International Shipping Info+Questions

[ivytoad]

i want to order a 5ml bottle, the website says it does deliver to the UK but as soon as i go to order it says it only ships to US address. what do i do?

[hypothermya]

Although I'm in the US, I know that several of the folks that post on this forum are able to get their orders shipped to the UK. I suspect that in order to get the order posted to the UK, that you'll need to pay via PayPal or a money order.

[fairywingmaker]

Here's what it says in the FAQ on the BPAL Website...

 

Do you sell internationally?

YES! Unfortunately, due to the limitations of our current credit card processing system we can only accept PayPal for any orders placed outside of the United States, Canada, Australia, and Western Europe.

 

 

Here's the link to that page Shipping Info Link

[ivytoad]

i was going to pay by paypal but the check out bit on the bpal website just wouldn't even give me the option of international at all & said it only ships to us addresses

[hypothermya]

Actually, to pay via. PayPal, you don't even use the check out bit on the website. You want to log into your PayPal account and choose the "send money" option. The e-mail address you want to send money to is: paypal@blackphoenixalchemylab.com.

 

You then fill in how much you're sending, what type of purchase this is (I believe the option you want to choose is "goods"), and then type out what you're purchasing in the comments field. Here's an example of an order I placed last month:

 

1 5ml of Queen of Spades

1 5ml of King of Spades

1 5ml of Whitechapel

1 6 pack of imps:

The Tower

Tarot: The Hermit

Three Jacks

Aunt Caroline's Joy Mojo

Black Cat

The Lampades

 

 

3 5ml @ 12.50

1 6 pack of imps @ 16.00

Shipping @ 8.50

Total = $62.00

 

Thanks so much!

 

Hehehe...I'm almost a bit embarassed posting that example, cause of how much I spent with that order! I also typically include a note up front or at the end of the order which gives them the shipping address, my contact info in case there's any problems, and a little note thanking them and telling them how much I love them. (yes, I'm an obsessed groupie.)

 

This I stole from their site describing how to calculate shipping internationally:

 

1 item = 1 5ml

1 item = 1 10 ml

1 item = 1 set of imps (6 imps)

 

If it's 4 items or less, these are the flat rates:

$7 Canada

$9 most of Western Europe

$10 to Australia

 

If it's 5 items or more = 2 dollars extra to each flat rate.

If 10 items or more, $4 dollars extra to each flat rate.

 

For example:

3x5mls + 3 set of imps = 6 items = $9 dollars to Canada, $11 to UK, $12 to Australia

 

Another example:

5x5mls + 6 sets of imps = 11 items = $ 11 to Canada, $13 to UK, $14 to Australia

 

I've ordered via PayPal like this several times and I've never had a problem with it. Every time I've ordered, I've gotten an e-mailed receipt from PayPal and a confirmation e-mail from the Lab.

 

Anyhow, hope that helps.

[allamanda]

I'm in the UK.

 

You need to work out your order, calculate the shipping click here, then PayPal your payment (incl shipping) to:

 

paypal@blackphoenixalchemylab.com

 

You list your order in full in the comments box, along with your forum name, email address if different to your PayPal email and submit. You will receive confirmation emails from PayPal and BPAL.

 

ETA: You need to transmit the payment in US$. As the good ladies above pointed out, you can't order from the website.

Edited September 17, 2004 by allamanda

[ivytoad]

thank you so much for your help, i'll go try

[any_old_actress]

i had a question for nella about the international ordering & shipping process at bpal and she answered it so great i though i'd post it for other international customers who may not know what the lab goes through when shipping out our mounds of orders.

 

FROM NELLA:

"We do process all of the orders as they are received, regardless of

whether they are domestic or international. The orders, at this time,

are going out in two week clusters: it is the only way that we can keep

things organized in the face of the difficulties we encounter with CcNow

and PayPal. Domestic orders go out a little quicker, simply because of

the way the United States postal system works. We can purchase postage

and print labels from the Lab for domestic USPS Priority, and the boxes

are picked up on the postal worker's route. When we ship a package out

of the country, there is a much more complicated and involved process

with all the hand-written paperwork; this, thanks to 9/11 and customs,

both in the US and the destination country. Occasionally international

packages come back to us, which is costly for us and frustrating for our

customers, so we have to ensure that this mountain of paperwork is

carried out correctly, and we have to walk in every single one of them,

stand in line, and physically hand the packages to a postal employee

within the confines of a postal office. We can only devote one day to

this per week to get an international order "cluster" out, since it

takes the whole day to do so. It's a day in which nothing else gets

done, to be honest. I wish we had the manpower to be able to send out

internationals every single day, but until we have the revenue to grow,

have a second computer in the Lab, and find a different shipping

company, we're going to have to keep posting them out only once per

week. As you know, we're still very small, and growing pains are oft

times hard to work out!"

 

thanks nella for your timely email and answering my question so wonderfully!

[ViolentKitten]

Thank you for posting this AOA and thank you Nella too, good stuff to know!

[chin]

ditto on the thanks to both anyoldactress and to Nella!

 

I am in Canada and I do know that it's not as easy to ship here from the US. I appreciate that the lovely peeps at the lab are willing to do it!

