This has exceeded the helpful post level 100 by another 100. Thanks for the detailed post.
Aliexpress.com - Feedback Thread
- Thread starter raksrules
- Start date
fastapifastdisks
Level F
Dude, thank you so so much this post was detailed way beyond expectation. Gonna save this for future use.You'll have to keep in mind that the prices you see on there will not be the final price that you pay at shipping, My 2.6kg parcel which would have been around 254 yuan (3k inr) came to around 3.6k inr after cgb's own exchange rate (which I think is 6.26 yuan : 1 usd) and paypal/UPI (yes they have UPI surprisingly) conversion fees.
View attachment 135083
CSSBuy's exchange rate is much better at around 6.4 yuan : 1 usd so you're getting more for your money. Both CGB and CSSBuy website UI is quite trash, it's usable but can be well improved upon (Best to use expert buy where you use a form to input the url of the product and tell them what exactly it is that you want)
View attachment 135084
CGB tends to charge more fees from just ordering an item tho if I remember right, They took around 1.3 usd on a 31 dollar shoe. CSS doesn't charge service fee until you ship the product where they will take X% depending on your account level (most accounts which are opened via a referral link get around 4% charged). In my opinion and without me spending too much time dwelling on the chump change, CSSBuy is cheaper when it comes to their exchange rate and services, is it by a whole lot? No not by that much compared to it's competitors but it is cheaper
CSS gives you more control over what services you want, unlimited QC pics for 1.5 yuan, Measuring your shoe for 5 yuan (ridiculous price for just a picture where they pull a measuring tape out) Priority Purchase where you pay a bit extra and they order your item immediately within an hour to at max a day, CGB on the other hand provides only around 5 QC pics for free, an extra 3 is given for free according to your request. CGB doesn't have any priority purchase option, you either get lucky and they order it in a day or they take their own sweetass time
There's also another concept called rehearsal shipping which is basically the agent repacking the Items properly into a box and giving a proper weight of the parcel, until you do this most agents will just give you an estimate weight for which you can pay for and after paying they will pack it and weigh the actual parcel, but the estimate weight is highly likely to be inaccurate, you could end up paying over the actual weight (Excess cash will be given back via agent balance) or if you underpaid they will ask you to pay up the actual amount. Rehearsal shipping just gets rid of that headache, they basically more or less pack it and weigh it first then give you the quote for the actual shipping cost. CGB does this for free, there's a button called manual quote for when you want to ship your parcel. CSSBuy on the otherhand charges 15 yuan for it.
Now for the actual part of your question
They're all somewhat equally the same
Ok to put it in a better way, they both have their own pros and cons. These days people are more annoyed with Citygobuy and their long order times as well as refund processing. Personally for me I didn't have much of a problem ordering but I agree they do take a bit too long at times. CSSBuy seems to be more consistent with their ordering time but recently they have more or less become the most popular agents for europeans and americans and so sometimes orders do take a bit longer than before but it far more consistent and precise compared to CGB for sure.
In terms of customer service, CSSBuy has a huge discord server with many representatives that can help you out, CGB also stepped up and have their own discord server now as well.
CSSBuy also has far better coupons too, you get like 2 when you join them and another 2 from their discord server (20 yuan, 30 yuan and even 50 yuan coupons for shipping etc)
If I were to purchase anything from china again, I would personally go for CSSBuy, they're cheaper and their service is more consistent than CGB but you can't really go wrong with both
imo ignore superbuy or any other agent unless you are sure of the weight of the item that you're purchasing and have checked it with the comparison calculator and superbuy or any other agent has the cheapest shipping line (I have never used those china post or NLpost shipping lines and can't find any posts of people using that in India so I can't say)
Shipping wise tho for India you basically have 2 options
View attachment 135085
E-EMS/EMS - E-EMS is the cheaper one but honestly the delivery time between EMS and E-EMS almost seems nonexistent. E-EMS at the moment takes around average 25 days to get delivered if there aren't any customs problem (majority of the time there isn't any unless your'e insane and declare like $5 for a luxury watch/bag)
Aramex (VOLUMETRIC WEIGHT IS 9/10 ALWAYS HIGHER THAN ACTUAL WEIGHT) - If the item you're ordering is small or money isn't a problem for you (and you have connections at customs) then aramex is the fastest, delivered usually within 2 weeks
Now if you use the comparison calculator that I have linked, you'll notice for like 3 kilos and below, aramex is cheaper than E-EMS. Well the simple reason for that is, E-EMS is ACTUAL weight whereas aramex is length*width*height/5000. CGB's Calculator for lwh is broken hence why the comparison calculator doesn't change when you change the values of lwh as well.
For example :- A 900gm parcel would come to around 90 yuan shipping which is cheaper than the rest of the options, however that is false because aramex is volumetric and 9 times out of 10, volumetric is always higher than actual weight, so let's say the actual size of the parcel is 35x25x17/5000=2.9 kg. 2.9 Kg is what you would input so the actual price becomes 236 yuan, where as using E-EMS it's only around 130 yuan.
