How to buy stuff from Hobbyking.com from Thailand

First problem I had with Hobbyking.com was that I didn't have a paypal.com account setup localy in Thailand. As I'm from USA my paypal account was in USA and it can't be modified to have a billing address in Thailand. To correct this the only way I could figure out was to create a new paypal account for thailand that linked to one of my Thai bank accounts. So to do this part: I am going to attempt setting up a kbank virtual debit/credit card to be used on paypal.com to enable me to purchase stuff from Hobbyking.com. I first setup a savings account at my local kbank branch on Nov 17, 2012 at about 2:30pm on a Saturday I might add. I told them I wanted a K-Cyber account for paypal and they said no problem they just needed my passport and my address and 2000 baht minimum deposit plus 800 baht to open the account and my cell phone number and my email address. I might add I had problems originaly setting up an account at kbank before I had a retirement visa. Seems they wanted a visa had more than 90 days left on it. Also at the time they wanted a work permit. Those problems seemed to have gone away with the retirement visa or maybe it's less of a problem these days as last time I tried was over 4 years ago. It wasn't more than 20 minuets before the Kbank staff gave me a bankbook and a noname ATM card with visa electron and plus network access on it. I later checked on the time of deposit that was at 15:08 on Nov 17, 2012. Note this is not the card you will be using for your paypal account. This card is only good at ATM's and maybe some local Thailand stores. When I got home I noted I had an sms message saying that my mobile phone was ready for Internet shopping. I checked my email I had given them but I saw nothing there yet and I still didn't have any user name or password to login to the http://www.kasikornbank.com website. The next morning I checked my email and found that I had received email from kbank that was time stamped at 18 Nov 2012 03:01:02 +0700 about 12 hours from when I opened the account with a temp username and password that enabled me to setup a real username and password at kbank. With the first login it also showed what they had entered as your mailing address and phone number and other profile info that you could now change as I did with my address that they had input in thai letters. I modified the address to be in standard English Latin lettering so that I could read them and I would think my paypal vendors might like English better. When I got all the first login stuff completed I logged into the K-cyber-banking system and selected K-Web Shopping card > Apply Card. There It first sends me an SMS security one time password before I can continue I must enter the received password into the box and apply. Note this phone number for the one time password was first entered at an ATM when I first opened the account. You can also change this phone number again from any kbank ATM if needed. Then I setup the virtual card that linked to the only account I now have in the Kbank. I did this transaction at 3:00pm on Nov 18, 2012. I didn't know it took time for this transaction to create this card to happen. As I would try K-Web Shopping Card > View Card Details and it would return this account not setup for this. So I thought I must have done something wrong so I attempted to Apply for another card. This time it return that this account had already applied for a card. So I waited and checked again 12 hours later at 3:00am and still same with status card application is being processed. I'll try again at 12:00pm tomaro and see how long it really takes for this process so that others will know how long to wait before bothering to look at all. Update Nov 19, 2012 9:00am : I got an email stating that: Subject: KBank has received your request for K-Web Shopping Card KASIKORNBANK has already received your request for a K-Web Shopping Card. When your card is ready, we will inform you through your registered e-mail. I didn't see this email yestarday but it's timestamped as received at 18 Nov 2012 14:54:50 +0700. so that's 2:45pm bkk time about the time I applied for the card on the web site. so I guess there is still some lag in yahoo mail that I might have missed it? Update Nov 19, 2012 10:55am: I got the email from kbank that my shopping card application was accepted. email timestamp was 19 Nov 2012 09:33:30 +0700 . So I guess I'm ready for the next step of trying it on the hobbyking.com site with paypal. I went ahead and added the virtual debit card that was created to my thailand paypal.com account and also had it verified there. As the verification will take a few days I'm going ahead and attempting the hobbyking.com purchase before it's verified in hopes that it will already work. I note the paypal exchange rate when I make the purchase is PayPal Conversion Rate as of 19 Nov, 2012: 1 Thai Baht = 0.0313127 US Dollars as compared to 0.0325 is what I see the exchange rate today when I googled it about a 4% difference in paypal.com's favor. cool it looks like the transaction went through with the manual payment option on my hobbyking.com order. The time now is 11:41am Nov 19, 2012 so now we will see how long it takes for my new Fatshark googgles and video transmiter to get here. I checked my paypal.com account and verified that I see a $404.42 account transaction at 11:38am on Nov 19, 2012. I also note that it first used the 120 baht I had in the paypal.com account before it used the debit card to get the rest of the funding needed. Update Nov 20, 2012 11:09am: Status at Hobbyking.com site is still reserved on all items. There is an added message at the bottom: Order Messages; Notes; Customer paid with: instant HK Absorbed PayPal Charge:10.01 PayPal Email:myemail@yahoo.com TXN ID:6CV134304Y720**** Your order will be manually checked before processing. Please allow 24hr for us to conduct this check. Reason; High-Risk Country Update Nov 21, 2012 9:00am: No change parts status still shows reserved. Update Nov 22, 2012 7:15am: No change in parts status still shows reserved when I login to hobbyking account. it does show status: paid, processing on the top orders status (same as before) I did note today that I had received an email from hobbyking on Nov 17, 2012 on my ipipi.com email account stating that they have my order and that another email would arrive when they get payment confirmation. no other email from hobbyking seen since that date. My friends at the field say it normally only takes 10 days to get here from date of order so I'm getting worried. I added images of my hobbyking.com status to my picasa site that I will update each time I see changes in my status as seen here:

