Customs - Items from Fasttech & Efun.top stuck

[thatguy]

My worst was a fasttech order that didn't ship for almost 6 weeks then they discontinued an item in it. After shipping it took another 5 weeks to arrive. Fair enough, the restocking was a fasttech cockup, but the 5 weeks from dispatch to arrival has to be laid at he feet of the shipping firms in china, international and UK.

I can send packages to Australia which arrive within a week, but our mail from China takes 2+ weeks on average ( I know epackets have improved this for many, but they still take a fortnight or more for me, in central belt of Scotland btw, not in some remote island)

We have aircraft capable of flying from China to the UK in under a day, but their is a huge under-investment in aircraft and infrastructure, and the usual silly red tape delays to consider. The only delays I'd put down to fasttech/gearbest/focalecig etc is the delay from order to shipping, the rest is down to the laughable inefficiency of mail couriers for international mail.

I'm sure that several plane loads of items are ordered in the UK from China daily, but the firms responsible for delivery don't invest in the capacity, and on top of that our local mail firms in the UK and the orient are woeful.

Personally, I'd allow 1-2 days for dispatch from China and 7-10 days in transit. Anything beyond this is just pure incompetence.

On this note I'd like to hand out a big "well done" to darkstar for the last order we placed. Previous orders for nic base have taken 10-14 days, this time the delivery was 3 days. Huge improvement guys, well done.

[Deleted]

Sometimes it is our own HMRC and Royal Mail that is to blame for slow delivery ... I had a FT order recently that took a reasonable 5 days from "dispatched to destination country GB" to "Arrived at destination country GB" and then a further 3 weeks to be delivered to my door!

[buggritt]

You think "several" plane loads? And the answer is buy more planes? At 300 million each, you would think they would have a few knocking about in reserve for those busy periods.

[vectis]

Sept 3, 2015 16:20:47 GMT LameLlama said:

Sept 3, 2015 9:56:00 GMT vectis said:

I'm waiting for one order from gearbest placed on the 10th August and one from Efun placed on the 13th August but have had two orders delivered from both of them placed after these ones.

Jumping jesus, I do hate the wait.

I'm still waiting for these two.

[chykensa]

I ordered 5 x Plume Veil-style driptips and a Velocity clone dripper from Focal on the 6th August. It finally dropped through my letterbox on the 10th September. Hardly a large package, and nothing I could not do without, but rather a long time to say the least. I have had packages from them arrive within 10 days, so it's completely random as far as journey time is concerned.
The moral as always is order and forget. It will arrive eventually in the majority of cases, and will be much cheaper than buying in the UK. If you are prepared to undertake these risks, then go for it. If you need the item yesterday and price is not a consideration, buy in the UK. The only time I would hesitate would be if I were buying a larger mod when I would like the safety of a warranty and a UK voice to speak to if things go t*ts-up

[TJ]

Still waiting for my two Gearbest orders as well vectis, received my Fasttech coils eventually & have orders placed after the Gearbest ones that have turned up so they must be using the old carrier pigeons as opposed to the turbo ones.........

[buggritt]

chykensa has the right attitude. I will never use the "express" service from any vendor, as in my case it means nowt. China is the biggest exporter in the world. These smallish mail companies book their freight space at the last minute, when it's cheaper. Sometimes on passenger flights. Royal Mail has a block booking for places like Australia, which has been cited on this thread. So your mail is usually on a flight the same day if you live within 30 miles of an airport. There's far more space, as we export sweet fanny adams.
So all the posts re FT or any other site doing a "great job", or a poor one, mean naff all when it comes to delivery times.

[phatfil]

Sept 12, 2015 0:24:50 GMT Q said:

I believe they have a few 'quads' in the UK warehouse so they would (hopefully) arrive very quickly and wouldn't incur any fees, if you bought from China the chances are that you'd get away with customers etc (no guarantees) but the risk is obviously the warranty side of things, we take a chance on our vaping gear but a quad is a different kettle of fish

Cheers i will pass on the info,,  i cant see the thing lasting very long without crashing tho, so warranty issues may well be irelivant