[PART 1] Official BLF GT Group Buy thread. Group buy officially closed! Lights shipping.

Hello, I do not understand how certified mail is more expensive than DHL, buy several times to lumintop from your page on Aliexpress, mails are always more expensive by mail as DHL, FEDEX, TNT, for example SD75 is sent only by some of these and Its shipping value is higher than 40 dollars, at least in my particular case it is like that, and it can be verified on the Ali page. The main reason why I choose to send registered mail is because, once I bought with DHL and I never received the package, I was detained in the customs of the capital of my country more than 1800 km from my house, I could only personally withdraw, this is the way in which DHL works here, to all other international shipments pay a customs tariff of 50% + 7 dollars of the local mail service, said this seems quite irresponsible as things are handled, not know how it will affect the shipping system before offering a product ………, I think it is more an excuse on the part of someone who does not specify, greetings!

Because most lights are only a few hundred grams, the GT is a few thousand.

“Normal” mail systems are great at handling small packages but suck at handling large ones. So for larger packages it is almost always cheaper and easier to go with a company like UPS, fedex or DHL. The only question is what that cross-over point is. I generally find in the US it is around 3-4lb.

Also they can’t ship the GT in one package with registered mail, so that means they have to pay for shipping twice.

Also, for those not aware the size of the box can be more important then the weight in some cases when it comes to the cost to ship it.

Get your conclusions, I have no complaint regarding the time of sending this is how it is, but the issue of sending certified emails … seems like an excuse, I’m sorry to say it and please do not take this as a attack, greetings!

I dont think its helping that people request custom numbers for their shipping value.
Maybe Lumintop will let people change to DHL. But i dont think they will give everybody different numbers. Just to much work for lumintop.

The SD75 is about half the size of the GT, double the size and the price increase will go up as well.

Then factor in 2 packages for the registered mail and you can quickly see how it would cost the same or more.

I have shipped over 25k orders over the years, I have dealt with a lot of shipping companies. I can tell you from experience that things change a heck of a lot when you go from 1-2lb to 5lb+. I use completely different services with 5lb packages then I do with small ones.

Although cost is not the primary delay with the registered shipping, it was just a factor that effects some countries.

There are permit issues, customs issues and logistics issues they are having to sort out as well. Plus the size and weight limits registered mail has are complicating things as well.

Thus far I have not heard anything from them that does not line up with my own experiences with shipping. They just have the added complexities of a communists state in the mix (which is something that they are having to deal with).

But they have a way or company to send to us after those reflector coming or they are dealing with it yet?

They are working on it. Neal thinks they should have it figured out by the time the reflectors show up this week and hopes they will be able to have them shipped either this week or early next week.

I have not heard anything since this.

Hi i want buy BLF GT i want to be put on the list
Thank you in advance
baljak78@gmail.com

Thanks, hopefully our light can shipped in registered mail without issues :+1:

The list do not exist anymore, you can only buy from a member or two months lather direct with lumintop.

Lumintop sells their lights by giant AliExpress. These guys are bigger than Amazon. They maybe have subsidized deals with China post. You can’t compare Lumintop with AliExpress. I think I would be better to let AE deal with shipping to Europe, but this is a GB deal with Lumintop, so maybe this is not possible or something.

That has got to be either a permit issue regarding LT shipping Li-Ions or a labelling issue regarding shipping Li-Ions, as if it were a value issue the package would arrive at UK customs & the problem would be with UK customs.
From what TA has said it sounds like LT still have a problem with permits ?

They had issues with needing new permits for 2018 but not sure if that is still a problem or not. I sent a message asking about this earlier.

Any Chinese merchant gets a subsidized deal every time they ship something to the West, at least with the typical package size. It’s the Western taxpayers and/or postal customers who pay.

Here’s the punchline:

This is why sending a letter containing one A4 sheet to my neighbor just across the street is more expensive than buying a pair of nail clippers from China shipping included.

The GT - and probably half a GT - must be way above this certain size and weight, thus they will have to pay a proper market price. It’s really steep compared to the regular mail shipping cost they typically pay. That’s why it’s expensive.

Even considering the above, I’m really surprised that courier is cheaper.

Haha :wink:
Still yet to see anyone on here that has received a light WITH batteries in the UK, from FedEx.
Can anyone confirm or deny this?

. Sent MP to Neal
.

Thanks to everyone for not giving me 5 pages of posts to read through, you have no idea how refreshing this has been the last few days with only a few posts to catch up on.

I got a reply a little bit ago with some more information.

Lumintop will be closing down for the China New Years next week, so the 3rd batch of PM’s will for sure not go out before they are back up and running.

They said that they should have most of the registered mail issues sorted out now and if the reflectors show up soon and are good quality they hope to get most if not all of the existing orders shipped before the New years celebration. This largely depends on how many reflectors there are and if they are good enough quality.

An update on the UK orders, they have had 5 GT’s returned from the UK 3 times. They are not sure why they were returned but so far it is only effecting these 5 orders that they know of. They are trying to figure out an alternative option for these orders.

They also had a GT from Romania returned that is somehow costing them $300 to sort out.

Otherwise they say everything is going as good as could be expected.

I will let ya’ll know if I hear anything else.

I’d like to see Neil’s face when the Military Police show up! :smiley: :laughing: I guess shipping issues are a crime in China? hahahahaha

Ok, got a reply back with some more info.

It seems that the UK shipment issues are due to the value not being accurate on customs form. They are apparently hyper strict about this now and refusing packages that they think are under-valued.

So, TA, they can not meet the shipping change request?
And creating a table for who wants to change the way of delivery is no longer needed?

Thanks