 

A question about shipping updates ... when Brian posts an update (e.g. "shipped through Sept 14th"), does that apply to international orders too? If not, would it be possible to have a separate update for international orders ... or is that too big a pain in the butt?

[klowey]

A question about shipping updates ... when Brian posts an update (e.g. "shipped through Sept 14th"), does that apply to international orders too?  If not, would it be possible to have a separate update for international orders ... or is that too big a pain in the butt?

 

I think there are separate topics in the announcement thread for International orders. They're further down in the thread, but they list the city and postal codes for the orders. The last one went out on the 11th of September.

 

My own question concerns how much time international shipping tends to add to an order. In a purely hypothetical situation which is in no way related to me and my inability to act like an adult when it comes to waiting for things, if someone were to have placed an order on the 28th of September for some imps and 5mL of Samhain oil, does anyone know the chances of it arriving internationally before the 31st of October?

 

Keeping in mind that whether something is mailed from Michigan or Fukuoka, everything takes a week to enter or leave Canada.

[Witch's Dagger]

I read this in a state of laziness and curiosity (since I'm actually a U.S. customer), but I found it extremely interesting, anyway.

 

Thanks to both of you for the wonderful information!

[Morrighana]

My own question concerns how much time international shipping tends to add to an order.  In a purely hypothetical situation which is in no way related to me and my inability to act like an adult when it comes to waiting for things, if someone were to have placed an order on the 28th of September for some imps and 5mL of Samhain oil, does anyone know the chances of it arriving internationally before the 31st of October?

Ha! You're an optimist. I mean...*cough*

 

If the Lab had any say about it, you'd have your oil on time. Unfortunately, our lovely Customs officers have been known to sit on packages for weeks on end for no good reason at all. So, you can expect six to eight weeks between order and delivery, depending on the friendliness of your package's border crossing.

[chin]

Hey Klowey - thanks for pointing that out

 

My next question is really the same question ... if international orders are going out in a cluster once per week, could we have an update once per week? I'm thinking that if tracking/paperwork is already being done for the int'l orders it might be not so painful to post which orders have gone out. At least that way we'd know to direct our mental energies towards Customs

[Mrs.Black]

I would love to have a once a week update on international orders. I live in Australia, and packages from the Lab take only six days to get here once they are shipped!

 

I'm always sending frantic e-mails to Nella to determine when my packages are shipped, because sometimes the mailman just dumps them at my door. I don't want the preciousss to spend one second more than necessary out there! The six days from shipping date have been very consistent, so if I know when the oils were sent out, I'll know when to stalk the mailman...

[chin]

Anyone from Western Canada besides me?

 

(apologies for the lack of formatting)

 

http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouvers...84-5867165b9697

[nevermore]

I'm from Western Canada, and I think my Blue Moon was in that backlog. It was reshipped on September 10 and I received it on October 13. It got opened by Customs ( ), but that's no reason for it to take more than a month to get to me! Stupid Post Office!

[chin]

Well, at least it's in your hands now, nevermore

 

I'm thinking that all of my outstanding orders are somewhere in that huge pile.

[Morrighana]

Ugh. I'd bet nickels to dimes that my Formula 54 is in that pile.

 

I'm glad I didn't panic and email the Lab about it! I hope it has fun in Vancouver, and gets to me eventually

[chin]

Morrighana maybe your orders will meet my orders and make some beautiful music

 

Meanwhile, maybe we should start up a Canadian swaps thread to tide us over!

[Ishtar]

chin, I was going to post about the backlog, but you beat me to it

 

Yes, a Canadian swaps thread seems to be in order (BTW, I still have that imp of Black Dahlia for you!)

 

I hope my last two orders are in the same pile as yours and Morrighana's so that they can play together and keep themselves entertained

 

Looks like quite a few friends in Europe will be getting belated Christmas presents this year...

[Pixie-elf]

Morrighana maybe your orders will meet my orders and make some beautiful music

 

Meanwhile, maybe we should start up a Canadian swaps thread to tide us over!

...Maybe next time, you guys in Canada could ask the Lab to take and put in 1-2 empty extra vials...

 

That way, while your BPAL stuff makes beautiful music together, if they get the chance to make you guys some babies while waiting at customs, then you have some original BPAL imps, that your imps made...while waiting....

 

(No, really, I'm not on drugs except for what my doctors give me!!!)

 

Also, I'm in the USA but I found this thread very informative. I liked learning about that.

Edited October 20, 2004 by Pixie-elf

[oceandessa]

hey guys, i emailed nella to see whether it would be possible to have a fedex option for canadian orders.

[chin]

AH O'dessa, thank you - It turns out that my Sept 10th order is shipping today, so I imagine it's too late for that one - but if the others (yeah, I went crazy in Sept ) and my Yule order could be FedExed, that would be awesome.

[tempete]

Cross-posted to the BPAL Chatter forum:

 

Hopefully the five-week delay of international packages going into Canada will be resolved within a month - at least that's what Canada Post hopes.... If it's not, I live in the U.S. and am flying to Toronto for Christmas on December 21, so I can bring orders with me and mail them within Canada. If you're interested, PM me!