on multibuy promotions are flagged as soon as you add them to your basket so that you don't miss out. I've been on other sites that don't flag this up until you reach checkout which can be annoying so I definitely liked it.

I also liked the fact they won't charge you anymore if they substitute for something more expensive. Substitutions are often the worst part of online supermarket shopping and I've missed out on offers before because of this. And you can still reject the substitution when it turns up, and you can also reject anything you don't think is fresh enough too. They are meant also to put anything on a short date in blue bags but I had no short dated items - which is definite progress as many is the time I have had things delivered for a week and it has a use by date of the following day!

Tesco have added a special offer tab, giving details of all special offers. However, I didn't find this  particularly helpful. The groupings were too broad and you had long lists to wade through, even by departments and you couldn't filter down further. I also found product searches annoying. I searched for cauliflower and it made me choose from different departments. It didn't make clear that "Vegetables and Fruit" were frozen items! When I found the right category, one of the options was a cabbage. Equally, if you searched for yogurts, you had a great long list of products to look through and you weren't able to filter it further by type of yogurt (ie small pots, multipacks, large pots etc) or by manufacturer which would have speeded up finding the products I actually wanted. It's not fun wading through 200 items.

I would also like the option to sort the items in different ways - like showing the cheapest items at the top of the list, which I can do elsewhere. If you do that, you can just look at the items up to the budget you might have set yourself for that item. Without this, you had to scroll through the whole list. 

Finally, although delivery slots were plentiful, a two hour delivery slot is less convenient than the one hour slots I'm used to and I don't understand why Tesco do not offer it. I would have liked the option. The delivery man was very polite and brought all the boxes into the kitchen as I had opted not to have bags.

I think Tesco have made improvements and have made their grocery shopping online easier, but I do think they could still do more to make it user-friendly and quicker to complete a weekly shop.

Tesco have also given me voucher codes for £12 off a £50 spend for 10 of my blog readers to win so they can try Tesco.com grocery shopping too. Please note that these codes are for first time Tesco.com grocery shoppers only. The codes are valid from 28th February for orders delivered on or before 11th March 2011.

To be in with a chance of winning one of these codes, first follow my blog through Google Friend Connect, Networked Blogs or become an email subscriber. Then, leave a comment below and tell me your tip for saving money on your grocery shopping.

All entries must be received by midday on 28th February. The winners will be drawn at random. Codes will be emailed to the winners after the draw is made, so please ensure your email address is recorded in your Disqus profile or you leave an email address within your comment.

Terms and Conditions

1. There are 10 prizes of a code to receive £12 off your online grocery shop when you spend £50 or more. 

2. Code is valid from February 28th 2011 on a single grocery order, delivered on or before 11th March 2011. 

3. Customers must spend & have delivered £50 or more of groceries from Tesco.com/grocery. 

4. Purchases from Wine By the Case do not qualify. 

5. £50 minimum spend excludes purchases of tobacco, infant milk formulae, prescription medicines & the service charge. 

6. Valid on purchases from Tesco.com/grocery groceries site only. 

7. Valid for first-time Tesco.com grocery shoppers only. 

8. Cannot be used in conjunction with other coupons. This coupon is and shall remain the property of Tesco Stores Limited and is not for resale or publication.

9. All entrants must be following this blog via Google Friend Connect or Networked Blogs or be an email subscriber. 

10. Entries must be made via the comments on this post and all comments must be received before midday on Monday 28th February. 

11. Winners will be drawn at random from all qualifying entries. 

12. The Five Fs blog's decision on all matters is final.

(I was kindly given a voucher code for £50 off a £75 order so that I could try out Tesco's online grocery shopping site. I have received no other compensation. The opinions stated here are my own, and have not been influenced by the aforementioned compensation.)