How I Get My Custom Minifigures (and Other Products) From Abroad Shipped Door-to-Door, Cheap, and Relatively Quick (For Philippines Only)

Shipping items from abroad to the Philippines is full of hassle and also expensive. Getting things through PHLPost is cheapest but takes so long and it's also not door-to-door; tracking is also almost non-existent. 
Now, you can use BuyAndShip (https://www.buyandship.ph/invite/4195373747/) to shop online and have it delivered to your door (yes, it's door to door unlike PHLPost) for just PHP350 per lbs.

Before BuyAndShip, my only experiences of shopping from abroad were for Magic the Gathering cards. I usually order with my friends from Hong Kong and Japan using UPS (for HK) and just regular intl mail (for Japan). 

For my HK orders, there are two options for shipping: FedEx and UPS. Both are fast but FedEx used to (not sure if they still do) charge an additional PHP500 storage fee in addition to whatever fees you're paying for which is why we used to choose UPS. The delivery charge for FedEx was USD10 while USD15 for UPS; these are decent prices but I think they were cheap because Magic Cards were often shipped as if they were documents; they're thin items and can fit in envelopes. They would arrive (with UPS) in about 2-3 days from ordering though, which is extremely quick.

For the Japan orders, I just relied on regular mail (since there were no options for UPS, DHL, etc.) and if I remember correctly, the shipping cost would be about PHP350 only (plus the PHP112 post office fee). Though because the PH Post Office will handle it, it takes more than a month to arrive and you'd have to pick it up in the post office [of your city] during office hours on a working day (which is impossible for most people).

When I discovered BuyAndShip.ph, I was skeptical because it seemed too good to be true. PHP350 (around $7) per lbs and that's it. That's such a good deal, especially for custom minifigures which aren't so heavy. Additionally, BnS doesn't charge you by volumetric weight, it's really the true weight that they charge you for. (But there are size restrictions.)

How it works in a nutshell:
Go to https://www.buyandship.ph/invite/4195373747/ and create an account.
(This referral link will give you and me 10 credits or PHP10 off your next fee)
(You can also use my friend referral #: 4195373747 )

When you shop in online stores abroad, use your BuyAndShip name and warehouse as your address. BuyAndShip will then let you use their warehouse as storage for your items until you choose to have them delivered to your house in the Philippines.

Here's one of my experiences with BuyAndShip:
This was an order from Hong Kong for 4 custom minifigures. (It was 2 small boxes, packaging-wise.) Since it's just 1 lb, I only paid PHP300 (PHP350 starting September) for the whole delivery (Crazy Minifigs ships for free within HK too.) I would assume that using FedEx would be at least PHP500 (since that's how much it was for my MTG cards).

My timeline:
I ordered the minifigures from Crazy Minifigs on July 15.
They were shipped from their store on July 16.
They arrived at the Hong Kong BnS warehouse on July 18.
Then I had them shipped to PH almost immediately (since I wasn't buying anything else).
They arrived at my doorstep on July 21.

Note that if you shop from US or other countries, it'll take longer because they'll be delivered to HK before the Philippines. 

There's a more complete tutorial on their website; please read that before committing any purchases. I made my first order without asking them anything; that's how complete the tutorial was. Plus, they also have great customer support!

Because of them, I'm tempted to get more custom minifigures but they're still expensive haha! Now I'm waiting to learn about a service that does similar but from PH to International so I can start sending some stuff to fans all over the world!

Comments

Post a Comment