Thread: Doubling of airfreight costs into Australia from UK.

Originally Posted by PhilipA

.................. I looked on Amazon Au and there they were , a bit more expensive though ..................... Regards PhilipA

Ha .................. , Amazon are one of the worst for screwing you over. How often do you find an item on Amazon US that's cheaper to buy and deliver to Oz than the Australian Amazon site sells it for ? The US Amazon site blocks the sale and re directs you to their Australian site. And here's me thinking we had a FTA with the US

Deano

Ha .................. , Amazon are one of the worst for screwing you over. How often do you find an item on Amazon US that's cheaper to buy and deliver to Oz than the Australian Amazon site sells it for ? The US Amazon site blocks the sale and re directs you to their Australian site. And here's me thinking we had a FTA with the US

Deano

Yes normally I agree with you but in this case the vendor was in USA. There were no vendors in Australia but Amazon lists overseas vendors also. They must have an option in their system for say USA vendors to list in OZ like Ebay.
It is the vendors which set the prices.
Regards PhilipA

Just my own experience

*Before covid, I could order parts from the U.K on a Thursday and DHL would be delivering it on that Sunday or Monday. Direct flight from Heathrow U.K to Perth Airport.
*DHL send a simple txt "your parcel is on its way bluh" "your parcel is being delivered today bluh", the same would appear in my email, one simple click and I could do "leave without signature"
*Even if I forgot to do the leave without sig, as I get the same 3 drivers, they know me and leave it in the workshop.
*Now like all my freight, it can do a bit of a world tour before landing in Syd or Melb, then coming by road to W.A

*Fastway and TNT have NEVER delivered first time and its always some big long winded BS to get it redelivered.
*Auspost are hit and miss, I expect them to loose stuff, the last lost item was 2 drain plugs (Perentie, series) , the package was damaged and one drain plug was missing. To the credit of the supplier (Landybitz) they simply sent another. Auspost send endless bull**** txts select this or do that bluh bluh bluh to which I never reply as I just want them to do their job and get my freight to me.

*I dont know what its like for others that do regular orders, but for me, I want to do the order and then not have to think about it or follow it up until its dropped in my workshop.

Originally Posted by PhilipA

................... It is the vendors which set the prices.
Regards PhilipA

The price isn't the issue. The issue is Amazon US refusing to sell to Oz customers to generate greater profitability for its Australian site. ie. restriction of trade.

If I imported regularly from the US it would be worthwhile to set up a VPN with a US IP address and despatch through a US to Aus. freight forwarder. eg. A few years back I imported an ARB air locker kit from the US as it was cheaper than buying it from the ARB factory just down the road where they were made.

Deano

Just thought I’d add to this thread - at work we potentially needed some equipment quickly from the UK - we’ve bought the same items before - a couple of pallets weighing about 900kg each. 2 years ago it cost $3,500 by Air and we got them in 5 days.

Got a quote half way through the first lockdown for the same gear again - $48,000 this time. Needless to say we did without them...

Originally Posted by DeanoH

The price isn't the issue. The issue is Amazon US refusing to sell to Oz customers to generate greater profitability for its Australian site. ie. restriction of trade.

It tends to be the 'brand' of the product rather than Amazon doing the blocking... Try buying a Fender guitar from ANY USA website and you'll get the "Sorry, we don't ship there" message [you can't even GET to the Fender US site without a VPN and they have a lot more options/products than they show us down here].

Originally Posted by PerthDisco

Just helped a mate today order new Meyle LCAs from AF in UK. They are heavy suckers. All up with Mahle filter kit and TC oil shipping was £169 which includes GST I think.

When I ordered same LCAs in March 19 shipping and GST was £161 DHL

Pretty similar.

Parts already arrived on Monday straight through to door.

In 2013 I located a brand new Muncie transmission in the USA for a local client. Too big and heavy for the post office according to their parcel post web site. The vendor got a quote from FedEx for US$900+. Too rich for my client for a US$1200 trans. The deal was not going to happen. Vendor got a quote from UPS for US$600+. Still too much. I read the USPS web site and found they would quote on over weight and/or over dimension articles. Vendor got a quote from the post office for US$380. Done. Guess what? The trans arrived in 8 days by FedEx straight to the door and no extra charges. I even missed out on GST & Duty. The vendor was quite impressed and said he would use the post office from then on. I told him to have a look at USPS Flat Rate Boxes for small parcels and he now uses these almost exclusively. A win for everybody except rip-off FedEx.