I have just collected my second round of shipment through 86OF parcel forwarding, and generally speaking, you could say it turned out just fine.
My bounty this time, amounting to 0.24 CBM
Here are some details of note during the course of engagement with 86OF for the shipment.
The Good
Customer service is prompt. They actually use WhatsApp, which facilitates clear communication, especially when you have to get across long strings of numbers. I communicated in Chinese, but I suppose simple English would be OK too.
Parcel arrival at the warehouse gets updated into the account at lightning speed. When I saw the logistics (物流) status in Taobao showing that the parcel has been delivered, I went into 86of website to check, and it’s already there. I did receive an SMS notification as well within a few hours. Also, the internet banking transfer for topping up funds was also updated into my account within half an hour. After submitting for shipping, my parcel was shipped the very next day. The response time is really impressive.
The date of arrival in Singapore was initially 10 Mar 2017, but it was later changed to 12 Mar 2017. It’s a good thing that they bother to update this information to keep customers informed.
When collecting my parcels, the staff did a match for each item in my shipment list. I suppose they must have run into the problem of customer complaint of missing items. Definitely a good and necessary protocol to ensure everything is OK at the point of collection.
I’m also happy with the way they tape the smaller parcels together. It is securely fastened, and there’s no way they can come apart, so it’s unlikely that they will go missing. It’s not as professional as how ezbuy does it, but it’s good enough.
The Bad
After submitting my forecast for a few parcels, upon receipt of the parcels at the warehouse, i tried checking the status, but i can find no trace of my parcels under “All forecast” nor “parcels List”. The only way i could confirm that the system has a record of my parcel forecast was by attempting to submit the forecast again, whereby I was told the record already exists. This was quite terrible, leaving customers in a lurch.
I contacted customer service and was told the records have gone missing due to a system upgrade. Actually, although there was a lapse in their handling of customer data, i kind of appreciate the honesty in the reply. I was told to perform a “claim parcel” operation, and upon doing that, my parcels were reflected in the parcels list.
I think 86OF has a long way to go in improving their website, but i’m guessing they don’t have the resources to do so at the moment. In any case, ensuring reliability in the parcel forwarding should be the primary focus, and I’m still quite happy with the website as it is now, since it fulfills it’s intended functions just fine.
When my parcels arrived in SG, they went missing in the website, again. Prior to arrival, they were in the “Sended SG” status. When they actually arrived, the status wasn’t updated to “Arrived SG”.
It’s gone again
A quick check with the customer service through WhatsApp revealed that the parcels were ready for collection. Anyway, I’m not too bothered about the accuracy of the website, since customer service provides instant confirmation.
Conclusion
Happy customer I am. Unbeatable low shipping fees.
This is my first time with 86OF after years with EZbuy, Prouter and so on.
I tried with them by ship to me 2 PMD (<S$600) at below 0.2cbm by end March, Goods arrived after ~ 3 weeks.
I purchased the item insurance with them as compulsory – only can be manually done by their customer service, where the nightmare began!
They have a term- "all insured items MUST self inspected and collected at their warehouse and cannot opt for delivery".
However, pre checked with their customer service via QQ (no response from their whatsapp) , they confirmed to me insured items can opt for delivery- Just imagine if a customer is getting up insured items 50 kg items, by 0.5cbm, they will provide free delivery -not tested) , can’t you expect the customer will get a truck over to transport the goods, home delivery must be offered as an option for customer’s convenience ,right?
When my items arrived at their China warehouse, I called them and spoke with them in Chinese as courtesy to confirm the total $ need to be transferred for the payment. WOW, the guy named Guo who answered my call was super rude, he just said ” I am very very busy, what do you want?” then hang up. My second call was answered by a lady who was more friendly and told me just on top added 2% to the total goods value as insurance fees and S$20 for delivery. I then transferred the required $ over, being confirmed and submitted the order. I made another call to them to proceed with the insurance payment and order.The rude guy answered the call again and said “Cannot, insurance is S$10 per item not 2% and cannot home delivery!” I told him your people confirmed to me all these before hand, he just hang my call! How rude this guy is !!!
In order to proceed, at no choice (my PMD already at their China warehouse), I canceled my order and resubmitted the order in the system with self collect only and with no delivery. Instead of talking with them again which were helpless and wasting time, I made the request in their inquiry portion to proceed my order, to deduct whatever needed and to ship out my items. I uploaded in the inquiry portion also the QQ print screen proof as they had confirmed to me earlier on that insured item can be opt for delivery, and soon later their admin replied me – “can do delivery but you have to pay S$30 ! ” instead of S$20 – see the additional S$10 catch here ! Come on, why should I pay S$10 more ?? for the rudeness, messy communication, poor credibility, poor system and service?
