It's pretty difficult to beat the conveniences offered by online shopping, but even the most experienced online shoppers might not know all of the tricks of the trade. Here are three insider secrets to ensure that your holiday online shopping experience is a good one.

1. Use credit cards. Last year, American shoppers spent more than $23 billion online during the holiday season, according to the eSpending Report from Goldman, Sachs & Co.; Harris Interactive; and Nielsen-NetRatings. The safest way to spend that money is with a credit card.

Avoid using your debit card. Most debit cards have fraud protections, but your bank account could be overdrawn while you dispute charges. The big three credit card issuers, American Express, MasterCard and Visa, have a zero liability policy. You pay nothing for unauthorized transactions if you notify your financial institution.

For extra fraud protection, sign up for MasterCard's SecureCode (www.mastercard .com/securecd/welcome.do) or Visa's Verified by Visa (usa.visa.com/personal/securi ty/vbv/index.html). These are password challenge programs for online shopping.

Under the programs, you create a password. Participating online stores will request that password for purchases. The password request appears via a pop-up window, so you might have to disable pop-up blockers. MasterCard and Visa list participating stores on their Web sites.

Also, most credit card companies offer numbers for one-time use. Check your card issuer's Web site for more information. In some cases, a one-time number may only work with stores you designate.

2. Clip those coupons. Not all coupons arrive in your Sunday newspaper; some come by e-mail. Many online stores provide regular customers with promotional codes. These codes are entered during the online checkout process. They save you money, just like a traditional coupon.

Promotional codes usually offer free shipping or a reduced price. Often, online stores offer multiple codes, but you'll probably have to use one or the other. Codes typically give you money off on standard ground shipping. If you need something in a hurry, that's the one to skip.

3. Disposable e-mail. You must register an e-mail address with stores. The store e-mails a confirmation of your purchase and, often, tracking information. Also, it may send you promotional codes, along with unwanted e-mail.

There are a couple of ways to handle this. You could create a new e-mail address, adding "buy," "store" or "shopping" to your current one, for use at online stores. For example, if your e-mail address were joesmith@hotmail.com, your new one could be joesmithshopping@hotmail.com. A number of sites offer free e-mail, including Hotmail, Yahoo and Netscape.

Or, sign up for a disposable e-mail address. Free services such as spamgourmet (www.spamgourmet.com) and Sneakemail (www.sneakemail .com) allow you to create a temporary e-mail address. They forward mail to that address to your "real" one. Sign up for a temporary address before making a purchase. When you've received your purchases and are satisfied with them, you can eliminate the temporary address.

Contact Kim Komando at gnstech@gns.gannett.com.