US Product Held by Customs Manila and DHL

@LoneWolfNY

I don’t know if Amazon Carrie’s the same products but I use Amazon and they ship to the Philippines for free , I’ve ordered a lot here from Amazon and never had a issue

good luck

Hi Casasint. I have an Amazon account. Do you use a third-party service?

@LoneWolfNY You might check out Johnny Air Cargo. You buy online and have it shipped to their NY ( what I do) or to their California address.  Then they ship it here to your address. No customs, it's like the balikbayan box but by air. No questions. Highly recommended.

Thanks, Danfin. I also did a test purchase recommended by Casasint. I placed items in the Amazon shopping cart, which recognized my Filipino address and was ready to ship. But I haven't read the Amazon Global terms for shipment yet. I'm also going to check Johnny Air Cargo also.

Thanks again for your help "Expats"

Lone Wolf NY

@LoneWolfNY Hi Casasint. I figured out the process. Thank you.

LoneWol NY said. . . .

So as we all know, foreign products in the Philippines are very limited. I take nutritional products such as vitamins and other organic products. I started to look into purchasing them on Lazada. Well, it turns out that didn't work very well, either. For example, I use TruNiagen, which is organic and FDA-approved. It even won a Nobel prize in chemistry for how effective it is. When I found it on Lazada, I researched the seller, and he checked out. However, I checked the product lot number with the manufacturer, and they also told me it would expire in a few months. My other option is to buy it from a Chinese company. When I read the packing online, it was written in Chinese. Wait again! TruNiagen is from Lamont Colorado. Ahhh, I don't think so. So I went to a trusted company in the US called IHerbs. Well, they sold it to me. I also decided to add other products to the shopping cart. Shampoos, facial creams for my wife, real razors (Finding good razors and shaving cream is simply crazy), +50 multivitamins, and so on. If I paid $59 dollars in DHL shipping fees, I could buy stuff for the year. I tracked a $720 package from Colorado to Canada, Hong Kong, and Manila. Then it stopped. "Package held by customs." Why? Well, here it is.
•  I bought over the pricing limit by, according to them, 13000 ph.
•  I needed to fill out an FDA form
•  I also needed to retain an FDA certificate
•  And finally, I needed to pay an additional $203 in Tariff, Taxes, and DHL Freight forwarding fees. (It turns out that DHL, as a courier, does not actually deliver the package. They act as a broker to make a profit.)

DHL, by far is the worst courier service in the world. If you don't believe so, look up what people say about their service online. The reason why they closed shop in the US. How did I resolve this?

•  I contacted DHL Corporate along with DHL management in three separate districts.
•  I also contacted IHerb and told them that I wanted my money back because they didn't warn me about this process, and I never received the package.
•  I reached out to the Philippines FDA and filed a complaint which forced them to investigate
•  I called and emailed the Director of DHL and Philippines customs in Manila.

Yes, I was angry. If you take an additional $203 from me by holding my package hostage, I might as well tie up 9 salaries in the investigation. After all, it's the corporate thing to do. Someone must have had the brains to figure out what I was doing. "This guy just tied up all our managers,” and I got my package in 48 hours.

Was it worth it? Absolutely not!
So my official question: How do I buy quality foreign products without going through DHL, and what services do you use?

Thank you, Expats in advance

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I had a the same problem with FedEx years ago when ordering vitamins, fish oil, krill oil & low dose baby aspirins, a thousand of each from a wholesaler. Customs held up the shipment. I calling a FedEx representative in the Philippines who investigated it for me.

She said that customs only would allow one months supply and for the baby aspirins I needed a Doctors prescription. Unfortunately it was over the Christmas holidays and the Doctor was out of the office for 10 days.

The Doctor who did write the prescription for all and he had to state the quantity of 1,000 each. After the first or second day FedEx would charge P500 a day for storage.

The FedEx representative handled the whole thing for me, I emailed the prescription to her she and she got customs to clear it and waived the storage fees. FedEx did the actual deliver.

