mailing credit cards to Vietnam

Last week, another credit/debit card was sent to us from the States using DHL as per our request. 

It left Cincinnati, Ohio at 7:30AM local time on Friday (18:30 here) and arrive in Saigon at 8AM today, Tuesday.  It's one and a half business day (not counting the non-working 2 day weekend when it waited idly in Hong Kong.) 

It's the 7th time our credit cards were sent to us from the States in the last 4 years (5 times by the bank, once by our daughter), and the fastest time ever.

Now, how long it'll take to go from Saigon to VT during lockdown is another story.

I'm from Canada.  My card (and my wife's card) expired earlier this year.  I contacted MasterCard a month or so ahead of time and they made it happen.  One watch out that I was unaware of at the time is they treated them like lost or stolen cards.  This meant that both cards where cancelled immediately leaving us with nothing for about 7 days.  Next time I will stagger the cards until I receive the first one so we still have access to our credit account.  Using this option, there was no shipping fees.  Everything was handled by Mastercard.

Ciambella wrote:

It left Cincinnati, Ohio at 7:30AM local time on Friday (18:30 here) and arrive in Saigon at 8AM today, Tuesday.  It's one and a half business day. 

Now, how long it'll take to go from Saigon to VT during lockdown is another story.

Schwab did the dumbest thing:  The address on the label is my daughter's in California, but the city is Vung Tau.  First time they goofed up like that. 

Thank goodness I called DHL to check on the status and found out it was sitting in Saigon for the last 24 hours waiting for instructions.  Gave them the correct address and it arrived at our gate today.  Still, even during lockdown and the delay in Saigon, it took only 3 working days and we didn't have to pay.  We never did.

Schwab is done; Amex is next in October.

Received two new credit cards this week issued by my German bank. Since these cards require a pin verified payment within Germany in order to activate contactless payment, I had them mailed to my mother so she could make payments.

She then shipped them to HCMC with DHL worldwide express on September 12th. Shipment arrived in HCMC on September 16th, 07:30 AM and got cleared by customs within one hour (commodity code IB:3926. 90.99, envelope was not opened)

Actual delivery to my place didn't happen until  21st of September as DHL insisted they were not allowed to operate under Covid-19 restrictions.

All in all it went smoothly.

devbob wrote:

Received two new credit cards this week issued by my German bank. Since these cards require a pin verified payment within Germany in order to activate contactless payment, I had them mailed to my mother so she could make payments.

She then shipped them to HCMC with DHL worldwide express on September 12th. Shipment arrived in HCMC on September 16th, 07:30 AM and got cleared by customs within one hour (commodity code IB:3926. 90.99, envelope was not opened)

Actual delivery to my place didn't happen until  21st of September as DHL insisted they were not allowed to operate under Covid-19 restrictions.

All in all it went smoothly.

Officially on DHLs list of items they don't carry.. bank and credit cards is one of the items.


Anyway good to here you for them safely

Jlgarbutt wrote:

Officially on DHLs list of items they don't carry.. bank and credit cards is one of the items.

They're not mentioned on the list of prohibited goods for DHL Express Germany. The closest one would be

Cash (legal tender - bank notes, currency notes, coins) and travellers cheques

However they make it very clear that credit cards cannot be send as documents.

Maybe policies depend on the shippers country? Or it might have changed completely?

Jlgarbutt wrote:

Officially on DHLs list of items they don't carry.. bank and credit cards is one of the items.

Every time I had the choice, I asked the banks to send the cards via DHL Express.  So far, I've received 6 DHL shipments for credit cards, all from the US (Bank of America, Barclay, Chase, and Schwab.)  The most recent time was only a few weeks ago during this lockdown, and Schwab wrote the address wrong (California street address with Vung Tau postal code, no country.)

I requested AmEx to send the new cards with DHL next month.

Ciambella wrote:

Jlgarbutt wrote:

Officially on DHLs list of items they don't carry.. bank and credit cards is one of the items.

Every time I had the choice, I asked the banks to send the cards via DHL Express.  So far, I've received 6 DHL shipments for credit cards, all from the US (Bank of America, Barclay, Chase, and Schwab.)  The most recent time was only a few weeks ago during this lockdown, and Schwab wrote the address wrong (California street address with Vung Tau postal code, no country.)

I requested AmEx to send the new cards with DHL next month.

Recalling the time I attempted to send you your active cards from Vũng Tàu to Europe: both DHL and FedEx refused to accept the cards for shipment.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Recalling the time I attempted to send you your active cards from Vũng Tàu to Europe: both DHL and FedEx refused to accept the cards for shipment.

Why did they refuse, I still don't know.  Many of the cards I received from the States were activated, but they're all sent from the banks except one.  That one my daughter sent via UPS and it was stolen.  She put 2 cards inside 2 pairs of compression socks.  The thief stole one card and one of each sock, leaving me the card that wasn't in my name (it was hers) and 2 unmatched socks. 

I was so mad.  I didn't care much about the card because the bank would replace it at no charge to me, but the socks, at $18 and $25 a pair from Amazon, what I was gonna do with 2 odd ones, unmatched in colours, patterns, length, and compression strength?

And UPS charged her $125 to send!

The world is full of rude people.   

Ciambella wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Recalling the time I attempted to send you your active cards from Vũng Tàu to Europe: both DHL and FedEx refused to accept the cards for shipment.

Why did they refuse, I still don't know...

"Maybe" it's the same mentality encountered in many VN banks when the default answer to many requests is NO.

Or maybe they misunderstood me and thought I wanted to PAY with the cards?

I don't think so.

My sense was that it's a big no-no for them.