4 ms·
I had a chat about this with one of the sellers on AliBaba. He claimed that the items are still being shipped from China, and that he is just witing Singapore
by sam_goody 8y ago
I had a chat about this with one of the sellers on AliBaba.
He claimed that the items are still being shipped from China, and that he is just witing Singapore / Czechoslovakia / any other developing country on the package (he said it is part of the tracking code), and he gets the benefit of the country whose code he used.
He said the main reason they do that is that the laws differ as to what can be shipped from each country, especially vis a vis things that use radio frequencies. By choosing even distant countries they can be caught breaking minimum standards and are not prosecutable.
He said that the down side is that things can never be returned to sender, since the sending address is fictitious.
This last sentiment has been echoed by many sellers.
Have no way to verify, but it is an interesting claim.
- koyote 8y agoSingapore is not a developing country?? And Czechoslovakia hasn't been a country in decades...
- oblio 8y ago> and that he is just witing Singapore / Czechoslovakia / any other developing country on the package That's impressive both because Czechoslovakia does not exist anymore, but also because Czechia is developed these days, I'm pretty sure :)
- sam_goody 8y agoThe conversation started when I got a package "from Czechoslovakia", and I couldn't figure it out. He had given me his email address and a catalogue, so we took to talking.
- oblio 8y agoReally? And the US Post fell for that? I'll try sending a package from Austria-Hungary, now that you've told me :))))
- fyfy18 8y agoIt sounds like it has some basis in what happens, but how does that give them better postage rates? Surely they still need to go to their local post office, in China, or is it a scam the local post office is involved in too?