An online marketplace Temu launched in September with much fanfare, with major news outlets such as the Wall Street Journal reporting on its establishment. Here’s why the online marketplace is not a scam and is totally legitimate, and you can trust it with your online shopping needs.

Reason #1: Temu is part of one of the world’s biggest e-commerce groups

Temu is the latest addition to the Nasdaq-listed PDD e-commerce group. The group also operates Pinduoduo, a third-party online marketplace that connects independent sellers with buyers through a digital platform. The group was founded in 2015 and listed on the Nasdaq in 2018. It’s a constituent stock of the Nasdaq-100 Index, alongside tech giants such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Tesla.

PDD’s current market cap (about $80 billion) makes it more valuable than captains of industry such as Boeing and General Electric. At one point, PDD surpassed $200 billion in market cap, making it one of the most valuable companies in the world. The company is profitable, having made $5.3 billion in profit in the 12 months ended June 2022 on $14 billion in revenue. It had 11.5 million active merchants on its platform offering a broad range of product categories.

While you may not have heard of Pinduoduo, it’s a giant in China, where it serves close to 900 million consumers and handled 61 billion orders in 2021. It surpassed Alibaba in the number of active buyers in 2021. Pinduoduo is also the largest agricultural platform in the country, connecting more than 16 million farmers to the digital economy. It handled $42 billion in agricultural-related transactions in 2020.

Reason #2: Temu can offer ultracompetitive prices because of its advantage in sourcing

There’s the tendency to associate price with quality and to dismiss low-priced products as low quality or even counterfeit or fakes. However, what many consumers do not know is the level of markups that exist in the retail industry, especially in so-called discretionary purchases where retailers price their products at what they think consumers will pay, rather than base it on what they cost to make. There’s also a lot of inefficiencies in conventional retailing (just think of all the out-of-season markdowns for unsold merchandise!). All of the costs associated with misjudging demand, logistics missteps are all eventually borne by the consumer in the final sticker price.

Temu offers some of the most competitive prices you can find anywhere. It can do this because it has a superior sourcing network that goes direct to the manufacturers who make these products. It then connects these manufacturers directly to the end-consumer (that’s you), ensuring that the prices are wallet-friendly because the middlemen standing between factory and buyer are removed.

With fewer intermediaries, the costs of distribution (fewer layers of markups) are lower, translating into lower prices. The low price has nothing to do with quality as they are the exact same products – but the same products cost less on Temu because Temu is much more efficient in helping consumers discover these products than others. This is also thanks to the vast network of merchants that sister company Pinduoduo has built up over the years.

The group has a zero-tolerance policy against counterfeits and fakes and will punish errant merchants if they were found to have infringed on the platform’s rules.

Reason #3: Peace Of Mind With Temu’s Returns And Refunds Policy

Shady online marketplaces do not advertise their returns and refunds policy but Temu has been shouting out loud about its 90-day return policy. Buyers can return most items in new and unused condition during the period and receive a full refund. Refunds will be processed within seven days of Temu receiving the returned package. The shipping charge for the first return on any order is borne by Temu.

On top of this, buyers get a full refund for late deliveries and get to keep the items. Their orders can also be tracked on the website.

With such safeguards, consumers can shop with full peace of mind on Temu. Under Temu’s Purchase Protection program, consumers can easily get help in the rare case that something goes wrong when shopping from a small business on the platform. Buyers will get a full refund if their items do not arrive, arrive damaged, or are not as described.

Reason #4: Temu Works With Reputable Payment Partners

Shopping on a new site can be slightly unnerving especially where payment is concerned. There is no worry with Temu as it works with major payments providers in the world to handle transactions. For example, it accepts credit card payments through Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Diners Club, Maestro, JCB and through digital payments such as PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay. In addition, it also works with Klama and Afterpay for buy-now, pay later payment arrangements.

Temu does not collect customer credit or debit card information or personal information during the payment process, which is handled by the third-party payment providers. All these platforms have stringent consumer protection policies and state-of-the-art technology in place to guard against fraudulent merchant transactions.

Consumers can shop on Temu with full confidence that their interests will be protected.

Reason #5: Temu Protects Intellectual Property Rights

Temu is a marketplace where third-party sellers can sell their goods directly to consumers. Temu is committed to protecting everyone’s intellectual property rights and has a strict policy against the listing or sale of products that violates a third-party’s trademark, copyright or patent rights.

The company will strive to respond quickly by removing or disabling access to the allegedly infringing material when it receives a report of intellectual property infringement that complies with this intellectual property policy.