Thread Starter
#76
Guide: Online Shopping Abroad & Customs Formalities
- Thread Starter Dr MUDHAN
- Start date
Sir can you give some simple steps to order from aliexpress?
I am about to order item of about RS 3500. Any idea for the custom price for this amount in approx?
I live in Guwahati, if i enter the address or area of my home will it be coming to guwahati custom office?
I am about to order item of about RS 3500. Any idea for the custom price for this amount in approx?
I live in Guwahati, if i enter the address or area of my home will it be coming to guwahati custom office?
Thread Starter
#78
@ Sumit2830
Register with AE, creating your account.
Go to AE page , select the item to add to cart , while doing so you will be indicated same/similiar item, check whether it is the same and price is still cheaper , add to cart all. Read carefully the descriptions and select the best in price. Always see the feedback and select the best.
Use your Credit Card , pay online. If you use Mobile AE App, it still gets cheaper.
Kindly read this thread fully, you will get thorough.
The item will reach Mumbai or Kolkata Airport Sorting Office - Guwahati Custom Office – Guwahati Foreign Post Office & delivered to you.
Custom duty depends upon your luck /your item / moods of the custom officer as they never follow the regulation norms. Don’t worry, generally you would be lucky.
Register with AE, creating your account.
Go to AE page , select the item to add to cart , while doing so you will be indicated same/similiar item, check whether it is the same and price is still cheaper , add to cart all. Read carefully the descriptions and select the best in price. Always see the feedback and select the best.
Use your Credit Card , pay online. If you use Mobile AE App, it still gets cheaper.
Kindly read this thread fully, you will get thorough.
The item will reach Mumbai or Kolkata Airport Sorting Office - Guwahati Custom Office – Guwahati Foreign Post Office & delivered to you.
Custom duty depends upon your luck /your item / moods of the custom officer as they never follow the regulation norms. Don’t worry, generally you would be lucky.
Tracking information show . Retention Reason : Retained by customs for unspecified reason
Kindly help me. My product hold by customs officers in Chennai. kindly guide how to get my product.
Kindly guide me and give me is there any contact details available.
Kindly help me. My product hold by customs officers in Chennai. kindly guide how to get my product.
Kindly guide me and give me is there any contact details available.
Thread Starter
#80
@Rajasekaranmari
Don’t worry and be patient. The goods are at customs for their inspection and review of custom duty. May take 15 t0 20 days more to clear and to be received by you. They will open the pocket, inspect, check value on line and repack it to send to you. If you are lucky no customs duty would be levied or otherwise, you may expect 30% of the value that you have to pay at the time of receiving from the post man. If it exorbitant, you may refuse to receive and you will lose at your cost. You can also make a request to re consider reduction of duty as described the procedures in this thread earlier.
Hope for the best.
Don’t worry and be patient. The goods are at customs for their inspection and review of custom duty. May take 15 t0 20 days more to clear and to be received by you. They will open the pocket, inspect, check value on line and repack it to send to you. If you are lucky no customs duty would be levied or otherwise, you may expect 30% of the value that you have to pay at the time of receiving from the post man. If it exorbitant, you may refuse to receive and you will lose at your cost. You can also make a request to re consider reduction of duty as described the procedures in this thread earlier.
Hope for the best.
Thread Starter
#81
THIS THREAD was started SIX YEARS before at that time when many of us were not aware of buying things abroad.
I am also proud that our TAI is the first Auto Forum to have such a thread in their ‘The Automotive Library’
I did share some of my experience and tips to our TAI-gers which I hope, would have been useful to them.
I have become the Platinum Member of AliExpress , have been buying many things for me and for my friends. Also bought things from www.banggood.com.
I personally feel things have improved now little better in shipping speed and on their approach to customer grievance. In general, Indian Customs (import) side attitude is also better than before ( May be due to more imports and avoid clearing delay) .
Of course, even now I do come across Sellers of unethical business practice on online platform as they will show the best of original item in their sales web page but send copycat / counterfeit products. Those poor quality products will make you feel disappointed and very sad sometimes.
China Market is a funny market where they have different grades of same item to be sold in different countries. They sell the better one in US as the consumer laws are very stringent. In some cases, they have US/EUROPEAN quality and INDIAN quality.
If one product becomes successful, there they follow copying the product like first copy, second copy(copy of the first copy,more they copy the quality deteriorates) and third so on - ultimately larger margin to seller for the third grade pathetic product at the cost of the consumer.
I am not telling all are worst, there are some honest sellers, they help even after the 10 days of trial period.
Let me REFRESH THIS THREAD by sharing my experience little more and tips for the benefit of our forum members.
- During online purchase abroad note, the maximum discount offered during the month of November (11:11) and Black Friday periods.
