So, as we speak, my shipment of swaddles has left China – but is stuck in Mumbai. Apparently the information needed for clearance is missing. It arrived in Mumbai yesterday and I’m tracking it, constantly, via UPS. It’s become a bit of an obsession and I’m seriously losing sleep over it. Last night, while up with a teething baby, I checked for the latest (bad move) and found out it hadn’t been loaded onto the plane as scheduled as ‘the receiver disputes or refuses to pay duty or taxes.’ That meant that even when my baby was finally sleeping peacefully, I couldn’t.
By this morning, it was released by the clearing agency and all seemed well. And now this. Delivery was originally due tomorrow, then pushed back to Monday. That doesn’t seem likely to happen…
Jackie (my contact in China) assures me that ‘the forwarder’ (who sounds like a middleman and an unnecessary one at that) will handle it and the delay will be two days.
I honestly can’t work out whether this is something I’ve done wrong or not. Should I have asked for more information about the shipping? I figured that by asking the cost, who was sending it and how, I knew enough. To be honest, I really didn’t anticipate them messing it up so much and I don’t understand it.
My best guess is, they’ve never shipped to the UK before. On Alibaba you can look up supplier’s transactions (the sale amount and where the order is from) and all of my supplier’s are to the US or Australia. So maybe that’s part of it. Or maybe I’ve been bamboozled somehow and nothing will ever appear? I really hope that’s not the case.
But every delay means we get closer to Christmas, people get into holiday mode and I think it’ll be harder to sell any. Then it’s January and nobody has any money. So I’m feeling pretty down about the whole thing, if I’m honest.
My big lesson here is that next time I’ll arrange the shipping with UPS myself, directly. That way (I assume) I’ll get the best price and be in full control. I guess the one positive from this experience is that I’ve learnt something.
Anyway, keep your fingers crossed that we get some positive news over the weekend and the goods actually get onto a plane… And have lovely weekends yourselves.