My parcel was shown as arrived at singapore and in delivering in early april and after 4 days only got an inbox message stated that my parcel was ready for self collection- no sms/whatsapp/call received at all !
When I was at their office for self collection, one of the lady there surprisingsly told me that I had not paid the insurance fees! OMG, can you believe that? 10 mins after she checked here and there then said paid already and without any sorry. I just then checked my goods, repacked and went off.
I had requested to refund my extra cash balance by end of March and only received the fund after 3 weeks with multiple times of pushing and follow ups.
The Good
-None ! The 0.1 cbm to ship for bulky item and at S$13/0.1 cbm , may look cheap BUT with catches and the below BAD
The Bad
-RUDE, messy, inconsistent customer service
-Poor system with tons of terms and conditions
-Refund takes forever
Just wonder with such extremely poor service standard, what makes its expansions here recently-Just because of it sounds low cost without considering of the hidden catches and hassles to be going thru?
People loves challenges and hassles with ample of free times may go try it but this is my first time and LAST time with 86OF !
Side note: Just noticed that its complaint phone no is handled by this rude Guo!
Hi Tang, thanks for sharing your experience. Indeed, 86of is a mess when it comes to communication. BUT, their price is really too attractive for now. I hope the competition catches up.
I spoke to Guo too when their CS couldn’t gave me answers regarding my lost parcels.
The outcome is Guo is 100x worse than their CS. He said what CS do is totally right. I asked for the parcels outcome. He sent me 6 photos of parcels and say ” we have so many of these parcels everyday that cannot find who it belongs to, you help me find then” Speechless.. and keep on demanding for their so-called evidence.
Super rude person!!
Hi yen Kai,
Would like to get your advise what about if my parcel is around 41kg electronic equipment. Is that worth to go by sea shipments or air?
Thank you so much
Hi Queenny, going by actual weight, it will cost you almost $140 to ship by ezbuy air. I would probably ship via sea freight.
hi yen kai
do you mind revealing how much you paid for shipping this time round?
Hi gym, of course i don’t mind. I paid $31.20 for the shipping charge for 0.24 CBM (0.24 X 10 X 13), plus GST for the purchased items.
Hi Yen Kai,
Thank you so much for sharing how to use 86OF and your reviews. but i’m stuck at the first step already. how do i register?? hahaha!
i would like to go with the woodlands branch.
anyway, can i check with you how do you make payment by? (by credit card or bank transfer – for the shipment cost) im assuming the item cost can be paid via credit card through taobao la.. but do correct me if im wrong ya.. 🙂
thank you very much!! 🙂
Hi Sarah, the website for Woodlands branch is http://www.888ocean.com/. Account registration should be quite straight forward, there’s a link on the top that says “免费注册”. You’ll have to be comfortable with Chinese to get things done when using 86OF.
You make payment for your shipment using bank transfer. After you have done the transfer, WhatsApp the screenshot of the bank transfer to customer service (displayed at the top of the website 客户服务电话) together with your account username, and they will update your account within a few hours usually. You can make payment when purchasing stuff on Taobao using credit card as usual.
Thank you very much YenKai!
Hi Yenkai,
I am now consolidating my parcels to get ship out while waiting for the last item. I have some questions to ask.
I saw in one of your post somewhere u mention if ship furniture will be charge at $84 for 1 cbm, but max items 4?
Currently I have 7 items in warehouse and 1 on the way.
Out of 8 items, 1 is dining table set, 1 is a book shelf so that consider 2 furnitures? Current cbm is 0.77 and by the time my last item come in shd be ard 0.9 cbm.
And I able to ship all out as one shipment? or must separate the furniture and non furniture shipment?
If paying for 1 cbm, max item is 20 pc?
Hi William, 86of has updated their sea freight pricing. There is no longer any discount for shipping furniture or commercial goods, it is $90/CBM as well now, but they claim they give priority for shipping these items. Also, they don’t limit the number of parcels any more. I just shipped 19 parcels in 0.5 CBM and there was no additional charge. Maybe it was not strictly enforced before also. So i guess you can just anyhow ship. Best to try to hit 1 CBM ($90), or 0.5 CBM ($59) or keep to below 0.3 CBM. If i were you i will try to ship more items because it would be “free” anyway, since you’ll have to pay for 1 CBM.
Ok. Thank you Yenkai.