Is China Post the slowest in the world ? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: PeterG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 06:18:59 am
content: I order a lot of items from China/Hong Kong on eBay. For quite a while now, i have noticed the shiping times have blown out to over 3 weeks. I have just received an order from the UK that took 8 days to get here via air mail. With this in mind, it is hard to see why it takes China so long. Anyone else having delay issues with orders from China?Regards

author: rf-loop
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 06:58:30 am
content: It is not China Post. It is Hongkong Post! Today HK Post is very slow. It have been explosive growing trafic after overseas peoples start buying more and more using internet. Today it is really bottleneck. If need hurry then use other class than regular service.China Post is more fast but it is more expensive. So, many mainland sellers do business via HK. handling capacity in HK post have not rise as fast as trafic. This amount of trafic is so much as.... or more.Also, there is less than two weeks to Moon Festival. Every peoples know that before this MF there is extremely high load in postal system. And it have started. (also peoples trafic later but not as spring festiwal)I have this and last year experience that HK to Europe normal regular registered airmail take 1,5 - 3 weeks.Then, it is not only in HK end. Someone tell me that today many ebay sellers have insert some countries to reject list. One example is Italy. Becouse they can not handle received parcels enough fast. It is today problem in many countries becouse peoples have start web buying.But today, situation with HK Post is really bad if use regular service - and many want becouse price.

author: Gall
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 07:08:48 am
content: Hehe. Russian Post is much slower: it can take 40 days or more.There are delays with China Post, I confirm. Looks like the shipment lays at its origin post office and does not start to travel for 3-5 days.

author: patb
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 09:09:12 am
content: Same here. Minimum 2-3 weeks from HK to Poland.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 09:21:37 am
content: yeah, 2-3 weeks from HK to New Zealand as well.

author: rf-loop
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 09:55:25 am
content: Subject is China PostThis is China Post:http://www.chinapost.com.cn/HongKong post is totally different organization.This is HK post, NOT China Post. And this is today bottleneck becouse price and lot of trafic.http://hongkongpost.com/also hongs may be more lazy and loose than mainland? Sometimes feels so...

author: project
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 02:01:58 pm
content: No it's not. Canadapost is much worse.And how fast it runs depends on how much u pay. Also it's on the other side of the world, shipping always take times.If say slow, most western country postal system run slower than either Chinapost or HongkongPost, their volumn are much larger than our system. Even the DHL/UPS/Fedax run much efficiency in asia and cheaper than here, North america.For my expeirence, ordered something from china by express shipping, 5days in hand(2 day from mainland China to HK, 3 days to here). regular shipping(most time it's free) 2-3 weeks to my door. last few km local delivery is slowest part, sometime take 2-3 days. Also it's highly depends on our customs clearance speed. And buy things from States to Canada, regular shipping take 2 or more weeks too, even it's only 700mils away. Sometime same province shipping take 2 weeks as well. We are used to slow service now.

author: Kiriakos-GR
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 03:17:13 pm
content: Quote from: Gall on August 30, 2011, 07:08:48 amThe slowest turtle are the Canadian post, I got my Fluke HV probe with 43 days delay.The poor seller he had shipping it immediately after the sale on eBay.I will never get anything from Canada, or Australia (especially if the delivery involves sea post = three months time )

author: AntiProtonBoy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 03:43:34 pm
content: I used to buy heaps kung-fu dvds from HK a few years back. The postage delivery was always 2 weeks max. But that was back then.I ordered a bunch of UV LEDs nearly 2 weeks ago. Hopefully they will arrive soon. Granted, they were cheap and postage was "free". So I'm not holding my breath any time soon.

author: baljemmett
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 03:59:48 pm
content: Quote from: Kiriakos-GR on August 30, 2011, 03:17:13 pmI received my uCurrent this morning, having missed the postman on Saturday morning; from Dave to my door in a week and a day, using the cheapest shipping option which the webshop suggested would take two months. Works for me.