Hence aramex is only good if you're buying something small, where the actual weight will be more than the volumetric weight or you're ready to pay as much as you can just to get an item from china as quick as possible. Shipping via aramex will also require you to give proper documents about the value of the Item as well, customs dodging does not exist with Aramex edit :- Actually, some people just had to pay the basic duty fees normally, the reddit thread I've linked was probably a heavily undervalued declaration which was a mistake by the OP
Ignore CSSbuy's aramex at the moment, it recently got added but is 2x the price of CGB's Aramex and it's a joke right now
Alright I've given a summary of what I've learnt over the past 6 months, if there's any more questions ask me. Btw I'm not affiliated with any of these agents, just a fellow techenclave member wanting to help people out
OneTapHero
Level D
Is AliExpress shipping products to India now? I see "From China to India via Special Line-YW" as a shipping method.
Also, will I be charged extra at customs for a product worth 1.6k INR? I will ask the seller to declare the product as a low value item.
Also, will I be charged extra at customs for a product worth 1.6k INR? I will ask the seller to declare the product as a low value item.
Jaspreetrattan
Disciple
you able to pay for your items ? payment was not going through earlier .
There are no custom duties anyway for upto 2K. The sellers always declare the value to be lower, so it is generally possible to get away with items worth around $100 if there is a cheaper generic equivalent available for that item. Known brands or knock-offs of known brands will always cause an issue.
Since the ban you could always proceed till checkout and then the error message would pop-up about shipping being restricted to India. Haven't tried it recently but I assume it is still on the banned list.
shefeeqonline
Disciple
The ban is still there. Tried site and app. Both shows restricted.
Rezep
Level F
To add an update to this EMS Shipping has apparently shifted to volumetric (this is for all agents)You'll have to keep in mind that the prices you see on there will not be the final price that you pay at shipping, My 2.6kg parcel which would have been around 254 yuan (3k inr) came to around 3.6k inr after cgb's own exchange rate (which I think is 6.26 yuan : 1 usd) and paypal/UPI (yes they have UPI surprisingly) conversion fees.
View attachment 135083
CSSBuy's exchange rate is much better at around 6.4 yuan : 1 usd so you're getting more for your money. Both CGB and CSSBuy website UI is quite trash, it's usable but can be well improved upon (Best to use expert buy where you use a form to input the url of the product and tell them what exactly it is that you want)
View attachment 135084
CGB tends to charge more fees from just ordering an item tho if I remember right, They took around 1.3 usd on a 31 dollar shoe. CSS doesn't charge service fee until you ship the product where they will take X% depending on your account level (most accounts which are opened via a referral link get around 4% charged). In my opinion and without me spending too much time dwelling on the chump change, CSSBuy is cheaper when it comes to their exchange rate and services, is it by a whole lot? No not by that much compared to it's competitors but it is cheaper
CSS gives you more control over what services you want, unlimited QC pics for 1.5 yuan, Measuring your shoe for 5 yuan (ridiculous price for just a picture where they pull a measuring tape out) Priority Purchase where you pay a bit extra and they order your item immediately within an hour to at max a day, CGB on the other hand provides only around 5 QC pics for free, an extra 3 is given for free according to your request. CGB doesn't have any priority purchase option, you either get lucky and they order it in a day or they take their own sweetass time
There's also another concept called rehearsal shipping which is basically the agent repacking the Items properly into a box and giving a proper weight of the parcel, until you do this most agents will just give you an estimate weight for which you can pay for and after paying they will pack it and weigh the actual parcel, but the estimate weight is highly likely to be inaccurate, you could end up paying over the actual weight (Excess cash will be given back via agent balance) or if you underpaid they will ask you to pay up the actual amount. Rehearsal shipping just gets rid of that headache, they basically more or less pack it and weigh it first then give you the quote for the actual shipping cost. CGB does this for free, there's a button called manual quote for when you want to ship your parcel. CSSBuy on the otherhand charges 15 yuan for it.
Now for the actual part of your question
They're all somewhat equally the same
Ok to put it in a better way, they both have their own pros and cons. These days people are more annoyed with Citygobuy and their long order times as well as refund processing. Personally for me I didn't have much of a problem ordering but I agree they do take a bit too long at times. CSSBuy seems to be more consistent with their ordering time but recently they have more or less become the most popular agents for europeans and americans and so sometimes orders do take a bit longer than before but it far more consistent and precise compared to CGB for sure.
In terms of customer service, CSSBuy has a huge discord server with many representatives that can help you out, CGB also stepped up and have their own discord server now as well.
