AliExpress "ePacket" delivery times :-(

Recently I’ve been buying a few items from AliExpress and paying a bit extra (often $2 or $3) for the item to be sent by ePacket

Initially I found that items shipped via ePacket seemed to go via air mail and get here in about a week, i.e much longer than the 4 to 6 weeks for surface mail.

However I have one ePacket which is currently in transit, which is going to take in excess of 3 weeks to get from China.

The package still seems to be trackable, and its now showing as having reached Sydney (I’m in Melbourne Australia), but it looks like its gone by ship rather than air mail.

So it doesn’t look like ePacket means it goes by air mail, it seems to mean its trackable.

epacket is a marketing name for registered airmail small-packet which has had the paperwork computer-generated (I often use it to send stuff Japan->US, saves a lot of time at the post office).

So it SHOULD be going by air.

Thanks

In the past I’m pretty sure that they have been going by air, because they have only been taking around 1 week from China.

But this particular packet is showing as

My local postal service shows the item as

In transit: Arrived at facility in destination country: 8:33am Thu 27 Oct: SYDNEY NSW
In transit Received by overseas carrier 8:01pm Thu 6 Oct CN-518029, CHINA

China Post show it as

2016-10-09 15:44:20 Successful pick up by China post

(thats all China post is displaying)

So even from China post’s standpoint, its taken 18 days, which is a long time to fly from China to Sydney.

Most likely it was waiting for available air transport. Once postal parcels get to the airport, they sit in holding, and for each available flight to a destination the cargo gets filled from ems parcels first, then airmail, then air parcel post, then small packet, then sal. As you can see, small packet is relatively low-priority.

I lot of people must be sending things via EMS etc

Actually, another small grip with AliExpress, is that I ordered some parts and paid for them to be shipped by DHL, because the first lot of parts in an ePacket seemed to have been lost in transit.

But the vendor took the maximum allotted time of 5 days to actually dispatch via DHL, and DHL seem to take 1 to 2 days just to pick up.

Which means, even paying for a more expensive service, still is no guarantee that the vendor will dispatch in short time frame.

I think I’ll need to be more careful in selecting who I buy from, when requesting shipping via courier, as otherwise its a complete waste of money.

But you live and learn.

I’m currently working on a list of sellers who shipped their parcels via singapore post (sadly at the moment only RC parts, not common electronics).
Singapore post is always; at least; 2 weeks faster than registered air mail (CN). So from China->Austria within 7-10 days (depends on the customs). Drop out quote: 0% and far better tracking records.
On my trip to stockholm I met a chinese guy living there since 10 years and he said, that he would NEVER use chinese post because of drop out quotes at nearly 50%. (I had better luck it the past )
Another good shipping method: Post NL (but for sure not available in Australia)

Thanks Matthias

Not many items seem to be totally lost. Perhaps 5% or less, and its impossoble to know if any losses are China Post or by my local AusPost.

But waiting 6 to 8 weeks is too long.

BTW. Even the big distributers do some dodgy tricks. I ordered some modules for a commeecial project, from Element14 just over a week ago, which were $30 each ( far more than on AliExpress ).
On Element14 they were listed in Australia as InStock for same day dispatch, with delivery time of 5 days.
I presumed the 5 days was to allow for 2 days in the post plus weekends and worst case delays.

But, I had to contact Element14 because of s screw up with something else, and I found out the items were not in Australia at all.

According to the person I spoke to at Element14, the modules were a actually being shipped from the UK, and had to go via the warehouse in Australia, before being sent to me.
Apparently Element14 removed the actual loacation of items from their website , Same Day Dispatch is meaningless.
You now have to look at the delivery time, and if its 2 to 3 days, it is held locally, if its above that, its held somewhere else, and has to be shipped via their warehouse in Australia, thus adding additional delays.

The best overview for tracking is 17track (sadly often problems with SG-post). You can easily add more tracking numbers and you’ll see every single tracking record. If destination (carrier) is checked you can go to your local post office webside for further tracking.
Here is a example of my current records, as you can see mostly of the “CN” stuck somewhere for 3 weeks:
https://www.17track.net/en/track?nums=R … 71926735CN
BTW Roger: I’m fighting at the moment with the dull Austrian Post. The goofy postman set the status of at least 3 parcels to “return to sender” (because he can’t read – it was the office adress I used hundred times). I recognized that within 2 hours(!) I tried to stop shipping the parcels back to china, wroting E-Mails telephoned several times without luck. I only got 2 pieces of 10Euro cupons for the Austrian post shop (ok, neither them I received) as I post the whole story on their facebook side.

Hi Matthias

Our local post is a not a lot better

It was state run (government company) but its now quasi private, and they did things like separate the parcel division from letters division.

So they now say that letter division makes a loss, and we have to pay more, but the parcel division is making a profit (but parcel prices are still going up as well)

And, its all delivered by the same postman, and all the distribution is by the same trucks

i.e Totally artificial separation of letters / packets and parcels, just to hide the real numbers and perhaps avoid tax.

BTW Thanks for the tip on 17track

I have 3 items in transit at the moment

https://www.17track.net/en/track?nums=L … 588CN&fc=0

The last one looks like it is nearly here

I have a loss of less than 1%. I am shocked about madias report about Austrian Post. I believed that Poste Italiane was one of the worst service, it is very slow but I received quite all my parcels.

Maybe because I use my work address, many colleagues do the same and we receive packets every day from all over the world.