Nexus 7 (2013/2012) and Orange ZA - is it Legit?

[MadHatterZA]

Hello there.
So for the past few days I've been scratching around for the best Google Nexus 7 deal (PREPAID, NO CONTRACT RUBBISH) available to us humble South Africans (preferably the 2013 WIFI edition, don't care about 3g/LTE ).
So, in terms of the 2012 edition I can get order one from Orange for R2,070 with free shipping. - This seems like a legend deal for the kinda specs that this thing has
Just for comparison I set out to look for the Nexus 7 at some of the tech stores here in PE. - Both incredible connection and hifi-corp have the same tablet (2012) for around 3 grand. I always love getting a laugh out of some of those employees. ("So, what processor does this tablet have." - "It has android")
Anyways, after chatting to one of IC's good staff members he told me that the 2013 edition nexus 7 will only land in Incredible Connection stores in Jan/Feb 2014- for a probably ridiculously stupid expensive price.
So, knowing that Orange are going to have stock of the NEW 2013 Nexus 7 ready to ship in a few days to SA for R3080 (See here) I called them.
Their number (which is 021 / Cape town area code) seems to redirect you to their South African sales division in the UK - I know this because the call quality was crap
I spoke to a very nice British woman who told me that all their stock sits in their UK warehouse and gets shipped here within 5-7 days on the time of order. She also said that I have 14 days to send it back for a refund/replacement if something is not right. - Note that all their stock is obviously from the UK and therefore comes with EU to ZA power adapters
So anyways, I think I've come to a conclusion that the best deal here for either tablet (2012/2013) is going to be to ship it down from orange - You can basically get the 2013 one for the same price as the 2012 one at IC.
My question is - Has anyone else here ordered (a nexus 7) from orange? How was their service- did it come within 7 days? Was the thing you ordered in NEW good condition?
Any feedback would be greatly appreciated

Thanks,
Tom.

 

[psc]

I recently ordered from Orange - Took 2 days to get to customs and then DHL dropped the ball (they needed my ID number to clear through customs and did not bother to phone myself), an e-mail to Orange sorted out the problem and I got my goods the next day (5 working days), no extra costs.

If you do order via Orange - set up notifications on your tracking for clearance events and then Phone DHL and give them you ID Number, once it registers as "extra information required", that will expedite the delivery.

Take heed of the Orange acceptance rules for your parcel (available on the Orange website).

Oh and the goods were new and sealed.

 

[Dineshg]

I also ordered recently from Orange and their service was great. Also had the same problem with useless DHL, my nexus sat at customs for three days and no one from DHL called me. A quick call to Orange and the next day my nexus was delivered to me. All in all I would definitely buy from Orange again but would probably request a different courier company next time.

 

[I O U]

Just for comparison I set out to look for the Nexus 7 at some of the tech stores here in PE. - Both incredible connection and hifi-corp have the same tablet (2012) for around 3 grand.

I know you stated you weren't interested in the 3G version, but recently IC have been marking the older version down to around R2,400 or R2,500 each weekend (starting on a Thursday to a Sunday). When last I saw the Wi-Fi marked down by them (a few weeks ago), it was at R2,000 if I remember correctly, maybe even less.

If you don't order the newer version through Orange for a while, have a look at the IC website on a Thursday to see pricing of the 2012 models.

 

[MadHatterZA]

Thanks for the feedback guys
Glad to know that their service is good
I'm definitely going to try get the 2013 Edition from Orange.
I think what I O U mentioned above is really cool, but I definitely think it's worth taking the risk and paying +/- R500 extra to get the newer one DHL'd down- well, if you have some wifi to hook it up to of course.

 

[J_S]

Used them last week for a Samsung SSD. Same issue with customs, but was sorted quickly and had the drive the next day.

 

[fish]

My company recently ordered the following from the Orange Store:

Nexus 7 (2013)
Nexus 5
Nexus 4
HTC Desire 500
Archos 97 HD
Galaxy Tab 8.0
Motorola RAZR i

Everything arrived within 4 days of ordering we did need to contact DHL to provide ID numbers.
But other than that the process was smooth and much cheaper than buying the stuff locally.

 

[Orange S.A. Official]

Hello,

Thank you for your feedback.

We would like to thank all members of this thread for the support, we are also addressing issues of service failure with our fulfillment partner, DHL to ensure our "Orange customer experience" is delivered the way we intend it to.

