Ordering at AMAZON JAPAN

Based on my own experience: From Japan to Manila, Philippines

Photo credit: harvardclubjapan.org

So you’ve been fangirling Shingeki no Kyojin lately and you want to purchase the  Survey Corps cape, or just the key necklace of Eren Jaeger (Comic Alley has those stocks of key necklace and Wings of Freedom patches anyway, just saying) or, you accidentally clicked the momoko doll ad of Amazon Japan from somewhere and you just decided to have it as a birthday gift to yourself? Those are not impossible! But I’m telling you to get ready, shipping fees are almost same price as the product you want to buy.

STEP 1: Sign in or Register on their website. Please be reminded that even you have an existing account on Amazon US, you can not sign in on Amazon Japan since they have different agenda. Click HERE to shop in ENGLISH.

STEP 2: Search for the item you want to buy. As much as possible find an item that is eligible for a free shipping sign so it would be less expensive. Anyway, here’s for an example of Momoko Doll I really want to buy.

10,420.00 JPY is about 3,872.28 PHP, you can use this money converter if you are curious how much it will be in Philippine Peso. I know it’s expensive, please be reminded that you have to make sure of your final product. You won’t get a return and refund easily, since we’re living in the Philippines, and the product itself was originated in Japan, of course we’re mountains and oceans away from them and it’s not easy as you think.

If you’re just curious if you may want to return a product. I have experienced returning one last month and successfully got a refund. Click here to find out how to request a refund or returns or replacements.

After you finally realized what item you want in your life, click Add To Kart on  your right side, if you can’t find it usually it says “カ-ト” or Ka-To (cart in Japanese Katakana) here’s the items I bought

Yuzuru Hanyu Kakusei no Toki (Time of Awakening) Blu-ray edition. And it’s eligible for Free Shipping!

Also I bought his photo book!

STEP 3: After adding it to your Ka-to, or cart, please click proceed to check-out. They will ask for you to log-in again for privacy concerns. Do not order it on public computer shop or while using a public wi-fi, you may not know what will happen to your card. You can see your order summary at the right side which looks like this one (this is my order summary when I ordered my Blu-ray)

STEP 4: Add your address, complete shipping address please. Then choose your payment method, add your card. They are accepting Visa/Mastercard.

Okay, this is your another problem, I know. You can’t borrow your parent’s credit card, right? I’m gonna give you another option for that. You can apply for a prepaid card, the easiest one would be BPI’s. Don’t worry if you don’t have an existing savings account, you can apply even you have no experience with BPI at all. Click this link to find out how. (PS, I used my visa prepaid card as my mode of payment, Amazon Japan accepts prepaid card)

STEP 5: Click “place your order”, you will receive an email from Amazon Japan few hours later, believe me, they are so fast when it comes to customer service. And don’t worry, they speak in English language.

Once you’ve received their email, you will receive a confirmation of your order which means your order is confirmed and now ready to ship. They will give a tracking number of the shipping carrier. They used DHL for me, (I think they really use DHL all the time, not sure though. But they were fast)

Once you’ve received the tracking number, you can track it now on DHL’s website (Note: it depends if the shipping carrier is DHL)

The status of your order(s) also will be posted on your account on Amazon Japan, in Japanese:

Click to enlarge

(Note: this is only the status of  my second time ordering from them after I got my refund, Feb 2014)

And in English (from DHL’s website)

Amazon.co.jp ships so fast more than you can expect. (well, of course we paid for a big amount for shipping and stuff) but in exchange, we receive it so fast and was secured (they put it on their own box with sign on amazon.co.jp on it)

NOTES:

Be ready to spend a big amount. You know it’s Amazon Japan right? I’ve tried to order from different Japanese online sites and so far, they have the most expensive shipping fees and stuff. I don’t know, lol, I just feel like they are more expensive among others but fast.

It’s okay if you’re not present upon claiming. I mean, it’s okay even you’re not in your own house as long as there is someone who could accommodate the delivery man, of course, they will be needing a signature and will be posted on their tracking site (exclusively for you)

Please please as much as possible, make sure you are ordering the right item, if you don’t want to have an intense headache, no, a migraine. I learned from what I experienced. You should know the different between Blu-ray and aDVD, (well I know the difference of them but I didn’t know that blu-ray cannot play on our player even on my laptop) and I ended up requesting a replacement for a DVD version, but I failed. That request was ignored and I’m really going crazy that time thinking that I spent thousands of peso for nothing. But I’m glad they managed to give me a refund, though, it’s been a roller coaster ride, I’m telling you. I’m warning you.

Please be reminded of DVD REGION CODES. We are all not living in Japan and some of their DVD and Blu-ray discs may probably NOT be viewable in other countries!! Unless you’re player is multi-region (windows dvd can be multi-region anyway)

Here’s the DVD Region Specifications (from Amazon.com)

Standard DVDs

Region 1: U.S., U.S. Territories, Canada, and Bermuda
Region 2: Japan, Europe, South Africa, and the Middle East, including Egypt
Region 3: Southeast Asia, East Asia, including Hong Kong
Region 4: Australia, New Zealand, Pacific Islands, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean
Region 5: Eastern Europe, Baltic States, Russia, Central and South Asia, Indian subcontinent, Africa, North Korea, and Mongolia
Region 6: China

Blu-ray DiscsRegion B/2: Europe, Greenland, French territories, Middle East, Africa, Australia and New Zealand
Region C/3: India, Nepal, Mainland China, Russia, Central and South Asia
Region A/1: North America, Central America, South America, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia

I ordered a Region 2 Standard DVD from AmazonJapan and it works perfectly fine here in Philippines.

So here’s what I got

If you have questions regarding Amazon JP online purchases or planning to buy something but curious, leave a comment below!

This post is not affiliated with Amazon Japan and other sites mentioned above.