Joining a Christian dating service is an excellent method of meeting people and making new friends all over the world. With a little caution and some research a Christian dating service will open a whole realm of possibilities!

The following tips will save you both time and money!

Finding a reliable dating service.

Using your favorite search engine type in "Christian dating service", a search at Goggle will produce 59 + Million results. Focus on the first ten or twenty results and forget the rest.

Click on the individual results and check out the home page of each site. What you are looking for is a service that offers a full access free trial membership of seven to thirty days. A free trial provides the opportunity to get a feel for the membership of that site and the number of members that match you criteria. For example if you're sixty and the majority of the membership is under forty the possibility of a good match is fairly slim.

During your free trial be suspicious of unexpected emails or contacts, some unscrupulous site owners pay people to contact trial members to influence them to sign up as paid members.

If the number of active members appears to be lower than the site claims, go to Alexa.com type the U.R.L. of the site you're considering and check out the ranking for that service. Alexa also provides statistics on the number of visitors to the site. If the ranking is higher than three hundred thousand to four hundred thousand then the site probably has very few real members.

Check for user satisfaction.

While you're at the Alexa site, scroll to the bottom to see if there are any negative reviews posted by unhappy users. As an added precaution, once again using your favorite search engine, type in the name of the site, you're checking out, plus the word 'scam' or 'rip-off' if there are any complaints about the site they will appear in the search results.

A superb site for checking out any online business is called ripoffreport.com.

Know what you're getting into and how to get out of it.

Read the sites 'terms of service and 'privacy policy' very carefully. Most online dating sites will automatically bill your credit card once a month unless you turn off automatic billing. Make sure that you know where to find that link should you want to turn it off.

Check the contact us page, if you have a problem is a telephone number and physical address provided, or is email the only way to resolve an issue.

Be certain that your financial information is secure!

Your financial info is not meant for public viewing and extra precautions should be taken. Before filling in your credit card info take a look at the page you are on. Check the U.R. L. in the address bar the first five letters should read 'https' with the S. indicating that the site has been verified by a reputable party, with certified paperwork, issued an S.S.L. security certificate and that the site is encrypted to protect your info.

S.S.L. Certificate

An S.S.L. digital certificate is an electronic file that uniquely identifies site owners and servers. Digital certificates allow the client (Web browser) to authenticate the server prior to establishing an SSL session. Typically, digital certificates are signed by an independent and trusted third party to ensure their validity. The "signer" of a digital certificate is known as a Certification Authority (CA), such as VeriSign

Check for a closed padlock icon in the bottom right corner of your browser.

Adjust your browser to warn you about secure and non-secure sites and sites with certificates that have expired.

For internet explorer go to tools>internet options>click the advance tab>scroll down to the security section and make sure that the following are checked. Check for publisher's certificate revocation, enable integrated windows authentication, enable profile assistant, use ssl2.0, use ssl3.0, warn about invalid site certificates, warn if changing between secure and not secure mode, warn if forms submittal is being redirected.

To insure your online dating service safety: If any of the above is missing, find another online dating service that cares enough to protect your financial information.