Tips to buy stuff in Chile - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Neuromodulator
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 12, 2015, 02:01:32 am
content: Hello,Chile is a pretty small country, and there isn't much market for electronics related stuff. Importing test equipment from ebay is usually super expensive, also the postal service is very slow, (lately it has taken me more than 2.5 months to get stuff from ebay). Also buying new test equipment is super expensive, usually the price is x1.8 the price in the US, mostly because of import costs and VAT. To make things even more difficult, our local currency has devalued considerable in terms of USD, as of now the minimum wage here is 350 USD a month. So as you can see there are a couple of difficulties here to get hobby parts/equipment.I'll start sharing a few tips I've learned so far:1- Postal cost from China is far cheaper than US or other countries and makes a huge difference. I've bought lots of RC/electronics stuff from Hobbyking, and its dirty cheap.2- There is a decent (not to expensive) reseller of Agilent and Rigol among other brands, I bought my oscilloscope and power supply from them (www.tecel.cl).3- I live in Viña del Mar, and apparently the only place that sells electronics stuff (although their stock kinda sucks) is "global electronica" (http://www.globalelectronica.cl/).4- There are a couple of guys that sell stuff they don't even know what it is, they usually get contacted by guys that want to get rid of old stuff. I've met just one of these in Valparaiso, he was kind of a conman, but I'm sure there are a couple of things you could get at a pretty descent price if you negotiate and make him believe that what he is selling is broken.5- Many universities get rid of their old equipment, but usually they don't make that information readily available for everyone, still if you have contacts at universities, you may have a good chance to get access to "obsolete" equipment at dirty cheap prices. I've seen people get >500 USD microscopes for less than 10 USD for instance. Not sure if private companies do something similar, but public universities usually do this, and its the best chance to get good equipment without spending an arm and a leg on equipment.6- When stuff that you buy is sent through couriers like UPS or FEDEX, you always end up paying taxes, no matter how cheap the product is. On the other hand with the postal service, usually if it costs less than 100 USD you don't pay taxes.If any local residents got any other tips, please share, this could be useful to others living here as well...

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 12, 2015, 03:40:10 am
content: As you might have known if you have seen any of my posts, I am a Canadian living in San Pedro de Atacama. Buying electronics, or any technology, in Chile is an exercise in wallet emptying. As you said, the cheapest option, almost every time is to buy from Hong King and China. Shipping to Chile from anywhere else is always the killer. If you can avoid any of the services like UPS, DHL, Fedex, etc, you are better off.The problem with the Chile post service is that you cannot recover anything other than the postal cost if the shipment falls off the back of the truck. This has happened to me twice. Once a cell phone, and this year an Ikalogic logic analyzer. Correos Chile ( Chilean postal service) will only refund the shipping cost, at least that is my experience. They also want documents and proof of proof that your proof is proven. Sometimes I wonder how Chile even manages to function at all.Trying to import and sell things in Chile is even worse and I have had some issues getting this done. It only took a full year of running around to 6 different government offices and lawyers and notarias getting papers signed, papers that prove that the papers were signed, proof that the person signing the papers had the authority to sign the papers, proof that I had electricity in order to run a business, and proof that I was authorizing myself to use my property to run my own business, and and and... I m not joking.In my 5-1/2 years here I have learned that China and Hong Kong are my best friends. Sellers in the US do not want to do business with Chile, but it is still cheaper to import your own things rather than pay for anything n Chile. The businesses here want anywhere from 2x to 5x the prices of the world market. If you do need to buy from Chile, it is either not in stock and will take many weeks to arrive, the web page has no information or doesn't work (as in the links you mentioned), delivery charges can cost twice the value of the product, the price is at least double the price in NA, they don't answer the phone, and if they do you can't be sure if they are lying about anything. At least that is my experience in the north here. I have had some better luck in La Serena and further south. Oh yes, as soon as they know I am a gringo, the price doubles.

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 12, 2015, 04:14:17 am
content: Of course for anyone who lives in Chile, this store is well known:www.casaroyal.clThe website is a nightmare to navigate and find things. The service in the main stores in Santiago is rather rude and inefficient, and they have a strange mixture of things.There is also:http://www.victronics.cl/They have a better selection but I have not done business with them yet.

author: Neuromodulator
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 12, 2015, 03:02:20 pm
content: Moving from Canada to San Pedro de Atacama seems like a very bad idea. Also being such a small town in the middle of nowhere, kinda the worst place to move if you plan to resell.I recently bought a book from the UK that hasn't arrived yet since 3 months or so (which would become my first loss (from a total of roughly 50)). The good thing is that the seller is sending me a new book again, problem is that for some reason seller isn't giving me a tracking number. I went to correos and tried to get info on the package, but they can't do anything at all without a tracking number, except to check if its in the office you are visiting. Lesson learned, getting a tracking number is very important, and so is making sure you will get refunded or anything if the incompetent postal service screws up (which will always deny any responsability).When you buy of ebay stuff can take so long to get to Chile, that only to avoid not receiving what you bought, you have to open a ticket (you just have a limited time to do that).Tracking numbers can sometimes be tracked from correos page. The info you get when tracking items always makes me wonder how items actually make their way to my home. The items I buy take a largely variable amount of time on different offices, also many times, they "skip" offices, or all of a sudden dissapear from the tracking system, all kind of weird stuff. I've also seen items sitting for 2 weeks in the local postal warehouse.I haven't had any experience with correos breaking stuff, but a guy I know got refunded after correos delivered the package to the wrong person (still was 25 usd or so). Also related to your issue, I found this:http://www.sernac.cl/27900/Don't know if you know these guys (sernac), but they have lawyers and can be quite helpfull when businesses in Chile try to screw you upAs you probably have already learned, in Chile, things never work as they should, nobody holds any responsability for anything at all, and everyone tries to screw you up in any possible way if you are not careful enough.BTW there are a couple of "ebay" like sites you can use to sell your products in Chile, Mercadolibre and Yapo, both can be free if you don't need to pay for any fancy advertisement. There are others too, but I haven't tried them.