Amazon France

[bigdeke]

Has anyone in the UK successfully ordered a Blu Ray from Amazon France - nightmare ?

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by bigdeke

Has anyone in the UK successfully ordered a Blu Ray from Amazon France - nightmare ?

I'm in the US and placed my first order from Amazon.fr with Standard shipping. Amazon.fr used DHL Global Mail and the tracking had been a nightmare since the beginning. There were no status updates for a long while and then out of the blue a few post dated statuses were posted to Amazon.fr; DHL global mail website could never track the number provided by Amazon.fr.

Long story short, my order shipped on 8 January and apparently was delayed at the UK customs office. The package departed the UK on 18 January and today I receive an email from Amazon.fr stating they recieved my return. I never received the package thus I never returned anything. I inquired why the package would go through UK customs instead of the US and never receive a good response; they did not now why that would happen. I highly doubt the package arrived in the US since it was returned to France within 4 days after departing the UK. It's more likely DHL returned the package directly to France. I guess DHL employees don't know the difference between the US and UK.

During this ordeal (of no tracking updates) Amazon.fr assured me that they would take full responsibility if something went wrong and stated that customer satisfaction was their number one priority. Well, it seems they've fallen short of that. They've only given me an apology and given me a refund for the order. They haven't agreed to reship the order or use another shipper. Nor have they responded as to what went wrong with DHL; just a standard statement that the problem is unknown. Now they seem to ignore my inquiries. I believe DHL needs to answer for this and be held accountable; this is something I can't due myself since I wasn't the one that shipped the package nor do I have a valid tracking number so DHL won't even entertain the inquiry.

[bigdeke]

You got further than I did lol. They did not even ship mine saying they were not set up for UK Visa payments - wot sort of 3rd world answer is that ????

Cant blu-ray.com find a better merchant for us to purchase our French blu rays thru ?

[rdodolak]

I know others on this forum have successfully received shipments from Amazon.fr. So it appears as long as nothing goes wrong in the shippinf process then you're ok but once there's an issue that's where the trouble starts.

Amazon.fr did refund my order but I think they should have reshipped it instead of issuing a refund. 2 of the 12 items I ordered were new releases; one of those two items is no longer available for order from Amazon.fr. Another item is currently out of stock. The one item that is no longer available isn't a huge deal as the same title is available in Germany. Thanks to another member on this forum, I just discovered Grooves Inc yesterday which will ship these titles to the US without the high Amazon shipping fees. They're located in Switerland but they seem to only have German and not French titles available.

When I saw the lack of tracking updates followed by the UK customs comment I was afraid something had gone wrong. Especially since DHL was used to ship the package. Looks like my gut feeling was right after all.

[jw]

DHL global mail seems to be a service where they place your package in a container with others destined to the USA and when it arrives at the port, they resticker the package with a label that has a delivery confirmation number. It adds about 2-3 days to transit time.

DHL standard, like from Germany for example, Ships to the USPS where the usps delivers it.

Just got my package from Amazon.fr in 7 days, I have never had a non delivery issue, just shotty packing and tons of damaged product.

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by jw

DHL global mail seems to be a service where they place your package in a container with others destined to the USA and when it arrives at the port, they resticker the package with a label that has a delivery confirmation number. It adds about 2-3 days to transit time.

DHL standard, like from Germany for example, Ships to the USPS where the usps delivers it.

Just got my package from Amazon.fr in 7 days, I have never had a non delivery issue, just shotty packing and tons of damaged product.

Wish mine had gone that smoothly. Are you on the east or west coast, jw?

[jw]

East Coast, DHL global is out of New Jersey.

[rdodolak]

I really can't complain about Amazon.fr other than having better customer service once an issue occurs; guess I'm a bit po'd since they told me not to worry and that they would accept full responsibility if something went wrong (their words not mine). My main gripe is with DHL. Maybe the package got added to the wrong crate but I would expect DHL to realize the problem and send it on it's merry way to the US instead of returning it to Amazon. I realize that would cause a delay in the shipping but I've had UPS and FedEx route packages to the wrong places before in the US and once they discovered the error they re-routed it to the correct destination.

Another member had suggested using the Eclair option since it's ~ EUR 5 more and would avoid DHL (usually shipped by FedEx or UPS). I just placed a new order and will wait and see what happens. At least on the positive side I should see the package sometime next week.

[jw]

yea but they charge excessive brokerage fees, they wanted 50.00 for 10 movies I ordered last year.

I cant remember the brokerage company

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by jw

yea but they charge excessive brokerage fees, they wanted 50.00 for 10 movies I ordered last year.

I cant remember the brokerage company

As I understood it, there would only be a brokerage fee if the order is over the $200 daily limit and it gets hit with customs charges.

