Fastest delivery

[x7razor]

Fastest delivery I have ever gotten to CPT and that for R30 shipping. Awesome service from the 3 business involved Bobshop, Electroman, Internet Express have to give credit where its due.

 

[FaSMaN]

Sometimes you get a bit lucky, I have had a few vape orders using Courier Guy arrive at me the next day (JHB -> Dur)

 

[soulie]

Fastest delivery I have ever gotten to CPT and that for R30 shipping. Awesome service from the 3 business involved Bobshop, Electroman, Internet Express have to give credit where its due.

View attachment 1697749

bobs internet express to me is 3 days ,last order the seller was 45 km from me and got delivered after 14hoo on the 3rd full day ,after collection .

 

[Mirai]

Aramex took two weeks to deliver an item from Jhb to Cpt for me.

 

[Gnome]

When I order from Amazon.co.jp I regularly get my parcels in less than a week.
And a few times within 2 days.

Typically if I order on a Friday, I get it on the Monday.
Japan is seriously efficient.

 

[CrypticZA]

As someone who works a bit with logistics this is generally called dawn express basically parcel gets picked up and tossed onto a plane that evening and goes from plane to courier vehicle.

Our company to save money does everything via road as its cheaper but often our courier throws it on a plane for a free upgrade since they have extra room in their shipment going from destination A to B, so we get billed economy but its next day overnight express delivery.

 

[scud]

Can anyone advise how to send a phone or tablet from UK to SA (edit) ?
it looks like anything with a battery is not allowed to be couriered ?

 

[Gnome]

Can anyone advise how to send a phone or tablet from UK to SA (edit) ?
it looks like anything with a battery is not allowed to be couriered ?

You will pay less buying it from a company that will handle the logistics for you.
For example buying a phone from Amazon.com is often cheaper than buying the phone off of takealot. (And Amazon.com is cheaper than Amazon.co.<....>)
Because they have the couriers and agreements in place.
Doing it yourself is a lot of paperwork, hidden costs (unless you've done this before) and the courier knows it is once off so they'll charge you an enormous amount compared to what they charge a large company like Amazon. (You are just a customer to Aramex, Amazon is 80% of Aramex' entire existence, Amazon actually has direct access to their logistics network and monitor them for example, it is a whole different ball game)

If you insist couriers can ship the phone if you contact them and ask about shipping an item with a Lithium battery.
But like I said, you'd better get the lube ready.
Your courier fee will be high, you'll pay a clearance fee (R150-R200 for Fedex/Aramex, R200 for DHL, R350 for UPS), VAT (15% on 110% of the item value) and duties (and additional percentage based cost because phones attract a duty, if you don't understand what a duty is you should google it, not all items attract duties).

The taxes are payable on the item value, even if you already "owned" it before (or whatever excuse), SARS isn't stupid, so saying it is a gift or my friend gave it to me isn't going to be enough. A friend gave it to me is still a trade, you still pay VAT on the product value. And if they query this, they hold your item until you provide receipts. If you lied, you are screwed, better to never respond and let them keep it. (which is what couriers do when they get into this situation)

 

[scud]

You will pay less buying it from a company that will handle the logistics for you.
For example buying a phone from Amazon.com is often cheaper than buying the phone off of takealot.
Because they have the couriers and agreements in place.
Doing it yourself is a lot of paperwork, hidden costs (unless you've done this before) and the courier knows it is once off so they'll charge you an enormous amount compared to what they charge a large company like Amazon. (You are a customer for Aramex, Amazon is 80% of Aramex' entire existence, if they pull out that company is seriously downsizing)

If you insist couriers can ship the phone if you contact them and ask about shipping an item with a Lithium battery.
But like I said, you'd better get the lube ready.
Your courier fee will be high, you'll pay a clearance fee (R150-R200 for Fedex/Aramex, R200 for DHL, R350 for UPS), VAT (15% on 110% of the item value) and duties (and additional percentage based cost because phones attract a duty, if you don't understand what a duty is you should google it).

thanks for that excellent info !!

I need to configure the device before sending, setting up and iPad for a 94 year old
I'll get some lube first

 

[Gnome]

thanks for that excellent info !!

I need to configure the device before sending, setting up and iPad for a 94 year old
I'll get some lube first

Family I assume?

In that case, call a few couriers before you start this whole thing.
I recommend you use Fedex, Aramex or DHL (that order with regards to cost and service).
Aramex is usually the cheapest but by far the worst service.
Fedex is mid priced, excellent service.
DHL might have slightly better service, but not so consistently that they justify the higher price over Fedex.

UPS might have the lowest quote but once it lands here they have the highest clearance fees.
It is so high that I refuse to use them anymore, it is a bait and switch in my opinion.

None of these companies will negotiate with you once it lands here, they will send you a thing that says pay X and you either pay it or good luck getting them to respond to you (in my experience, especially with Aramex)
I have challenged once when they put the wrong item on the duty, so I bought 100m of fibre and they listed it as copper wire (duty has a line item where you can lookup what it is listed as) which has very high duty.
They did actually update the clearance record and it reduced the cost significantly.
Maybe I got lucky but it wasn't effort at all.

So that you can try, but telling them "Why do I need to pay this clearance fee" will simply be ignored.
I've tried this with UPS for example and they ignored me, when I called they basically said, do you want your parcel or not, else we are sending it back and you aren't getting a refund.

 

[Mirai]

When I order from Amazon.co.jp I regularly get my parcels in less than a week.
And a few times within 2 days.

Typically if I order on a Friday, I get it on the Monday.
Japan is seriously efficient.

Amazon JP is DHL only. No Aramex. All sites which use DHL or FedEx are fast. Aramex is the slow poke.

Also shipping is faster. I remember EMS from Japan would take 3-4 working days, while from US would take 5-7. I suppose it's the transit routes and maybe less deliveries via Hong Kong.

Aramex Gobal Shopper in Japan is pretty slow. Takes 3-4 days to ship the item. AGS Thailand do it next day.

Amazon JP doesn't ship everything abroad though, so I use Tenso/Buyee for other stuff and other site. They often have promo coupons as well and 30 days consolidation and storage.

 

[Mirai]

Family I assume?

In that case, call a few couriers before you start this whole thing.
I recommend you use Fedex, Aramex or DHL (that order with regards to cost and service).
Aramex is usually the cheapest but by far the worst service.
Fedex is mid priced, excellent service.
DHL might have slightly better service, but not so consistently that they justify the higher price over Fedex.

Courier rates vary, it depends on the company and geographic location.

Some shippers have a discount with FedEx, others with DHL. There are also two tiers of FedEx, economy and express,
economy is like 2 days slower but is sometimes much cheaper.

 

[airborne]

Can anyone advise how to send a phone or tablet from UK to SA (edit) ?
it looks like anything with a battery is not allowed to be couriered ?

Shipping a phone or any device with a small li-ion battery contained in the device itself is fine, any courier can ship it without extra cost or jumping through hoops but you have to correctly notify them when you book the shipment so they can place it in a certain part of the plane hold and also certain planes won't fly li-ion cargo.

I recently sent 2 separate international shipments each containing a digital camera with li-ion batteries, I was expecting a sht show of special packaging and labels etc but nothing more was required than correctly specifying them as containing small li-ion batteries and also signing a battery declaration. I did also supply an MSDS sheet for the battery which was easy to find via google but it appears even that wasn't a requirement, it’s only necessary on larger batteries.