- Avoid placing order just before / during Chinese New year (The Chinese New Year of 2020 falls on January 25th, and the festival will last to February 8th, about 15 days ) as shipping time will be much delayed.
- Always check for AliExpress Discount coupon that you can use for purchases of value more than Rs.1000, which can be even combined value of different items.
- Don’t order immediately, place in CART first. The reason is once you place in cart, you can see similar items even for less value from different seller that will help you to delete and add the new one.
- Select the Seller based on Seniority (Business Years), Order Numbers, Genuine Feed Back.
- Use Mobile APP for More / Better discount.
- Ensure clarification ( About quality as described, compatibility with your equipment etc.,) about the product with the Seller by contacting him before placing the order if you have any doubt / required.
- While placing the order give a note to the seller in the appropriate space, as not to mention as GIFT.
- All most all the sellers are showing lesser value on the pack for avoiding customs duty. It doesn’t mean that the seller charged more from us. You can also make request for a reasonable value.
- It’s better to choose the favorable shipping logistics like AliExpress Standard Shipping / China Post Registered Mail even if costs little bit more (if it worth) for fast and guaranteed shipping / receipt.
- If you have placed the order by normal, unregistered logistics you need to carefully follow the dead line as my experience shows loss / theft of goods to the extend of 15% on transit.. If you have not received it within the guaranteed period of 60 days, you can request the seller to extend the shipping period 15 more days or raise a DISPUTE claim within 70 days (60 + 10 days) with AliExpress and they will definitely refund your money.
- Don’t allow the seller to extend the period beyond 60 days, in case if he makes it without your consent, normally they will extend for another 30 days (Total 90 Days), in that case wait 15 days more after 60 days, and raise dispute with AE on trust.
- In case, if you receive the item lately after getting the refund you can honestly pay back the money to the seller by making another order, but sending a note to the seller that not to send the item as that is towards repayment of money received.
- On receipt of the item, don’t throw the parcel cover, check the item whether you received it without damages, if there is a damage beyond self-repair, take a clear photo of both the cover and item showing defects, damages and, raise the dispute. AE immediately will refund the money if the damaged goods appear to be unusable.
- If you received badly damaged item or a wrong item but have still more time, don’t confirm receipt but contact the seller, send the photo, he will either ask you to raise DISPUTE or assure you to send replacement. In this case, ask the seller to indicate the new tracking ID to ensure replacement is on the way and wait until the guaranteed period. Still if not received, raise the dispute and get back your money but note everything must be within the guaranteed / extended period. You should be also careful that some seller promises to send replacement but they will not and they will drag the days to complete the period so to expire and to lose your right of claim.
- The main issue /difficulty will arise when you receive the item ordered but not \ functioning or partly damaged but manageable or a counterfeit item of very poor quality against what seller described in his sales page. I will guide you later with my own experience the ways to be dealt.
- Don’t raise a False / Fraud claim as though you have not received despite you received in good condition / within the period.
- Send real time photographs / videos only during Dispute / Refund Proposals.
- Regarding usage of Credit / Debit Card so far no issues. But still, it is better to have an exclusive DEBIT CARD (international transaction provision) with minimum balance for online abroad transactions, as Bank approval is direct and not through OTP security measures.
- If you are happy and had a pleasant business transaction, don't forget to acknowledge receipt in time (The seller will get his money from AE at the earliest) , give genuine feed back, help others asking clarification about the product that you purchased which will give you a better credibility.
- BANGGOOD.COM may ask you the details of your PAN / AADHAR , You can disclose as its required for INDIA DIRECT shipping. This is a better method if available, mostly you may not have Custom Duty. Select Insurance cover 'loss in transit' for safer side. My experience indicates that dealing with AE is easier than any other Chinese sites like BANGGOOD, GEARBEST, prices are also competitive there. The equivalent INDIA DIRECT logistics with AliExpress is GATI & Special Line-YW. Banggood uses AllJoy courier to deliver in India.`
![[:D]](https://www.theautomotiveindia.com/forums/images/smilies/Big%20Smile.gif "Big Smile [:D]")
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I used to buy using credit card at Aliexpress one day morning when I am causally looking at messages on phone I am shocked, USD 2000 used at aliexpress that too mid night. Fortunately my card issuer bank rejected the transactions and returned money. Due to that reason I am using Webmoney now.
Thread Starter
#83
@ Suryaputhra
Its good, you created awareness. Kindly guide on the procedures and how best we can use the webmoney transactions, for the benefit of our forum members.
Its good, you created awareness. Kindly guide on the procedures and how best we can use the webmoney transactions, for the benefit of our forum members.
Hi, definitely I will guide the members. I will write the procedure in a day or two.
I'm afraid your credit card details have been breached and whoever has the details will do international transaction again so I strongly suggest you to block that card and get a new one if you haven't already.