That's one of the reasons why I went with Standard shipping to begin with along with the fact I could wait a bit longer longer and save some money. However if I don't receive the package in the first place then standard shipping doesn't do me any good.

[jw]

not with UPS/Chronopost

[rdodolak]

Hmm... I'm trying to wrap my head around understanding these services.

I found think on the UPS website for importing from France into the US:

http://www.ups.com/ga/CountryRegs?loc=en_US

Service Options

Always check Calculate Time and Cost for details of service availability and guarantee information within a country. All Service Levels may not be available to or from every address within a country.


France to United States

• UPS Worldwide Expedited
• UPS Worldwide Express
• UPS Worldwide Express Plus
• UPS Worldwide Express Saver

As I understand the above UPS Worldwide shipping is the only service that is available from France to the US.

Now based on this page, UPS states if UPS Worldwide service is used then there are no entry preparation fees.

http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/shi...toms/fees.html

I wonder what other brokerage fees would be charged them

[jw]

I googled it
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronopost

Ironically its in wikipedia

[katharsis]

Never had any trouble getting it shipped to either Hawaii or California.

I have ordered from amazon.co.uk amazon.fr and amazon.de

Shipping from UK took the longest at 3 1/2 weeks.
All others arrived within 8-10 days with standard shipping, which in some cases was either DHL or UPS, mostly regular mail though.

[dclivejazz]

I too just had a shipment returned before I received it, which also seems to have been returned from customs in the UK. This was the first time I had a problem. Two other times I received shipments to my home in Virginia within 8 days without incident. Amazon.fr can't explain why and appears to only be reimbursing the item costs, not the high shipping charges for 4 Blus and a book. This is quite a bummer because I don't feel I can count on them now and I enjoy French movies you can't get here.

[jw]

^ A local neighbor

[Arlington]

Just found this thread after googling the same problem. I have ordered from the Amazon UK and Amazon Germany sites without problem. But my Amazon France order has been returned TWICE now as "undeliverable" for "unknown" reasons. I was wondering if some minor address format change would be necessary; Haven't had a problem getting refunded, but I want the DVDs and their customer service doesn't know what to tell me (they actually just called me of their own accord). So...any advice? Just keep trying? Pay for different shipping method? Also live in VA, so figured misery loves company, right? :-)

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by dclivejazz

I too just had a shipment returned before I received it, which also seems to have been returned from customs in the UK. This was the first time I had a problem. Two other times I received shipments to my home in Virginia within 8 days without incident. Amazon.fr can't explain why and appears to only be reimbursing the item costs, not the high shipping charges for 4 Blus and a book. This is quite a bummer because I don't feel I can count on them now and I enjoy French movies you can't get here.

If they don't end up reimbursing you automatically for the shipping charges I'd push them for that refund. If all else fails I'd dispute the charges with the CC company for the portion equal to the shipping charges.

Amazon.fr did reimburse me for the shipping charges as well so they should do the same for you. It's not your fault that the item was returned thus you shouldn't have to eat those charges.

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by Arlington

Just found this thread after googling the same problem. I have ordered from the Amazon UK and Amazon Germany sites without problem. But my Amazon France order has been returned TWICE now as "undeliverable" for "unknown" reasons. I was wondering if some minor address format change would be necessary; Haven't had a problem getting refunded, but I want the DVDs and their customer service doesn't know what to tell me (they actually just called me of their own accord). So...any advice? Just keep trying? Pay for different shipping method? Also live in VA, so figured misery loves company, right? :-)

For my second (replacement) order I ended up using Amazon.fr expedited (Eclair) service. The order arrived in the States last night (shipped on Monday) and should be delivered today.

There was no problem with my delivery address although the country is listed in French (États-Unis). Has everyone who had a problem recently used Amazon.fr standard shipping service and has it been shipped with DHL? At least that appears to be the common thread.

It's just a guess but it appears DHL has some incompetent individuals working for them who don't know the difference between the UK and US.

If they keep this up and it happens all too often I'm sure Amazon will give them the boot.

[Arlington]

Originally Posted by rdodolak

For my second (replacement) order I ended up using Amazon.fr expedited (Eclair) service. The order arrived in the States last night (shipped on Monday) and should be delivered today.

There was no problem with my deliver address although the Country is listed in French (États-Unis). Has every who has had a problem recently used Amazon.fr standard shipping service and has it been shipped with DHL? At least that appears to be the common thread.

It's just a guess but it appears DHL has some incompetent individuals working for them who don't know the difference between the UK an US.

If that keep this up and it happens all to often I'm sure Amazon will give them the boot.

Thanks...I'll try that. I wondered if the "United States" part being in French had anything to do with it; stupid, but you never know. I can't believe this problem exists for so many and they aren't doing anything to improve it. Sadly, looks like I may never get the "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me" Blu...appears to be OOS or something...