question about international shipping

still nothing.
I think my parcel has been stolen now
whinging_gif.gif
 
moonlight said:
still nothing.
I think my parcel has been stolen now
whinging_gif.gif

This really sucks :mad: Has anyone else had a package shipped to France go missing? This was my first time shipping outside the USA and must say I probably will never do so again. If this were a $50 knife I would chalk it up to experience, but a Sebenza :(
 
Next time use a Global Priority envelope.It has a tracking # and I have never had any trouble at all.Delivery time is usally 3 to 5 days.Most of the time the cost is less than sending something air mail in a box.
 
I've been sending and receiving high dollar knives from all over the place (mainly by USPS),and never had problems in any way!!!
I always use USPS global priority.
But I can give one advice.....,if the buyer/seller do not know each other and there is no way to verify if either one have good feedback on previous sales,it would be wise to send an expensive knife with trackingnumber and delivery-conformation!

a) It gives the seller the opportunity to see that the knive was delivered and received by the buying-party.
b) It gives the buyer the chance to see that the knife was actually shipped by the seller.

A lot comes down to trust and honour.......,unfortunately more and more people show up on the various forums who don't have either!!!

I hope this helps for future reference!
 
overlord1 said:
This really sucks :mad: Has anyone else had a package shipped to France go missing? This was my first time shipping outside the USA and must say I probably will never do so again. If this were a $50 knife I would chalk it up to experience, but a Sebenza :(

It is the first time I lost a parcel. And as you said, if it was a butter knife it was no big deal, but a sebenza :mad:
I am as sorry as you are about this bad experience. I think we did the mistake to not send it with a registred mail for few bucks more. I think your PO really give you a bad advise or no advise at all, for a more secure shipping.
So, Ed, we talk about it next week end as we said, by emails?
Let me know what we can do...

julien
 
Bummer dude, From the US to Japan is 5-7 days either Air mail or Global Priority. From Japan to Italy was 7 days because 2 of them fell on a national holiday, Japan to Sweden 5 days.

Too late now I guess, but for future reference ask anyone sending from the US to use USPS Global Priority it should cost about $8-15 for average size/weight knives.

List the item as 'Precision ground steel'
 
Sorry for your problems.

My experience is that it takes from monday to friday from the US to my door.
ONE day transit over the pond, the rest by domestic surface mail.
Any delay is caused by package being held by customs.
This is with USPS, UPS, FedEx, DHL and Airborne Express.

Summa summarum, both the regular Postal service and the other services never failed me...
But then again, Norway is kinda small and doesn't generate all that much postal traffic, so it's more transparent and less chaotic than it would be in a larger country.
 
Just an update about this sad and strange story...

Sad because it seems that my large sebenza was finally lost for ever.
What a bad experience ! It was the worst one for me... :(
I trusted Overlord1 when he told me he did everything I could for me. And he finally told me that he will refound me the half of the value of the knife. :rolleyes:
But... he never did it for the moment :(

His last mail dated from 04/19/2006 said :

Julien,
Sorry for not having the first payment to you as I promised. You will have it by this weekend ($50) to your paypal account. I have been a little short of money after having to pay several $$$ in taxes recently. Thanks for your patience.

Ed


Since this day, he never paid me a cent, and he never answered to my emails.
Now I begin to doubt about his honesty...
Did he swimdle me? It was very simple to do... I'm in the other side of the ocean. I never saw a pic of the knife, only a parcel with my name on it.
When I told him my doubts, he said in the end of March:

Julien,
This is also my worst experience in many years of trading/buying knives. I have never had a package lost/stolen before. As a collector, you know you have a favorite knife and mine happens to be the Sebenza. The Bloodwood Sebenza to be exact. At one point I had THREE, yes 3 Bloodwood Sebenzas. The one I shipped you, one which I sold to another person and a small Bloodwood Sebenza. Just for the record, I did not choose the worst shipping method possible. The worst shipping method possible is by surface (sea) which takes 6 weeks. I chose the least expensive air service which happens to be "air parcel". I was told delivery in 14 days maximum. As I said, before this I had NEVER shipped a knife outside the USA. Therefore I did not know what would be the best/safest method. I trusted what the USPS told me. I have been completely honest with you and am as sick as you about this apparent loss. Looking back, I should have insisted on insuring the knife for $400. If you were unwilling to pay the appropriate duties then I should have refused to sell the knife to you. I was trying to help out a fellow knife collector. Since the package was not insured, I have no way of confirming whether the knife was in fact not delivered to you. I am trusting that you are being honest with me too. In any case I am willing to split the loss 50/50 as you suggested over several weeks time since I do not have the money in full to send you. I'm sorry that this has been such a bad experience for both of us.

Ed


So, I called USPS to explain my case, and they answered me that Ed had to contact them because they could perhaps track my parcel in spite of the parcel wasn't insured. I told Ed to do that but he never answered me again.
Very weird case...
Maybe something wrong happened to him? (I don't hope that, of course...)

