Hobby King Global Warehouse.

[Daithi O Buitigh]

Things are actually getting back to what passes as 'normal' for POS Malaysia (30 days or so) now that the Lipos are being sorted out for sea transport and orders without lipos are going by air. When the journalistic sting went in, they simple shipped ALL packages from late May to mid June by sea rather than manually go through who knows how many thousand packages (HK ships on average 5,000 parcels a day so there were a LOT)

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

Posted by Gary Manuel on 08/08/2014 12:14:24:

Posted by GrahamWh on 08/08/2014 11:53:36:

My props arrived today _ 2months 3 days!

Pretty good service then. Phileas Fogg took 80 days .

Not sure why any criticism is directed towards Hobbyking Global warehouse, as they normally post the items within a couple of days. The delay is with the postal service at the various ports of call. It doesn't get much better when it reaches our shores either .

The thread is useful though to give readers an idea of postal service to expect.

Do remember though - A watched kettle never boils .

Well my parcel finally arrived this morning from the other side of the globe but was beaten by Phileas Fogg's circumnavigation by a couple of days...

I think most people's complaint against HK is the total lack of information or interest from their customer support. It seems that the Malaysia Post problem is at the root of the problem - why could they not have explained this when we contacted them? Are they concerned that they could be liable for their carrier not air mailing the packages as per contract perhaps or just not bothered enough to actually investigate the delivery problems?

[Pete B]

Surely, if buying something from Hobbyking is going to induce such grief and angst, wouldn't it make sense to just not shop there?

You can get whatever you need overnight from UK outlets or even visit your LMS - the only 'attack of the vapours' you're likely to suffer then will be due to the cost.....

That would leave the stock and shorter queues for the rest of us who don't expect UK levels of service world-wide and are content with live with HK's little foibles....

If the 5000 parcels a day is an accurate figure, we're not hearing much about 99% of them are we?

To coin a phrase, "Never in the field of human consumerism has so much been writ by so many about so little of import" - if you forgive the pun.....

Pete

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

Well said Pete - and it's a conclusion that I'm being driven to with various difficulties with poor customer service responses from this and other matters.

A recent thread highlighted that problems can occur with anything from the smallest cottage industry to global players but let's just learn to accept poor customer service whether from home or abroad without complaint. I'm sure that the speedy resolution of that matter soon after the thread was raised had absolutely nothing to do with it. Far better to simply put a bad experience down to poor selection of supplier and let everyone else enjoy wandering off blindly into making similar errors. There are just too many people willing to waste time and effort in pursuing silly little matters of £20 here and £50 there.

I'm so annoyed to have found out that a certain national carrier has a reputation for slow and unreliable service as a result of this thread - now I can't enter the wonderful lottery of selecting a carrier with any sense of random chance. Who knows, widescale publicity around carrier problems and poor response to customer service queries might even raise a small amount of concern with the companies concerned and help improve their service! Where's the fun in that?

It's a sad fact that some of the range of items available through HK are either ridiculously more expensive or not available from UK suppliers and these are the sort of products I'm likely to order - in the case of my (eventual) last order it was something I've never seen advertised anywhere else and at a price which just put it into "that would be nice to experiment with" territory so buying locally was never an option.

If this sort of thing is allowed to continue we'll be in danger of losing our reputation as a nation happy to put up with indifferent customer service!

Edited By Martin Harris on 08/08/2014 14:42:18

[Erfolg]

I am very surprised and in some respects cannot comprehend the non response of HK to the issues raised.

It is apparent that they have been aware of the issue s with Pos Malaysia for some time. Why should I think this, quite simple really. Last year, perhaps early this year, I purchase a lipo from HK international, it took a very long time to arrive, in excess of the 30 days max indicated on the ordering system. Early this year I ordered another Lio specifically for Greenacres, well in advance of the 30 days, making an allowance from the previous experience.. The order now showed a 40 day up to note. None the less this was well within the Greenacre date.

The important thing is, HK were aware of the Pos issue. Their reaction was to stretch the delivery date. Yet it is still far to optimistic.

What should and should have been done. In my opinion they need to flag up that the delivery of Lipos from the International depot, is experiencing long delays. This advice needs to be prominent. They also need to seek a faster and more reliable carrier,

It has been stated that many carriers will not deal with Lipos. The irony is I have recently read an article which addresses Lithium batteries in all the types and their transport. The gist was that carriers are already transporting many millions of these devices, by aircraft and other means, where they generically used in Tablet computers, phones, increasingly used in mobile devices which are shipped in bulk and individual basis. The response would appear to be incoherent in many respects, in that when included in a device, some are happy, others are not, unless specifically packaged. One UK organisation was criticised as abusing a near monopoly position, for their commercial gain, although I did not get how or more importantly why (I do get why in principle)?