Should you require any information whatsoever, please do not hesitate to contact us via e-mail : contact@orange.co.za

Regards,

Orange South Africa

 

[Spectratec guy]

Yeah I know of a place in South Africa that sells the Nexus 7 2013 edition but its not as cheap as them.

 

[Zenbaas]

Quick question regarding the charger etc...as this is from the UK what is and isn't compatible with our power/plugs here..? Anything that we should know about..?

 

[MadHatterZA]

Hey Zenbaas, nope. As far as I know there's nothing to worry about, everything from orange comes with a free UK (EU) to South African power adapter which is pretty nice oh and with the issues regarding DHL they seem to have fixed their customs problems. Upon ordering, I needed to send them pictures of ID & Bankcard for verification (you can block out the digits after the first 4 if that's a problem ) Anyways, as soon as it arrived in SA customs I received a call asking for an ID number, the woman there said I can expect arrival in the next few days

 

[Zenbaas]

Hey Zenbaas, nope. As far as I know there's nothing to worry about, everything from orange comes with a free UK (EU) to South African power adapter which is pretty nice oh and with the issues regarding DHL they seem to have fixed their customs problems. Upon ordering, I needed to send them pictures of ID & Bankcard for verification (you can block out the digits after the first 4 if that's a problem ) Anyways, as soon as it arrived in SA customs I received a call asking for an ID number, the woman there said I can expect arrival in the next few days

Thank you for the detailed reply. So what did you order...? I've never had to give anyone a copy of my bankcard but if it's jsut for verification purposes then it should be ok.

 

[MadHatterZA]

I ended up ordering the 2012 Nexus 7 - the 2013 was not available at my time of order and I wasn't too bothered with the spec difference (or paying a grand less!) Although now they seem to be out of 2012 stock (which is crazy as last Thursday they still had over 100) and they currently have 27 2013 ones in stock. Anyways, ordering was easy, I created an account with all my details, added my desired purchase to my basket and went over to the checkout where a put the debit card details - 15 minutes later I received an email asking to submit a copy of the bank card used and ID, I scanned those in and submitted them to the link provided. Half an hour later they told me everything was verified and my purchase had been shipped!

 

[Zenbaas]

I ended up ordering the 2012 Nexus 7 - the 2013 was not available at my time of order and I wasn't too bothered with the spec difference (or paying a grand less!) Although now they seem to be out of 2012 stock (which is crazy as last Thursday they still had over 100) and they currently have 27 2013 ones in stock. Anyways, ordering was easy, I created an account with all my details, added my desired purchase to my basket and went over to the checkout where a put the debit card details - 15 minutes later I received an email asking to submit a copy of the bank card used and ID, I scanned those in and submitted them to the link provided. Half an hour later they told me everything was verified and my purchase had been shipped!

Ok cool. Thinking about the 2013 model for the SO for christmas and I shouldn't hurt if I borrow it every now and then

 

[Zenbaas]

Quick question for anyone who has one. Can you connect a USB drive or similar to the micro USB slot to play additional movies and such? (You get those male to female adapters) http://img.dxcdn.com/productimages/sku_162930_2.jpg

 

[copacetic]

Quick question for anyone who has one. Can you connect a USB drive or similar to the micro USB slot to play additional movies and such? (You get those male to female adapters) http://img.dxcdn.com/productimages/sku_162930_2.jpg

I have not done it yet on mine, but from what I have read you can indeed.

You need one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_On-The-Go

USB On-The-Go, often abbreviated USB OTG or just OTG, is a specification that allows USB devices such as digital audio players or mobile phones to act as a host, allowing other USB devices like a USB flash drive, digital camera, mouse, or keyboard to be attached to them. Unlike conventional USB systems, USB OTG systems can drop the hosting role and act as normal USB devices when attached to another host. This can be used to allow a mobile phone to act as host for a flash drive and read its contents, downloading music for instance, but then act as a flash drive when plugged into a host computer and allow the host to read data from the device.

 

[rodga]

I had the 2012 model and can confirm that mass storage via usb otg works
Can confirm that 3g modem + otg + ppp (app) = working 3g connection as well.

 

[D4N]

Damn that 2013 model for 3k is tempting...

 

[Spectratec guy]

Damn that 2013 model for 3k is tempting...

What's the price of that 2013 model with shipping,import tax...etc? that's a very good price.

 

[Zenbaas]

Thanks guys.