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Play Asia shipping from Netherlands to European Countries?

Geobros

Geobros

Member
Dec 31, 2018
670
I recently bought Atelier Trilogy for Switch (Asian version) from Play Asia to France. There were no shipping cost as it was a pre order. So, I chose the option "tax paid" and I paid 17.80 euros more for taxes. Though, I see in the tracking number that the package departed from Netherlands with postnl (https://postnl.post/tracktrace) and the tracking number ends in "nl". If the package departs from Netherlands to France why I paid taxes as there are no taxes between those 2 countries.

Does anyone has experience with Play Asia?

Update: I received the following answer by Play Asia, my english are not very good but i understand that the package comes from HK.

"Thank you for purchasing with us.

Allow me to inform you, that the parcel originally comes from HongKong that
is why tax is included. We only use PostNL as the courier as they are our
service partners and their hub is located in the Netherlands. I hope that I
have cleared this up to you. ^_^

Should you require further assistance, feel free to drop us an email and we
will get back to you in a timely manner.

Thank you for choosing and trusting Playasia.

Best regards,"
 
Last edited:
shadowman16

shadowman16

Member
Oct 25, 2017
31,863
I noticed the same thing with PA before. It was super annoying as one of my packages seemed to go missing, but since the package was seemingly sent using PostNL, contacting the courier for any update on where the package was, was impossible thanks to the language barrier. And as usual PA is worse than useless when stuff goes missing... thankfully it turned up in the end. I only use Amazon JP now for the couple of imports I get, I can order a game on Thursday and have it delivered to me in the UK the following day, as opposed to PA's weeks long wait.
 
Symphony

Symphony

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,361
A bunch of companies are doing this now, essentially you're paying the import fees off in advance so you don't deal with them at your end. They ship the parcel to a redistribution place in Europe (thereby incurring import fees), and then it is sent from there to you. Personally I still prefer just shipping directly and running the chance of customs ignoring the parcel to avoid any fees whatsoever, but for others they prefer to get it all sorted in advance, specifically for countries where stuff just disappears into a void for a few months when there are customs fees to pay.

As for using Play-Asia. Eh, they are ok. Never had a problem recieving anything that was shipped, but I definitely have had problems with stuff advertised as being in stock when it isn't. Your only other real option for getting Asian releases in Europe though is random eBay sellers, while that does work out cheaper I also find they don't often label what you are getting correctly, they'll say "Asia version" and you'll get it and have the South Korean release, or Hong Kong or whatever and while it will still be in English the packaging won't be.
 
kuroneko0509

kuroneko0509

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,377
my guess is that the tax paid option is for them to clear custom upon entry in netherlands, then from there it'll go to france for delivery.
i assume if you didn't pick the option, it'll go directly to france from hk
Mendrox said:
Play Asia is a shithole. If you can just use Amazon Japan https://www.amazon.co.jp/ (Yes they ship many things outside of Japan now)
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sadly amazon jp don't stock up asian copies. not many alternative for securing 1 online if you're not locals.
 

Polk

Avenger
Oct 26, 2017
4,213
I assume they ship bunch of stuff from HK to some warehouse in NL and then ship indivudual orders within EU. So they paid taxes when container reached their warehouse. You are paying them back.
 
OP
OP
Geobros

Geobros

Member
Dec 31, 2018
670
Polk said:
I assume they ship bunch of stuff from HK to some warehouse in NL and then ship indivudual orders within EU. So they paid taxes when container reached their warehouse. You are paying them back.
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Hmm.....ok. So you say that if I had chosen to not pay taxes it would have been shipped from HK. This is something that makes sense but I would try it to a cheap game next time.
 
Kain-Nosgoth

Kain-Nosgoth

Member
Oct 25, 2017
15,532
Switzerland
Sadly for me, amazon.co.jp doesn't send in switzerland

Fortunately there's other places like CDjapan and so on... Play-asia is my last resort cause i don't want to support them more than nececssary
 
Alice

Alice

Banned
Nov 2, 2017
5,867
Kain-Nosgoth said:
Sadly for me, amazon.co.jp doesn't send in switzerland

Fortunately there's other places like CDjapan and so on... Play-asia is my last resort cause i don't want to support them more than nececssary
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Buyee - Then add Surugaya (or Rakuten, or Amazon, anythin', really) with the Buyee app, and buy straight from Surugaya. There's a fee for each purchase of 500 yen minimum (a bit more if you want them to check your package in advance) (the fee is also per-purchase, so if you wanna buy 20 PS2 titles or something, it'll only occur once) and you can have them store your stuff in a warehouse for a month if you plan to buy more during that month to save shipping.
 
Symphony

Symphony

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,361
Alice said:
That's wrong. There's a box set out in Japan. It was released this December.


Also released for Switch.
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The problem is that it very likely doesn't have English text, in the case of games that get Asian releases with an English option the Japanese version virtually never does. As questionable as Play Asia can be on a lot of things, they do correctly label the language options for games that they sell.
 
Alice

Alice

Banned
Nov 2, 2017
5,867
Symphony said:
The problem is that it very likely doesn't have English text, in the case of games that get Asian releases with an English option the Japanese version virtually never does. As questionable as Play Asia can be on a lot of things, they do correctly label the language options for games that they sell.
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Even so, I refuse to support gamergaters.
 
weblaus

weblaus

Member
Oct 27, 2017
933
Symphony said:
The problem is that it very likely doesn't have English text, in the case of games that get Asian releases with an English option the Japanese version virtually never does. As questionable as Play Asia can be on a lot of things, they do correctly label the language options for games that they sell.
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Often, but not always - I've seen a few games where they didn't mention English support in the Japan version (even when that wasn't cheaper than the Asian version), at least before or at the time of release.

