Shipping Problems

Over the past several months I have had significant problems receiving items I’ve ordered through online vendors. Living in the Philippines what I’m really talking about is international orders. So that this doesn’t sound like a simple rant, I will start by conceding several issues. I am very aware and sympathetic concerning the impact of the global Covid pandemic on businesses, including both public and private carrier services. Adding to the worldwide impacts of Covid, the Philippines, like much of Asia, has been experiencing a surge of cases. The surge has tightened restrictions even more. The government and private sectors that remain open are employing even smaller skeleton crews. I accept this impact and wouldn’t suggest any different form of mitigation.

What I would like to ask, if others have had similar experiences, is what shipping methods have worked the best. Traditionally, having things (most are from the U.S.) shipped through USPS priority international and then delivered by the Philippines postal service was the cheapest and slowest. Although it was rare, once they arrived in the Philippines they would sometimes magically disappear. The fastest and most secure was through the private carrier services such as FedEx, UPS or DHL. The shipping was more and they added their own “handling” fees but that was more of an annoyance than a reason to choose regular mail. I have had 3 orders come since the surge began. Each was handled by one of the private carriers and each had serious problems.

Has anyone had similar problems and found a solution?

I think some services use the pandemic as a bad excuse either for their poor service or to save money by doing less to give a better service sadly.
Some buisnesses struggle from loosing workers and activity of course.
I have experienced up to 6 weeks delivery time these last months. usually three weeks from Asia to here, 2-3 weeks from US, 1-2 weeks from UK. Now often double that, but so far all get here eventually.

There has been differences depending what service you use in what region. some of the parcel recieved here in Norway would get a large fee from handling. it is supposed to be 25% VAT fee and then some but i never quite get the grips on why it varies, kinda random but most often DHL end up with a extra fee..

Also thru my work i heard that some services in some countries should be avoided as parcels seem to go missing some places. And for some countries customs papers must be filled in the exact correct way to make it there on time.

Thanks for your reply Yakusa. The shipping times have certainly been impacted. Pre-pandemic, shipping through the postal service would take about 4 – 6 weeks and it would take about 7 – 10 days with the private carriers. I have mentally prepared for the delays but have had a more serious issue recently.

Bringing things in with a value exceeding (about) $200 USD, would result in duties being applied. Like you, I have given up trying to figure out their method of applying duties. Generally the cost (duties, handling, storage) ends up being about 30% of the value of the import. I have had as high as 60%. Over the years I have simply resigned myself to the cost. The problem with the recent orders is that they seem to have been held by either, or a combination of, the carrier and customs. While I’m not exactly sure why, it would seem as though there was confusion with import classification. This resulted in items being held and penalties being applied on 2 FedEx shipments. I was lucky that I was able to resolve it fairly quickly as the penalties could have easily exceeded the cost of the items. A third shipment through DHL was apparently almost seized. I couldn’t get a straight answer on the issues. As far as I can guess, there were questions whether or not it contained restricted items. These were all car accessories which I have ordered for years without any problems or delays. If a DHL agent hadn’t intervened for me, my problems could have been worse than penalty fees. Two days ago I received a package through the postal service from the U.S. It arrived without issue. I am now wondering if things have switched and the private carriers are the risky method.

I recognize that, being in the Philippines, my case may be too unique. I am still curious if others have had shipping problems and, if they have, whether they have found a solution.

One of the biggest problems is shipping containers, many of them are in the wrong place due to pandemic, on top of that people are buying them for various reasons, working from home and change of business model. My brother was told by a wonk high up in NHS procurement, that there are thousands of containers full of PPE. I guess they are cheap warehousing.
A mate just been scammed trying to buy one and lost £1700, apparently a very common scam as people are desperate to buy them.
Two businesses have set up near me doing storage so have bought a few dozen between them. I'm guessing some of the stockpiling for brexit is stored this way as well. Read the other day, used to cost around a grand to ship one from China, now more than 7 grand, think price increase for goods includes that??

Strange but today one of the last the last things I ordered from Epray came to my postbox. Ordered May 15 and arrived this morning May 28. a small fan and a solar panel for my Suzuki camper trailer.
Almost a new record I think from Guangzhou, China to Norway.

But stuff i ordered in april still not arrived. two months from US for a small parcel last month. I do try to order stuff from Europe mostly (except DE) and UK mainly. more stable and more often no problems.

Lambert: I would be interested to hear about your item in customs. Like everyone who responded, I have faced delays in shipping. My biggest problem/concern is what happens once the parcel reaches the Philippines and passes through customs. As I stated, I'm not sure why there has been an issue. The only thing that I can guess is that the reduced staff of either the private carriers (who usher the items through customs) or of the customs agents has resulted in people who are not typically the frontline workers now handling the parcels. I wouldn't be too concerned except that this has resulted in more serious problems than delays.

As I said, that is only a guess and whatever the problem is may be unique to here. If anyone else has had issues with items passing through customs, I would be interested in hearing what happened. I may try ordering a couple of more small items with one shipping through the postal service and the other through FedEx to see what happens.