Any advises?
 
moonlight said:
Update : Ed sent me 25$ few days ago...
Moonlight

I am very sorry to hear that this precious knife has gone missing. Although it seems as though it has truly disappeared, do not give up hope. I have seen packages turn up after months.

I must say that I think that Ed is being very generous to send you $25.00. He is not liable for this and you knew the risk.

You and I had a transaction last year and I did send you a new Sebenza valued at $400.00. You also decided to have me ship it by airmail with no tracking and no insurance. Fortunately, you did receive the package, but it took close to a month. I feel that it is OK for me to mention this here as you did bring it up on BF yourself when it was happening.

You could have paid me $15.00 more for secure FedEx (or UPS) shipping and have the package in your hands within 2 business days. But, you chose to save the $15.00.

This is clearly your prerogative, but as you are a serious enthusiast and love knives perhaps you could consider spending just a it more to be safe and comfortable while your package is over the ocean?

This will give you and your supplier peace of mind and drastically reduce the possibility of any loss or failure to have recourse with the carrier- where it belongs.

Anyway, I know that these knives cost a lot and every penny counts so please accept this message in the spirit of friendship and to help secure more successful international deals.

Bien a vous,

Neil
 
I've received sharp stuff from New Zealand and Canada, longest for me so far has been a custom from Brazil still waiting on. Stuff has taken a while to get to Thailand and Italy from me, about two weeks.
 
My experience: tracking number doesn't matter, because it is tracked only in USA (I am talking about USPS global priority). It is logical, who would track it for USPS in other countries with other post companies :)
Next thing is that I do understand why to have expensive thing shipped uninsured, probably even with low declared value -
1)it will not attract thiefs
2)taxes and customs duty can be easily 25% or even more (for $400 you can end with about $500, + shipping and insurance ) of the original value

My experience is it usually takes about 2 days for package to leave USA, and about next 2 weeks to get to my doors :(

That said I think it is up to anyone to compare risks and advantages of such deals and I really wonder that overlord1 was so honest to take half of the loss.
IMHO it is very mean of you, Moonlight, to acuse him or crying here that he hasn't paid you.
In same logic he could acuse you that you have received Sebenza and want to get half the price back.
I don't know any of you what I have said is just how I see it.

I hope the Sebenza will appear and it was just some kind of delay in post machinery.
 
I beg to differ that tracking only works in the US even for USPS.

Use the Global Express Mail starting at $15.00 for 3 to 7 working day delivery provided the package is not stopped by customs.

http://www.usps.com/global/globalexpressmail.htm

In Asia the GEM is handled by EMS and even DHL. In Malaysia the GEM tracking and delivery is handled by Poslaju, the Malaysian equivelant. So go to the post office to find out the cheepest and fastest way to send items overseas. U might be surprised. If possible NEVER use airmail, its not worth it for the wait and rate of loss.
 
I still don't receive my refund for my lost sebenza. Ed just sent me 25$ and that's all.
He sent my many mails saying that he send me a payment but he never took his promess.
I was nice, I just ask him the half of the price I paid for this sebenza "lost in the mail".
He never sent me a pic of the knife before the deal ; I never had the evidence that he sent me the parcel ; he didn't do the effort to contact USPS as I told himto try to find the parcel.

I think I've been screwed by this guy ! :mad:
 
moonlight said:
I think I've been screwed by this guy ! :mad:
You seem to specialize in thinking you've been screwed by people. Usually after getting into situations of your own free will without fully understanding the ramifications of your own actions. Your whining and complaining, always unfounded, both on this forum and another we both frequent, is reaching legendary proportions. I know I would certainly never sell you anything. For shipments from the US, Global Express Mail offers COMPLETE traceability at a cost that, in the case of something like a Sebenza, is very modest.
 
I don't know where you saw that, Deacon.
The only problem I had and it was my fault, I made an apologize and it was a good ending.
 
I contact Ed about a sebenza on knifeforums.
He answered me that It was too late but he had another large bloodwood sebenza for me if I wanted. I trusted him and asked to send me that knife with a low value on the parcel because of the customs taxes. He never sent me a pic of this knife, but I trusted him because He had good feedbacks here. He just send me a pic of the parcel with my adress on it :


He declared 100$ of value and didn't insure the parcel (he could for 100$).
Then, I never received the parcel.
I contacted him to explain my problem, and we decided to wait few weeks more. Still nothing.
He told me he couldn't do anything because there is no tracking service with an air post mail.
I contacted USPS and they told me that Ed could contact them to find a solution. He never answered me.
I was nice and proposed a 50/50 refund with the promess of if the parcel appears, we would stay in contact and refund totally the other. He said ok.
All I had is 25$ for the moment. Everytimes, he answered me that he will send me payment this week-end, then he plays the dead.
I don't know what to do...
 
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