Sometimes they do update the information later, at least - I think that happened with Dead or School (PS4). But e.g. Deemo Reborn is multi-language in Japan as well, yet the description doesn't.
 
Symphony

Symphony

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,361
Alice said:
Even so, I refuse to support gamergaters.
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That's fine, you can buy Asian releases from small eBay sellers (as I do). But make sure you check what the language options are before telling people it is fine to get the Japanese releases instead as it'll likely be a costly mistake (one that I've made before). The Japanese Arland DX releases did not have English, I don't believe any previous Atelier release has.

weblaus said:
Often, but not always - I've seen a few games where they didn't mention English support in the Japan version (even when that wasn't cheaper than the Asian version), at least before or at the time of release.

Sometimes they do update the information later, at least - I think that happened with Dead or School (PS4). But e.g. Deemo Reborn is multi-language in Japan as well, yet the description doesn't.
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Yeah I always give it a few weeks after release before checking their product pages regarding JP versions as it is never listed before release. Unfortunately there are no other sources of info out there for which language options are supported in each release, publishers really don't seem to like to source that information. There was a PS4 game I bought once where I got the (I think) Hong Kong version and had a handwritten note from the seller reassuring me that as long as your console language is set to English it will play in that, but the box and publisher website don't list it as one of the language options and you can't select it in-game, even though the Asian release was clearly promoted as having English.
 
Alice

Alice

Banned
Nov 2, 2017
5,867
Symphony said:
That's fine, you can buy Asian releases from small eBay sellers (as I do). But make sure you check what the language options are before telling people it is fine to get the Japanese releases instead as it'll likely be a costly mistake (one that I've made before). The Japanese Arland DX releases did not have English, I don't believe any previous Atelier release has.
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I never claimed the Japanese version has English, and "English" wasn't a factor in what OP or the people I responded to said. Some people know Japanese, some people double dip just for the physical, etc.
 
weblaus

weblaus

Member
Oct 27, 2017
933
Symphony said:
Yeah I always give it a few weeks after release before checking their product pages regarding JP versions as it is never listed before release. Unfortunately there are no other sources of info out there for which language options are supported in each release, publishers really don't seem to like to source that information. There was a PS4 game I bought once where I got the (I think) Hong Kong version and had a handwritten note from the seller reassuring me that as long as your console language is set to English it will play in that, but the box and publisher website don't list it as one of the language options and you can't select it in-game, even though the Asian release was clearly promoted as having English.
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The Prototype VNs and a few others have a small icon on the front when the include Englisch text (e.g. Clannad), and recently PA actually did list Englisch text options for some Japanese versions as well even before launch. Otherwise I've had a decent amount of success in checking what languages are included in the digital releases on the eShop and PSN store - at least for smaller publishers or indie games so far that always corresponded with the physical Japanse version though I'm sure one of these days I'll get it wrong eventually.
 
OP
OP
Geobros

Geobros

Member
Dec 31, 2018
670
I updated the first post.....i received the following answer but it is not clear to me to be honest, what are your thoughts.

"Thank you for purchasing with us.

Allow me to inform you, that the parcel originally comes from HongKong that
is why tax is included. We only use PostNL as the courier as they are our
service partners and their hub is located in the Netherlands. I hope that I
have cleared this up to you. ^_^

Should you require further assistance, feel free to drop us an email and we
will get back to you in a timely manner.

Thank you for choosing and trusting Playasia.

Best regards, "
 
Dr.Phibes

Dr.Phibes

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
3,175
The Socialist Hellscape of Europe
Geobros said:
I updated the first post.....i received the following answer but it is not clear to me to be honest, what are your thoughts.

"Thank you for purchasing with us.

Allow me to inform you, that the parcel originally comes from HongKong that
is why tax is included. We only use PostNL as the courier as they are our
service partners and their hub is located in the Netherlands. I hope that I
have cleared this up to you. ^_^

Should you require further assistance, feel free to drop us an email and we
will get back to you in a timely manner.

Thank you for choosing and trusting Playasia.

Best regards, "
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Honestly, that's the norm with a lot of Asian online stores.
 
Symphony

Symphony

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,361
Geobros said:
I updated the first post.....i received the following answer but it is not clear to me to be honest, what are your thoughts.

"Thank you for purchasing with us.

Allow me to inform you, that the parcel originally comes from HongKong that
is why tax is included. We only use PostNL as the courier as they are our
service partners and their hub is located in the Netherlands. I hope that I
have cleared this up to you. ^_^

Should you require further assistance, feel free to drop us an email and we
will get back to you in a timely manner.

Thank you for choosing and trusting Playasia.

Best regards, "
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Click to shrink...
Simple. The goods are subject to import tax and processing fees when entering Europe from Hong Kong, rather than it coming direct to your door where you are subject to whatever fees need to be paid (eg. in the UK it is 20% VAT on the declared value, plus extra fees if the value is over various threasholds, plus an extra £8-15 as a "customs handling fee" by the courier). What you did is pay that import tax and a handling fee upfront, PostNL have dealt with clearing customs and then redistributed the parcel to you.

It boils down to - if customs in your country sucks then pay upfront otherwise you'll be waiting over a month and paying a fortune in customs fees, otherwise have it sent direct and pray for the small chance of customs ignoring your parcel and saving yourself the fees. Importing to the UK during Christmas time is an example of when you would do that, they barely check anything because they rush it through.
 
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