On the other hand, the HK service for the vast majority of non Lipo orders (although that could include electrical items) have a delivery time in the 14 day time frame. I even had one in 3 days from the Chinese depot.

I do think that this thread has allowed us to pool our common experiences to confirm a pattern, that individually was just conjecture.

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 14.

No other progress today.

Kev

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 15.

How many ways are there to say no activity today?

Kev

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 16.

It is a Sunday so no progress.

Kev

[Masher]

Kev - go fly!

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Blowing a gale here...

Kev

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 17.

Well this is a new one.

Can not access the HK website!!

However the tracking No. still shows.

"Item sent to London"

Lucky London.

Kev

[Daithi O Buitigh]

'Sent to' is just POS Malaysia speak for "We've put it in a cage waiting for the next free spot on a cargo plane going in the general direction of London"

Unless of course it contains Lipos, in which case it's "We've sent it to Singapore to wait for a container ship"

Edited By Daithi O Buitigh on 11/08/2014 19:25:51

[Rob Jones 2]

I bought some electric props, escs etc. from HK Global Warehouse a few months back. The tracking info was not informative, and it took about 2 weeks to arrive. Cracking value though, no-one else has their range of products and great prices even with postage.

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 18.

Progress!!!!!!

11-Aug-2014 1233 Item arrived UNITED KINGDOM UNITED KINGDOM
07-Aug-2014 1428 Item sent to LONDON MPC PMIH (KLIA)
06-Aug-2014 2133 Item posted over the counter MPC PMIH (KLIA)
06-Aug-2014 1721 Dispatch Pre-Alert 02/08/2014 In Transit

Kev

[Gary Manuel]

oh yea of little faith!

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Posted by Masher on 10/08/2014 17:26:55:

Kev - go fly!

Day 19

Took your advise today.

Postie called at 11.13am.

I now have to wait another 24hrs to collect it from my sorting office.

Kev

[Roy Hill 3]

Kevin, Sorry that you are having great problems. I ordered some items from the Global Warehouse on 1st August (via PayPal). The following day, I received the usual certification, picked, packed etc, and another informing me that it could take up to 45 days to deliver! Lo and Behold the items arrived today. 13 days. Well happy!

[Gary Manuel]

I don't know kev!

You've been waiting by the letter box for 19 days and on the day of the delivery, you are out playing with your mates. I'm not impressed with your dedication to the cause

I think 19 days is pretty acceptable, and typical of the delivery times I've been getting for small packages from Hobbyking International.

[Pete B]

Posted by Roy Hill 3 on 13/08/2014 19:37:47:

Kevin, Sorry that you are having great problems. I ordered some items from the Global Warehouse on 1st August (via PayPal). The following day, I received the usual certification, picked, packed etc, and another informing me that it could take up to 45 days to deliver! Lo and Behold the items arrived today. 13 days. Well happy!

Hardly great problems, Roy - a day or two longer than normal, perhaps, but well within the suggested time frame. As I've said before, if you want something tomorrow, don't order it from the other side of the world!

Pete

[Kevin Fairgrieve]

Day 20.

Finally got my hands on my goodies.

So what do I think of the service.

As I said from the outset I was in no hurry for my items, so 20 days from order to in my hand was completely acceptable.
What does bother me is the supposed "sent items" to actually leaving for delivery would appear to be different.
The postmark on the packet was the 27th July when HK said they posted it. It did not hit the tracking system until the 6th August. So who had it for the ten days in between? Hobbyking or Malaysia Post?. I suspect the delay was down to Malaysia Post.

Would I order from the global warehouse again. You bet I would. I saved £18.00 on my two items alone.

Kev

[Daithi O Buitigh]

POS Malaysia never seem to update tracking - usually by the time you get the number it's already in Kuala Lumpur and that can take some time. Anyway their tracking is abysmal (to put it mildly)

[Erfolg]

Hows this for service, last week i ordered a couple of items from the Global warehouse.

So how long will it take to arrive?

Answer, today. That is in 7 days.

Is that good or what?

[Gary Manuel]

I regularly use the Global warehouse for small items and have never had a problem and have saved a lot of money.

I hope this thread doesn't encourage everyone to start using the Global warehouse or stock levels might fall to the same level as the UK warehouse

[Gary Manuel]

Two turbo spinners and a dozen heavy duty ball links ordered from Global Warehouse late on 13/08/14. Total cost $20.02 of which $3.99 was International Air Mail.

Arrived this morning - That's 10 days.

Very happy with price and delivery times.

[john stones 1 - Moderator]

Never bought owt from global warehouse, I fancy a 20cc petrol model so it'll be a big box, models £125 but on sale at £80, if I get caught for duty how much is it likely to cost ?

John