author: Kiriakos-GR
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 04:17:39 pm
content: Quote from: AntiProtonBoy on August 30, 2011, 03:43:34 pmThe actual description of free postage , are two weeks true shipping time by the postal service = slow mail.Plus one week time so the seller to transfer all those hundreds of packages, at the nearest major postal facility.Usually the bad sellers, they delay shipping so to gather enough tiny packages, so to be shipped all together.The true shipping time from China to Greece is 7-8 Days, the same time that it takes for one USPS packet to arrive too.Or for a packet send by the Royal mail.For my surprise I received an envelope loaded with genuine stickers for my Honda motorcycle, directly send from Japan to Greece in three days.And from Germany I got a an envelope in just four days.And few weeks back Agilent send to me from Germany an printed copy of the U1272A DMM complete Users Manual ( in B&W A4 516 Grams) by using the Frankier - Service, and came in a week time.http://www.deutschepost.de/dpag?tab=1&skin=hi&check=yes&lang=de_EN&xmlFile=link1017171_1009543

author: AntiProtonBoy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 04:28:08 pm
content: Quote from: Kiriakos-GR on August 30, 2011, 04:17:39 pmYeah, I thought as much. Plus the LEDs are shipped from mainland China.However, I wouldn't call them bad sellers though. The practice you described makes economical sense to me. Unless of course they don't deliver at all. But the sellers I bought the LEDs from had a fairly good customer feedback, so that must count for something. If not, they were only 5 bucks total (for 50 LEDs), so it's not a big loss... lol.As far as I'm concerned, long shipping is OK with me, as long as the merchant is honest about shipping times and pricing. I hate merchants that BS about shipping time, or inflate shipping prices to supplement the item price.

author: RCMR
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 08:46:43 pm
content: Both ChinaPost and HK Post are backlogged right now.I've had some consignments sent from China via EMS (ChinaPost) and it's taking 5-7 days before they actually leave the country.HK Post seems to have a 3-5 day backlog between a package being accepted and actually being handed over to the airline.

author: dumpystig
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 09:23:26 pm
content: @ OPWhat was the difference between UK and China/HK rates? I'm in the UK and in my experience although it takes a little longer to receive an item from China than say the US, the rates are mostly cheap, and sometimes 'free'.

author: Kiriakos-GR
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 30, 2011, 09:40:05 pm
content: About rates conversion here..http://www.xe.com/ucc/If you convert one CNY - Chinese Yuan Renminbi into a US Dollar you will be scared ..1.00 CNY = 0.156632 USDThe average shipping cost about the "free" packets are about 0.20 USDAnd I need about 4$ so to send just a letter to USA from Greece.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 01:50:37 am
content: All packages from Hong Kong are now subject to extra "security measures", thanks I'm sure to paranoid Uncle Sam.That's in Australia at least, likely the same problem for other countries.What was once the fastest postage system around (I'd get packages from Hong Kong next day sometimes!, 2-3 tops) is now 2-3 weeks.Dave.

author: PeterG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 02:00:40 am
content: dumpystig, generally the postage is free or maybe about $2.Regards

author: dumpystig
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 02:23:08 am
content: Quote from: PeterG on August 31, 2011, 02:00:40 amI'm assuming that's from China?But how much, in comparison, from the UK? I'll bet it's nowhere near as cheap as that...

author: AntiProtonBoy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 03:15:09 am
content: Speak of the Devil, my LEDs arrived today

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 06:48:21 am
content: I find them slow too, but with ebay it also depends on the sellers, I have bought stuff and have known for certain that it took a week just to get posted. I suppose that is where UK sellers score as if you need it quick you can forget going to china

author: PeterG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 07:57:55 am
content: From china postage is usually free. From the UK it depends on the weight of the item. For what i usually buy, it costs me no more than $5.Regards

author: the_raptor
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 12:46:04 pm
content: And I thought it was just the guys I bought my last package from (took 2 weeks to arrive). Kind of annoying as it was so quick before (especially as Australia post had a fairly integrated system with HK post).Though international postage is much better these days. I remember in the late 90's have a package spend a month coming from America (and it arrived wrapped inside a US Postal service sack... which the USPS didn't get back).

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 01:33:39 pm
content: I ordered some stuff from seeed studio. Items shipped on the 10th Aug, not here yet!Dave.

author: saturation
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 31, 2011, 02:06:56 pm
content: Per an expat site, ENGLISH based addresses are treated differently from Chinese labeled ones. So there often is a large delay until such mail is relayed to the area that processes it. If you happen to live or have a shop there that sends mail to EU and USA, it will be expedited better than others. China Post is one of the world's largest mail carriers and does ~ $3B in business, compared to the US at $10B, but one shouldn't consider China a first world country, and its efficiencies, at least yet.

author: ablacon64
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 02, 2011, 03:15:07 pm
content: To Brazil it lasts about 20 days to arrive from China plus another 20 days for the brazilian post deliver the goods.

author: RCMR
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 02, 2011, 09:10:17 pm
content: Singapore "Speedpost" (misnomer) has kept one of my packages in the air for eight days now.Either they're sending it by balloon or that plane has some pretty large fuel-tanks and keeps aborting its landing here.