Here is little bit about how a credit/debit card info is leaked online and how to be careful:
1. Many eCommerce sites allow you to store your credit/debit card information for later use, making repeated purchases easy. Reputed sites highly encrypt this information and incase they notice data breach, they will immediately alert the users but some sites or payment gateways have security flaws or weak encryption that make your information vulnerable. I would suggest not to save your bank details anywhere online and if you receive alert about data breach, secure your information asap (i.e change password, replace card if its leaked and etc).
2. Infected devices (Smartphone, PC, Laptop, Router) can also steal your card details while making online transactions. Old hardware, drivers and softwares can also be vulnerable. Using more then 10 year old computer with Windows XP for bank transactions is very bad idea. Most routers or modems provided by ISPs aren't secured either so instead get yourself a router or modem of reputed brand and change the default password to a strong one. Keep your devices protected with latest antivirus and security patches. Remove suspicions softwares and games.
3. You need to be doubly careful when using a smartphones for online fund transfer and online shopping. OTP authentication is not safe as you may think.
The purpose of an OTP is to prevent fraud by confirming that the person making the transaction and the credit/debit card owner are one and the same but is the smartphone used to send and receive an OTP innocuous? Regrettably, not very. What seemed to be like a strong authentication process when it was first introduced is nowadays easily bypassed or accessed by mobile apps (Including infected by malware).
For example in Whats app setup, you enter your mobile no and then it sends OTP from their server to your number and the app automatically fetches SMS for OTP for confirmation. Same thing happens in eCommerce apps while making payments and I have seen some OTP's having no details about transaction amount, just the pass code!
Of course the app will ask you permission to intercept SMS and some payment gateways have option to get OTP from bank's website but how many people are aware? They just accept everything and do the payment believing the app is safe and then end up losing huge amount. Even if the app is safe, the smartphone could be infected with a spyware and it tracks whatever you do. Once it gets your card details, it will make the transaction, get OTP from your phone and deletes the SMS once done. This all happens in the background and you'll not be aware until you get notification from bank. Clicking URL links sent by unknown person (Via email, whatsapp, sms) is very bad idea and thats how you get malware.
I always use my PC for most of online transactions and manually enter OTP that is sent to my smartphone. For mobile banking I use one phone for the transaction and another phone for receiving OTP.
4. International stores (Like Aliexpress, Banggood, Gearbest and etc) don't use OTP for placing orders and its good for fraudsters to buy items using leaked card details. It doesn't mean card owner has registered in that site and that is being leaked or hacked. One of my friend came across fraud just like what happened to Suryaputhra but he never visited Aliexpress. May be his card details was leaked somewhere else and fraudster tried to place order on Aliexpress. Fortunately bank rejected the transactions and refunded his money.
Ask your bank if they can provide OTP for international transactions and if you don't make international purchases, I believe there is an option to disable international transactions in your online bank account.
Here is little bit about how a credit/debit card info is leaked online and how to be careful:
1. Many eCommerce sites allow you to store your credit/debit card information for later use, making repeated purchases easy. Reputed sites highly encrypt this information and incase they notice data breach, they will immediately alert the users but some sites or payment gateways have security flaws or weak encryption that make your information vulnerable. I would suggest not to save your bank details anywhere online and if you receive alert about data breach, secure your information asap (i.e change password, replace card if its leaked and etc).
2. Infected devices (Smartphone, PC, Laptop, Router) can also steal your card details while making online transactions. Old hardware, drivers and softwares can also be vulnerable. Using more then 10 year old computer with Windows XP for bank transactions is very bad idea. Most routers or modems provided by ISPs aren't secured either so instead get yourself a router or modem of reputed brand and change the default password to a strong one. Keep your devices protected with latest antivirus and security patches. Remove suspicions softwares and games.
3. You need to be doubly careful when using a smartphones for online fund transfer and online shopping. OTP authentication is not safe as you may think.
The purpose of an OTP is to prevent fraud by confirming that the person making the transaction and the credit/debit card owner are one and the same but is the smartphone used to send and receive an OTP innocuous? Regrettably, not very. What seemed to be like a strong authentication process when it was first introduced is nowadays easily bypassed or accessed by mobile apps (Including infected by malware).
For example in Whats app setup, you enter your mobile no and then it sends OTP from their server to your number and the app automatically fetches SMS for OTP for confirmation. Same thing happens in eCommerce apps while making payments and I have seen some OTP's having no details about transaction amount, just the pass code!
Of course the app will ask you permission to intercept SMS and some payment gateways have option to get OTP from bank's website but how many people are aware? They just accept everything and do the payment believing the app is safe and then end up losing huge amount. Even if the app is safe, the smartphone could be infected with a spyware and it tracks whatever you do. Once it gets your card details, it will make the transaction, get OTP from your phone and deletes the SMS once done. This all happens in the background and you'll not be aware until you get notification from bank. Clicking URL links sent by unknown person (Via email, whatsapp, sms) is very bad idea and thats how you get malware.
