buying electronics from china online

myles79

anyone have any experiance buying goods from chinese websites i found this one www.chinavasion.com and the goods on it look like there 2 cheap to be true ,whats the catch? Its something like 44 euro for a mpeg4 player watch,that sounds mad.

jor el

myles79 wrote:

whats the catch?

It's all generic unbranded stuff. They ship by DHL/UPS so you will be caught for import duty, VAT and the charge that DHL/UPS levy on top of that (duty about 4%, VAT 21% on top and then charge of up to €15). You'll more than likely have no warranty either. You can only pay by Paypal or bank transfer.

RoyalMarine

Fast Delivery
Shipping direct from China to major destinations (Europe, US, Australia, etc.) typically takes only 5-to-10 days.

Warranty All the products we sell come with a minimum one-year warranty but you will find that some merchandise is guaranteed for a longer period by their Chinese manufacturers.

byte

The company seems to be aimed at dropshippers who get discounts depending on the volume of purchases. DHL and the likes would be used so the dropshipper can track the item.

scottyboy1973

byte wrote: »

The company seems to be aimed at dropshippers who get discounts depending on the volume of purchases. DHL and the likes would be used so the dropshipper can track the item.

The issue I've always found with drop shipping from the likes of these guys is that no end-consumer is going to take a shipping charge of €10-€15 so you end up having to absorb some of it yourself (probably at least half) and that eats into your own margin.

Re the customs, VAT etc, sometimes they get you and sometimes they dont - quite often the guys mark the package as a gift and it will get through customs without any charges.

scottyboy1973

jor el wrote: »

It's all generic unbranded stuff. They ship by DHL/UPS so you will be caught for import duty, VAT and the charge that DHL/UPS levy on top of that (duty about 4%, VAT 21% on top and then charge of up to €15). You'll more than likely have no warranty either. You can only pay by Paypal or bank transfer.

that is true but if you choose to ship with EMS (China Post) or similar, that come to your door via SDS (An Post) so generally that gets around the customs thing

scottyboy1973

myles79 wrote: »

whats the catch? Its something like 44 euro for a mpeg4 player watch,that sounds mad.

the bottom line is you get what you pay for. I bought 6 of them from china and they were delivered last week. They look fine, the packaging is fine and they work. The menus are a bit (OK VERY!) clunky and the GUI certainly isnt apple standard but its OK. If you are planning to resell them you can make 60-100% markup and still come in at half the cost of the equivalent Apple unit that retails for €110.

If you expect that it will be aload of rubbish, you'll be pleasantly surprised.

littleoulme

another good little site for bits and pieces is dealextreme.com