If customs holds up any shipments over 30 days it is forfeited. I learned my lesson and never ordered these things again.

Personally I would never order anything off lazada . Too many knockoffs and fake junk. at the drug stores you have to watch out also with fake medications. My advice would let your lady handle it! I went with traditional and or have a legit doctor prescribe or recommend. Just be aware of what you purchase.

prs948 said. . . . . Personally I would never order anything off lazada . Too many knockoffs and fake junk. at the drug stores you have to watch out also with fake medications. My advice would let your lady handle it! I went with traditional and or have a legit doctor prescribe or recommend. Just be aware of what you purchase.

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Addressing some issues with online & brick/mortar purchases.

(1) Prescription Drugs I buy only inside big legit Pharmacies.

(2) I have made maybe 50 plus purchases off of Shopee never having a major problem and minor problems have all been satisfactory handled by the seller.

My personal vetting:

(A) Read the description carefully, know what you want, know what they are selling.

(B) I only purchase from Mall or Preferred vendors.

(C) I never order from vendors that say state pre-order.

(D) I always use cash on delivery.

(E) In the sort section I always search by Top Sales.

(F) On the shipped from selection, I select Manila, as I live in Manila, you can make another selection that is close to your location.

(G) I initiate chat and ask the vendor a question, usually if it's in stock, my motivation is to see how quickly they respond.

(H) I check to see how long they've been a seller on Shopee or Lazada

(I) I read the reviews, I know some of them may be fraudulent and don't sound legit. Use your own judgement.

(J) Sometimes you're able to determine if they have an actual website outside of Shopee or Lazada, that's a plus.

I know Moon Dog has purchased hundreds of times with success.

@prs948

I know Moon Dog has purchased hundreds of times with success.

-@Enzyte Bob

My Lazada order tally is now 771, and I have a few orders on Shopee also. I even bought my electric clothes dryer on Shopee since heat pump dryers weren't available locally. I bought mostly from Amazon in the states because I was in a similar situation living in a very rural area. I even bought a new Toyota Fortuner online and had it delivered, but that wasn't through Lazada. Come to think of it I sold my Chevy Colorado and Mazda CX5 online to Carvana and made a $7K profit on the pickup and never left my house.

Lazada customer service is ok, just takes time. I would say it is better than the customer service in brick and mortar stores in my experience.

When buying a high end item check the Lazmall box and only the authorized brand distributors will be listed.

@prs948 You're right about the knockoffs. I didn't appreciate tracking the product via lot number with the vendor. It was legit, but I won't do it again. Too time-consuming.

@Moon Dog Lazada is hit-and-miss with me. For example, I bought two Johnny Walker Gold 1-liter bottles for a party. I got the Johnny Walker Gold all right, but one was a 1-liter, and the other was the smaller 750 ml. There was no way of contacting the company through Lazada, as they made that virtually impossible.  In another instance, I purchased 12 packets of assorted pepper seeds for my garden.  There was nothing assorted about it. I was sent 12 Chili Peppers packets. I wanted assorted peppers to plant in my garden, not start a "Chili Pepper farm." You're right.  Customer service in Lazada is better than most, and not all purchases were bad. Some were legit. But it is still hit-and-miss for me.  If I can go to a store and buy it, I will (Not a big fan of Chinese-made products).  My latest successful purchase from Lazada was an electric water flosser (recommended by a Dentist after Dental work) and an XL foldable pool for my Golden Retriever (Cool down and bath pool).

Lone Wolf NY

LoneWolfNY said . . . .

another instance, I purchased 12 packets of assorted pepper seeds for my garden. There was nothing assorted about it. I was sent 12 Chili Peppers packets. I wanted assorted peppers to plant in my garden, not start a "Chili Pepper farm." You're right.

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Seeds . . . .

I've commented on this before, but since you are relatively on this forum, I'll repeat my plight of legally importing seeds from the states.