From hobbyking

Update Nov 23, 2012 12:19pm: No change status: paid, processing Update Nov 24, 2012 9:18am No change in hobbyking status: paid, processing I got an email from kbank today stating they just made a payment to PAYPAL *UHOBBIES on Nov 23, 2012. Not sure why it's taken this long to see this transaction as I saw the funds leave the kbank acount the same day I made the transaction 5 days ago. Update Nov 25, 2012 1:05pm No change status: paid, processing Update Nov 26, 2012 3:11pm No change status: paid, processing Update Nov 27, 2012 3:56pm No change status: paid, processing Update Nov 28, 2012 9:53am No change status: paid, processing I did attempt to do a live chat with hobbyking.com yestarday but after I sent them a short message asking why my status hasn't changed, I got no responce after waiting about 20 minuets. I did get an email response back from them showing that they did get my chat message I sent them. I think it might already be the Xmas season that might be slowing it down? Bad timing on my part to try to start this now. Update Nov 28, 2012 5:25 I did a change to my order with direct chat with hobbyking that seemed to work this is the chat session: You are now chatting with : Zoe (Customer Service) Zoe: Thank you for contacting the HobbyKing Support Team. How may I help you? You: yes I have an order already and was wondering if I could add some items to it? Zoe: may i have the order number? You: yes 200564**** You: I was told by a friend that he was able to add if it wasn't printed yet Zoe: yes we can add for you Zoe: please provide quantity*product ID You: oh cool, how oh ok just a moment Zoe: sure You: part part id weight price qty FTDI Adapter USB Controller - 5V 9000003 5 4.75 1 MultiWii PRO Flight Controller w/MTK GPS Module 387000003 78 65.26 1 Carbon Fiber Tube (hollow) 12x750mm CF15 50 4.66 2 Carbon Fiber Tube (hollow) 10x750mm CF12 19 3.95 2 30CM Servo Lead Extention (JR) 26AWG(10pcs/bag) AM1043-30CM 53 2.48 1 You: oh can you read that? Zoe: could you do it like 1* 9000003 to avoid mistake? You: sure just a moment Zoe: thanks Zoe: and 9000003 is not a product ID You: oh let me double check that one You: 1*9000003 1*387000003 2*CF15 2*CF12 1*AM1043-30CM Zoe: 9000003 is not a valid product ID You: ya that's an error on my part just a moment You: 1*009000003 You: http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__24779__FTDI_Adapter_USB_Controller_5V.html You: my spread sheet just cut the leading zeros You: ok? Zoe: sorry there was a connection error Zoe: one moment please You: no problem You: oh I just found that AM1043-30CM is now back ordered so I will cancel that add Zoe: ok Zoe: You may send the funds $92.43 to our PayPal account at accounts@unitedhobbies.com. Please provide me the Transaction ID of your payment from PayPal for verification. You: ok You: my total is showing 87.23, was there added shiping? Zoe: yes it is over 2 kg now You: ok You: Payment Sent (Unique Transaction ID0AB39127JC59*****) You: does that sound correct? You: 28 Nov, 2012 Payment To hexTronik Limited Completed ... -$92.43 USD Zoe: One moment please. You: ok Zoe: payment received Zoe: thank you You: wow you guys are the coolist thank you very much You: how long before my order is processed about? Zoe: thank you, our warehouse will ship your order in 2 working days You: wow cool and I already see it in my status ok that's it thanks again Update Nov 28, 2012 I didn't notice this email I had received from hobbyking that stated why my order had been delayed after I had sent the offline chat message before: Jessi, Nov 28 13:39 (HKT): Hi Scott Carlson , Thanks for contacting the HobbyKing Support Team. Please kindly note that the order had been held by system automatically due to a litter difference from the billing address and shipping address. I have put the order back into the process