Shopping at Wish
Online shopping is no longer a foreign concept to most South Africans. It’s a service that thousands of consumers use daily.
However, in true South African style, we tend only to buy from online stores that are familiar to us such as takealot and bidorbuy. We know that local is “lekker”, but it seems that many consumers are looking beyond South African shores and importing their online retail fix from directly from China!
A few Chinese retail stores have popped up such as BangGood and Joom, but the most popular in our opinion is WISH (www.wish.com).
Is WISH Safe?
Our experience says YES and NO! The following information is based on the experience of the Woogie crew.
We decided to place a small order to test the service out and ordered a wireless cell phone charger and a tempered glass screen protector for a cell phone. A few weeks later, the tempered glass screen protector arrived directly to our post box, and we received a collection notice from the post office for the wireless cell phone charger. Both items were received in a perfectly good working condition.
We then lost the plot a little and ordered various gadgets and toys to the value of just over R800.00 and everything that we ordered arrived!
We have also experienced orders not arriving and in these cases, we were refunded. WISH has a refund process to follow which we will speak about later on in this article.
WISH Deliveries
Using the correct address on your order is important. Use an address where you generally have mail sent to. The package is then sent to your closest Post Office and they usually send an SMS to notify you that a package is waiting for you along with a reference number.
It is also important to make sure that you provide the correct contact information on the WISH order so that the post office can contact you.
Disadvantages of buying from WISH
Delivery Time
Ordering from WISH does take time… A lot of time! We waited on average of 2 to 3 MONTHS for each item ordered. So if you are in a rush to receive your order, don’t use WISH or any of the other mentioned Chinese websites. In many cases, items only arrive a month or two after the estimated delivery date.
Import Duties
It seems that the post office is charging about R24.00 per package no matter what the value is. We find this unfair as most of the items bought did not even cost R24.00 with the delivery charge. So brace yourself for import duties when the package is collected.
Reports suggest that this amount may vary.
Single Item Delivery
The most significant irritation for us after the long delivery time is that fact that they ship everything that you order, individually. So, if you order ten items, you will end up running to the post office ten individual times to collect your order/s.
Clothing Items
We have not bought any clothing items but we have been warned against it. We hear that the clothing items are far smaller than usual. This is a normal and known issue with clothing items from China. (Chinese people are small).
Advantages of buying from WISH
Low Cost
Most of the items that you find on WISH is CHEAP and sometimes even FREE. The only catch is the delivery fee, especially for the “Free” items. But in the bigger picture of things, the delivery fee is minimal.
Large Variety
WISH provides an almost limitless amount of products to choose from. You name it, you will probably find it.
Display Currency
WISH picks up that you are shopping from South Africa and as a result, the product prices are displayed in Rands (ZAR).
Secure Payments
Payment can be made with a credit card and if you do not want to part with your credit card details (like us) then you can make a PayPal payment.
WISH Refunds
WISH Returns, Replacements and Refunds
We have not had to return any item to WISH or needed a replacement, but we hear that WISH have no issue with refunds and product replacements where and when necessary and within good reason.
The refund process for not receiving a parcel or not receiving the correct parcel is simple. Navigate to Order History menu option on the WISH app or website. Find the item that you have an enquiry on and select Contact Support.
WISH has an automated customer enquiry support system that will ask you a range of questions. Answer them as accurately as possible and WISH should provide you with an answer to your enquiry.
If an order has not arrived, you must contact support within 30 days of the original estimated arrival date. They tend to ask you to wait a few more weeks and give you a new date that the package should arrive by. It is important to remember that if your package has still not arrived by the new date, you need to contact support before that date. If you contact support after the new timeline has passed, they will not issue you with a refund.
Visit WISH Now
Woogie is not advertising WISH in any way, shape or form. We are merely sharing our experience based on our experience with WISH.
If you would like to explore the world of WISH, visit www.wish.com or download their app from your relevant App Store (Apple & Android).
Share Your WISH Experience
Don’t only take our word for it. Do your own research before ordering from WISH. If you have any feedback based on your experience with shopping on WISH, feel free to leave a comment below.
PS. If you planning to do Christmas shopping on WISH, best you get your orders in by the end of September… Just to make sure that your order arrives in time!