I always use my PC for most of online transactions and manually enter OTP that is sent to my smartphone. For mobile banking I use one phone for the transaction and another phone for receiving OTP.
4. International stores (Like Aliexpress, Banggood, Gearbest and etc) don't use OTP for placing orders and its good for fraudsters to buy items using leaked card details. It doesn't mean card owner has registered in that site and that is being leaked or hacked. One of my friend came across fraud just like what happened to Suryaputhra but he never visited Aliexpress. May be his card details was leaked somewhere else and fraudster tried to place order on Aliexpress. Fortunately bank rejected the transactions and refunded his money.
Ask your bank if they can provide OTP for international transactions and if you don't make international purchases, I believe there is an option to disable international transactions in your online bank account.
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@CRACING, Immediately blocked card and requested for new card. As of now using webmoney it is the best I have ever seen.
Thread Starter
#87
THE FEAR OF THE UNPREDICTABLE STALKS EVERYONE’S LIFE AND, WE ARE NO EXCEPTION!
@CRACING
Well said. I agree with you in all aspects. Thank you for sparing your time for this detailed information.
Our Forum Members / Readers to know that it is not to scare or to refrain from those little pleasures of buying things online, but to understand that one must take utmost care and precaution while doing such transactions.
Risk and uncertainty are part of our life today, what is safe today may not be safe tomorrow. We know every transaction has its own advantage and disadvantage that includes online gateway payments like PayPal, Perfectmoney, Payza etc., as again their reliability depends upon whether they follow properly licensed payment method, commission that they charge, the way they handle disputes and reversibility.
Hope, CRACING will agree with me the following way is comparatively better way to have peace of mind.
1. Learn to know Net Banking procedures of a good bank.
2. Don't allow your Operative System / Portals to store your password automatically.
3. Clear cache of your Web Browser regularly.
4. Use Virtual keyboard while keying in the password.
5. Change your PW periodically.
6. Protect the systems by Firewall and by a reputed antivirus software that's updated regularly.
7. Better use a Credit / Debit card of a good bank where there is an option for you to limit per transactions whether Domestic or international.
8. Opt for OTP process if there's provision for international transaction
9. Don't ignore the SMS messages of your bank.
10. Note down your Mobile device IMEI that you use for online transaction. In case of loss, you can block any unauthorized phone transactions by contacting the service provider and also the bank immediately.
I have a provision in the Net Banking system of my bank wherein I can limit ATM transaction and both domestic and international transactions. One can opt from Rs.0 to the total amount in our savings account. I have limited to Rs.5K for both domestic and international and Rs.20K for ATM. The disadvantage, in case you want to pay or take more money at any time, you need to change the limit and to wait for Bank approval for a day. It requires advance planning. It suits me as normally I never buy online things of value more than 50 Dollars.
Thread Starter
#88
CAN ANY ONE SHARE THEIR EXPERIENCE?
I know that it is not possible now for an individual buyer, even for personal use, to buy from online Chinese sites like AliExpress due to the ban imposed in India.
There are quite a lot YouTubers say that it is possible now and not illegal. But, AliExpress clearly declares that not possible to send to India and never allows payment transactions.
I find, a lot of intermediaries like SHOP & SHIP (DROP SHIPPING) in other countries who promise to deliver to India when you want to buy anything from AliExpress. This is possible, but I feel it would be expensive, not worth always and the original buyer deprived off dispute / refund if a wrong material received.
But, the online Indian sites like Amazon.in and Flipkart are all flooded with Chinese imports. I don’t understand how they are allowed.
Some sited like Banggood says that direct shipping possible but the choice is limited and exorbitantly charging towards shipping expenses.
Kindly let us know your experience for the benefit of our forum members.
Regards
Dr MUDHAN
I know that it is not possible now for an individual buyer, even for personal use, to buy from online Chinese sites like AliExpress due to the ban imposed in India.
There are quite a lot YouTubers say that it is possible now and not illegal. But, AliExpress clearly declares that not possible to send to India and never allows payment transactions.
I find, a lot of intermediaries like SHOP & SHIP (DROP SHIPPING) in other countries who promise to deliver to India when you want to buy anything from AliExpress. This is possible, but I feel it would be expensive, not worth always and the original buyer deprived off dispute / refund if a wrong material received.
But, the online Indian sites like Amazon.in and Flipkart are all flooded with Chinese imports. I don’t understand how they are allowed.
Some sited like Banggood says that direct shipping possible but the choice is limited and exorbitantly charging towards shipping expenses.
Kindly let us know your experience for the benefit of our forum members.
Regards
Dr MUDHAN