of the 0rder and we will ship out the order after we packed all items into the parcel for you. Thanks for your understanding and patience. Thanks for emailing support. If you have any other questions, please let me know. Regards. Jessi : I thought I was sure to make both my addresses the same, I will have to look again and see what might have been different. been anyway it seems to be fixed now. Update Nov 29, 2012 5:13pm No change status: paid, processing Update Nov 30, 2012 8:55am No change status: paid, processing I do note I see three green checks on warehouse status not sure that's different or not. I also heard from Nick that he has had some googgles stuck in custom now for going on two weeks that were sent from Team Black Sheep TBS shipped from USA. I wonder if there have been changes in regulation for import of video tranmiters/ recievers in Thailand or something? Update Dec 1, 2012 10:58am Good news! I got an email today from hobbyking stating: FW: Scott, Your items for order:2005649*** have been packed and will soon be shipped. Status from login to hobbyking is seen as unchanged with paid, processing. So I guess email from hobbyking is more detailed than the status seen on there web site. Update Dec 1, 2012 10:35pm more good news! I got email from hobbyking that they already shipped my package and sent me a tracking number: Hi This is an email to inform you that your item has been dispatched from our warehouse. TRK#: EQ302444*** To: Scott Carlson 482/*** Mo *** soi ** Nongprue Banglamung, Chonburi 20150, TH THAILAND Ph:6686827**** I also see status: shipped when I login to my hobbyking account. Update Dec 5, 2012 12:38pm: I logged into hobbyking account and got the link to track my parcel. At the link to speedpost I checked my tracking number and see this: EQ302444**** Hong Kong Thailand Acknowledged at Transit Centre 03/12/2012 21:46 . So it won't be long now. Update Dec 8, 2012 7:31am: I've been checking the postage status and thought I should update this with what I see today from speedpost: Update Dec 11, 2012 7:35pm: when I got home from flying today my door man called to me telling me I've got a notice. sure enuf it's the package we have been weighting for. It shows the value of my parsel being 14,000 baht with a total assesment of duty of 3976 baht. That's a bit more than I expected but it's Thailand. So tomaro I'll run to banglamung post office and try to pick up my goods. This is what I now see on the tracking from both thailand EMS and speedpost can be seen in my google picasa galery:

hobbyking

Update Dec 12, 2012 2:20pm : We got it!! I went down to the banglamung post office on my bicyle to pick up my package. I found the post office from this site http://allpattaya.com/directory/public-services/business/2722/Banglamung-Post-Office . that had a nice google map to guide me there. When I got to the post office at about 1:05pm I was surprized to see there was no lines of people. I asked the first person I saw at a window on the bottom floor for EMS she said yes with a smile. No scary looks like I'm used to at the imagration department. She asked for my passport and had me sign a few papaers and in about 3 minuets total I had my package handed to me. The box looked a bit beat up but no hole in it and looked to be never opened. I paid her the 3947 baht duty and vat fee's and she gave me a reciet and my package. when I got it home I opened the box and found everything in order with all that I had purchased in the box well packed and undamaged. It took me a total of 26 days from the day I opened my new Kbank account to the date of receiving my first package from Hobbyking.com . I'm sure my next package won't take that long. It's always the first one that is the most difficult. So that's the end of this article. If you have any other questions just ask in the reply box below.