(1) Letter to director Georgy Y. Culaste (Form BPI "Q" Number 1) of National Plant Quarantine Services to  get permission to import one packet of these seeds. (Beefsteak & Heirloom tomato seeds, Vidalia Onion, Red Pepper for home garden.

(2) Sketch of final destination.

(3)Brgy Clearance Letter and Business License (Fee involved)

(4) Copies of ACR Card & Philippine Drivers License.

(5) Promissory letter for inspection.

(6) Picture of of final destination site.

(7) Proof of payment to Bureau of Plant Industry.

(8) The process also need clearance from customs.

(9) And clearance from Drug Enforcement Agency

I also needed help from my local FedEX representative to clear Customs & Drug Enforcement.

Prior to that I purchased two Mars Grow Tents, two sets of high intensity Grow Lights, loam soil, grow bags, Mircle-Gro tomato fertilizer and other associated things like vibrating tooth brush for pollination. Also viewing hours of Youtube video's.

All this to grow plants indoors under proper environment. (Artificial sun light and with temperature control.)

The results total failure

Also I've bought a second round of seeds from the states and had them mailed to my daughter. She placed the packets in a plain envelope and mailed them to my re-mailer (US Global Mail), thus avoiding the custom hassle again.

I still have seed packets of Walla Walla Onions, Yello Granex Onions, Ailsa Craig Exhibition Onions (Giant Onions), Vidalia Onions, Beefsteak Tomato, Brandywine Heirloom Tomato, Tiny Tim Tomato, Sweet Princess Tomato and Mica Red Tomato.

I would be able to part these things under the right conditions.

@LoneWolfNY I have had similar issues but I found a way to get a little satisfaction. I scroll down to "Customer Care" and select "Help Center" then "Chat with Us". You would be chatting with a bot called CLEO but if you keep typing "agent" and answer a couple questions you should eventually chat with a live person. Maybe it is because of all my orders but I always get help that way.

About a month ago my wife ordered 10 post lights for the back fence but 3 of the lights had bad batteries. The same guy was good for sending free batteries for lights I bought earlier but was no longer answering my messages. I went on the chat thing and got in touch with an agent and after about a week they refunded the cost of 3 lights, about P3,400, and allowed me to keep the lights. The batteries are a very common 18650 model which I have so I soldered in new batteries and the lights work great.

You have to know that any time you order Makita, Dewalt, Yamaha etc. for a fraction of the price it should sell for it will be a fake. Some of these items have hundreds of 5 star reviews which is nuts. I wanted a 5.1 Yamaha receiver so I emailed Yamaha and asked for a list of genuine Yamaha dealers in the Philippines. Turns out there are 3 so I ordered the receiver from one of them and I have what I ordered, complete with warranty papers that verified the receiver when I registered it.

We recently installed a 140' hollow block fence in the back and there was about a dozen scraggy trees and stumps that had to be cut. I ordered a 20" Stihl chainsaw on Lazada for a little over P2k or about $45. Of course it is a fake, that saw should cost over $500, but it runs great and it it hard to tell it from a genuine Stihl. When I first arrived here I saw all these Stihl chainsaws being used to cut studs and planks from coco wood and I wondering how can they afford Stihl chainsaws?

That was exactly my point. How far back are the Philippines that they don't know ex-pats saw this game over ten years ago?  I went to Toyota to buy a car advertised on their site, and I even gave them the printout of the specs. Do you know when I offered a complete cashout, they showed me the wrong car? No finance with me ever (Not in the Philippines), but if I can afford to pay cash, I will. I decided to take a look at Nissan. No games, no crap, you got what you advertised, or I'm walking. They at least got the message, And we are working on it now. Tire of the Walking Dollar Sign looks every time they see me.

Sorry! Pretty upset that I have to pay more than a Filipino because I'm a foreigner.

Just saying.

Lone Wolf NY