Dangerous Prototypes Open Source Hardware

NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

September 04, 2016, 07:16:19 am

We changed logistics companies on the new site only. Espeed just couldn't automate our export control documents so we had to find an expert in cross border ecommerse to help us. The new company seems much more professional and generally have their shit together better than espeed.

DHL
DHL Hong Kong for all destinations instead of a combination of DHL Hong Kong and DHL China. Timing is 1-7 days, same as Espeed, so we'll have to see what happens. Price for popular destinations seems the same, I didn't check others. I'm using an old value for currency exchange as well. RMB today is all the way at 6.6/USD, when updated our shipping prices will drop around 5-10% I imagine.

DHL next day is suspended, probably indefinitely, until the Chinese currency control laws change. We can still do next day, but you'll need to pay around $60 extra for the export declarations.

Airmail options
Replaced Hong Kong Airmail with PostNL Dutch mail. Supposedly this is much faster, slightly cheaper, and registered mail is an option. We will no longer refund or replace lost untracked packages, use that option at your own risk.

Known Issues
The new logistics API is quite slow to give price quotes. You may see a momentary loading message when opening the cart if your combination of country and weight has not been refreshed in the last 7 days.

It is not clear how the new logistics API will actually give a tracking number when available. We know where to get it, but we haven't seen exactly how it will be presented in the JSON feed. Once one package goes through we will be able to see and adjust the system in a few minutes.

Re: NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

Reply #1 – September 18, 2016, 09:26:18 am

Is this info still valid? Regards

Re: NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

Reply #2 – September 19, 2016, 05:52:20 am

Nope, sorry I didn't update. The new provider was absolute rubbish. We spent four days debugging their API with them. Their programmer knew nothing about either logistics or the API or really programming. Got the typical "works for me" over and over and over. Sent him links to totally garbage shipping labels, but instead of clicking it he loaded in their back end and said it was our problem. I mean how do we cause their PDF shipping labels to not have any values on them? They also returned a batch of air mail because the country on our labels (entered manually, as the API still doesn't work) didn't match their system, but clearly they did. IT was just a nightmare so I removed the new methods and restored the espeed methods. The quest continues, which really sucks, as we spent the last five weeks dealing with them. My current goal is to find a logistics company in the free trade zone and handle our export declarations here in China and then pass to a bonded warehouse. I'm gonna cruise down to Futian Free Trade zone on my electric bike and look for one this afternoon :)

Re: NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

Reply #3 – September 19, 2016, 06:58:06 pm

Wow, sorry to hear that. :/ I had high hopes for PostNL because of faster times and registered option.
That's the spirit! ;)

Re: NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

Reply #4 – September 19, 2016, 10:38:44 pm

[quote author="ian"]I'm gonna cruise down to Futian Free Trade zone on my electric bike and look for one this afternoon :)[/quote]

Pictures or it didn't happen :P

pitty about postnl, on paper a good option. Hope you find a good shipper.

Re: NEW SITE: New Shipping Options and Logistics Provider

Reply #5 – September 20, 2016, 04:41:47 am

We will bring back postnl, there's no problems with that and Espeed does provide it (though slightly more expensive). It is the logistics company that was reselling postNL that has all the problems. Actually, we're starting to get the feeling we're just to big to be messing with logistics companies, we should probably negotiate an account directly with PostNL without the middleman.