CSSBuy also has far better coupons too, you get like 2 when you join them and another 2 from their discord server (20 yuan, 30 yuan and even 50 yuan coupons for shipping etc)
If I were to purchase anything from china again, I would personally go for CSSBuy, they're cheaper and their service is more consistent than CGB but you can't really go wrong with both
imo ignore superbuy or any other agent unless you are sure of the weight of the item that you're purchasing and have checked it with the comparison calculator and superbuy or any other agent has the cheapest shipping line (I have never used those china post or NLpost shipping lines and can't find any posts of people using that in India so I can't say)
Shipping wise tho for India you basically have 2 options
View attachment 135085
E-EMS/EMS - E-EMS is the cheaper one but honestly the delivery time between EMS and E-EMS almost seems nonexistent. E-EMS at the moment takes around average 25 days to get delivered if there aren't any customs problem (majority of the time there isn't any unless your'e insane and declare like $5 for a luxury watch/bag)
Aramex (VOLUMETRIC WEIGHT IS 9/10 ALWAYS HIGHER THAN ACTUAL WEIGHT) - If the item you're ordering is small or money isn't a problem for you (and you have connections at customs) then aramex is the fastest, delivered usually within 2 weeks
Now if you use the comparison calculator that I have linked, you'll notice for like 3 kilos and below, aramex is cheaper than E-EMS. Well the simple reason for that is, E-EMS is ACTUAL weight whereas aramex is length*width*height/5000. CGB's Calculator for lwh is broken hence why the comparison calculator doesn't change when you change the values of lwh as well.
For example :- A 900gm parcel would come to around 90 yuan shipping which is cheaper than the rest of the options, however that is false because aramex is volumetric and 9 times out of 10, volumetric is always higher than actual weight, so let's say the actual size of the parcel is 35x25x17/5000=2.9 kg. 2.9 Kg is what you would input so the actual price becomes 236 yuan, where as using E-EMS it's only around 130 yuan.
Hence aramex is only good if you're buying something small, where the actual weight will be more than the volumetric weight or you're ready to pay as much as you can just to get an item from china as quick as possible. Shipping via aramex will also require you to give proper documents about the value of the Item as well, customs dodging does not exist with Aramex edit :- Actually, some people just had to pay the basic duty fees normally, the reddit thread I've linked was probably a heavily undervalued declaration which was a mistake by the OP
Ignore CSSbuy's aramex at the moment, it recently got added but is 2x the price of CGB's Aramex and it's a joke right now
Alright I've given a summary of what I've learnt over the past 6 months, if there's any more questions ask me. Btw I'm not affiliated with any of these agents, just a fellow techenclave member wanting to help people out
If any side of the parcel exceeds 40cm, then volumetric weight will also be considered. If volumetric weight is more than actual weight then the volumetric weight will be taken for measuring cost of shipping.
Has anyone tried to order something from aliexpress recently?
Today I was browsing some products, when I moved to checkout page I was able to finally make it to the payment page of paypal or credit/debit card.
As long as I can remember previously the checkout page just gets stuck to this
Do anyone know if they started shipping back to India?
Today I was browsing some products, when I moved to checkout page I was able to finally make it to the payment page of paypal or credit/debit card.
As long as I can remember previously the checkout page just gets stuck to this
Do anyone know if they started shipping back to India?
Digigear
Level F
hellblazer33
Level F
Digigear
Level F
Yeah, this is what we'd been seeing since the beginning.
jinx
Level E
No-one should be allowed to bump this thread unless they successfully place an order lol. Everytime I get a notification from this thread, it gets my hopes up only to be disappointed a few moments later
Use of eBay and parcel forwarding services were a couple of good things that came out of the discussion but now it is pointless to bump this thread until there is an official reversal in government policy, which is extremely unlikely anytime soon.No-one should be allowed to bump this thread unless they successfully place an order lol. Everytime I get a notification from this thread, it gets my hopes up only to be disappointed a few moments later
montsa007
Level F
I'll bump it anyway LOL.
---
You can use services like PPOBox which have an office in HK (Check for similar services), so your Stuff will be stuffed in a gunny bag from China to HK for India, it may be a long and costly route, but I am assuming you are in a scenario where you cannot live without the product.
Jaspreetrattan
Disciple
ppo box is based out of mumbai ? i checked website and it shows wherehouse in UK and US Only
montsa007
Level F
Yep, they have a setup in Andheri
Maybe ppobox decided to close their HK Setup, now you have 2 options
1. Get your merchandise in USA and ask PPO to send it to your Indian Address
2. Find an alternate to PPO (Myus, Ship7, there are a bunch of them, you have to do some research before you choose your partner in crime) and get it via HK or some middleman country.
Honestly the ban is not 100% bulletproof, there is always a way around lol.
I know people will say getting it via US would mean higher wait time + more shipping charges & customs drama, but read my previous post again, its all under the assumption that "You cannot live without the product, you need it at any cost, by any means necessary"
Nope, had made a payment a week ago with the seller being listed from Shanghai.
Interestingly, package was shipped from Uzbekistan and I received it in a week. Amazing where all the Chinese sellers have warehouses.