Anybody buy on rakuten?

[SparTonberry]

Weird, been waiting about 4 days now to get an email from a seller, with a shipping price (which I'm guess I'm supposed to respond to okay the charge).
I don't know, that seems a bit long, does it?
At least I'm not out any money, but it does leave me curious what's happening.
Tried using the contact seller email, so hopefully I get an answer soon.

[mobiusclimber]

I have. It didn't take a really long time to get a quote, but I don't remember exactly how long it took. But Rakuten is like Ebay in that it is a site with many different sellers, so my experience isn't going to amount to a hill of beans unless it's w/ the same seller. My guess would be, tho, that some people on there are just people and not stores. Maybe the seller had to physically box everything up and take it to the post office to give you a quote. Or maybe some of the items you wanted aren't in physically in stock (they just buy stuff from a wholesaler) and the item not in stock is an odd size/weight that would have to be weighed rather than guessed at. (Did you order any limited edition items, for instance?)

At any rate, you aren't under any obligations to purchase the order when you finally get the quote, so you could always just find a different seller and place the order w/ that person instead.

[SparTonberry]

It's okay, they said they were indeed just busy and have since sent it.

[nensondubois]

I was going to buy from one of the stores for a deal that seemed too good to be true... and indeed it was since they don't accept Paypal from overseas. Really, that is the only downside to consider when buying from some of their stores at rakuten. Hopefully they'll change in the near future due to peer pressure or whatever.

[Breetai]

I have quite often. It's basically like ebay or amazon, where it just groups together different sellers/online shops.

If you don't have a Japanese bank account, credit card or address, you might have a difficult time finding someone willing to sell to you. There is also a language barrier with a lot of sellers (and most, if not all, shops) if you do not know Japanese.

Because some sellers are individuals, and others are shops, you might have to wait for an individual to get back to you. There are always personal reasons, like work, family, etc., that can prevent a person from getting back to you straight away. If you communicated in English, they might be using a friend to help them translate/proofread, so that can take time also.

[Jumbo]

It is actually easy to order from if you use a mail forwarding service such as mailorderjapan or others.http://ligumi.com/ak.php

[SparTonberry]

Since then, I have found that one of the shops I frequently buy from does tend to take a week to respond.
A few items I have seen only listed with mail forwarding, but for many it was not necessary to use a forwarding service. (though the shops I have bought from only use EMS, which is fast but expensive. Still I doubt forwarding is going to give significant, if any, savings.)

[Jumbo]

Since then, I have found that one of the shops I frequently buy from does tend to take a week to respond.
A few items I have seen only listed with mail forwarding, but for many it was not necessary to use a forwarding service. (though the shops I have bought from only use EMS, which is fast but expensive. Still I doubt forwarding is going to give significant, if any, savings.)

Thanks for the input man!

[Guyra]

www.fromjapan.co.jp makes it really easy to order from Japan, be it Rakuten, Yahoo, or whatever. I've been using them a lot. They'll even contact sellers for you if needed. :)

[Jumbo]

www.fromjapan.co.jp makes it really easy to order from Japan, be it Rakuten, Yahoo, or whatever. I've been using them a lot. They'll even contact sellers for you if needed. :)

Thanks a LOT!

[iddqd]

www.fromjapan.co.jp makes it really easy to order from Japan, be it Rakuten, Yahoo, or whatever. I've been using them a lot. They'll even contact sellers for you if needed. :)

Thanks, I used it several times for buying things from Amazon.co.jp and Rakuten. I would also recommend for expensive stuff http://zenmarket.jp/en/ they charge only 3 $ per item.