Shopping experience and review of iShopInternational.com international shopping service
Are you living in a country like India and would like to buy some high quality items that can be found only in countries like the USA? Read this article to learn more about iShopinternational.com, an online service, which allows you to buy items from shops in the USA.
I lived in the USA for more than 10 years and am quite used to the shopping experience of that country. Most of the times, the quality of the items I can get from the American shops are much better than what we find in India. I was actually surprised to know that many of those high quality items that we buy in USA are "Made in India", but you can never buy it in India.
I recently relocated to India after a pretty long time in the USA. Along with many other lifestyle issues, one of the major issue for me was the shopping experience and availability of many items we were using regularly. I started looking for options to bring stuff from USA and the most convenient option was to buy online, ship to a friend in USA and get them to bring it along, when they visit India. However, it wasn't very convenient. I had to wait too long for some friends to come to India and also it was inconvenient for them to bring a lot of items for me due to the baggage restrictions in the Airlines.Shop in USA and get it shipped to India
I came across a couple of online services that offer the Buy in USA and Ship to India service. I evaluated most of them. One of the disappointing factors about such services is that, most of them require a membership and an annual membership fee. This will be useful only if we buy a lot of items regularly. But I felt that over a period of time, my shopping frequency from USA will come down and eventually we will adapt ourselves to live with items available in India. Also, paying a membership fee to one shop will make me stick to one shop and I will lose the opportunity to grab the best deals from the best places.
So, I continued my search for an international shopping service with no membership fee and finally I landed onto a promotion of iShopInternational.com. I did some research and figured out some interesting facts about them. I tried an online purchase through them and it worked out very smoothly, except that the local courier guy in my locality wanted me to come and pick up the item from their office rather than delivering it to my home address. But that is quite common in my place and I have found no courier service that can offer a good service in my area, so that is no reason to blame iShopinternational.com.Review of iShopinternational.com
Here is my review of this international shopping service. As of now, I got only 1 item from USA through them, but I am planning to use them in future. Here is how the whole system works with them:
1. You create an account (free registration)
2. Submit an order with iShopinternational, with the list of items you want to purchase (along with url of the items in any major online shops in USA).
4. Pay the charges to iShopinternational.
3. iShopinternational will purchase the items manually for you, get it delivered to their USA address and ship it to your address in India using their international shipping service.
4. You will receive the items in your home in India.Charges
iShopInternational.com charges you a couple of costs, which are:
1. Original purchase price of the items.
2. Local shipping charges incurred in getting the items shipped to their local office.
3. International shipping charges.
4. Customs duty.
You can use their calculator to calculate the cost involved in shopping the products from the USA and shipping them to India.
According to their calculator, here is the international shipping cost:
Less than 1.5Lb: US$10
1.5Lb to 2.5Lb: US$15
2.6Lb to 3.5Lb: US$20
This is one of the cheapest international shipping costs you can find. For example, ShopAndShip.com charges US$18 for items above 1Lb and US$26 for items above 2Lb.Advantages of iShopInternational.com
Here are some of the advantages of iShopinternational.com shop & ship service, compared to some other popular services:
1. You don't need a USA credit card. You can use your Indian credit card to pay them and they will use their USA credit card to purchase the items in USA. Once you submit your order with the list of items to buy, they will calculate all the costs involved, including taxes and shipping and will give you a quote. You can pay the total cost involved in Indian Rupees.
2. You can buy from any online shop in USA. Many other similar shop and ship service providers will allow you to buy only from a selected list of shops. But iShopInternational gives a personal shopping experience and they will allow you to buy from any reliable shops in USA.
3. Guaranteed delivery and insurance: All items purchased through them are insured for up to US$100 for free. For the higher priced items, you can purchase insurance of upto 2% of the value of the item.
4. Thirty day guarantee - If the purchased items do not reach you within 30 days from the date of placing the order, you will get your money back. The company assures full refund in such cases.
5. Customs and duties taken care for you: You don't have to worry about the custom duty and any other import duties. When you get the quote from iShopInternational, it includes all the charges, including the custom duty. Customer experience and feedback
I used iShopInternational.com once and got a product shipped to my address in India. Due to a local courier delivery problem, it took a couple of extra days, but the overall shopping experience was very smooth. While I was waiting for the item in India, I got periodic notifications updating me about the status. Also, once the item reached India, the customer support executive called me and verified the delivery location and address. When the local courier office declined to deliver to the address given, the company was nice to coordinate with me further and get it shipped to another nearby courier office, thus allowing me to go and pick it up from there.
My overall review of the iShopInternational.com service is, "great service". I would recommend it to all.
Have you used this service or any other similar services? Please share your experience.
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Well I have been with ISHOP Team for past few years now . Occasionally there have been delays , but most of the orders are serviced timely.