We’ve tried so many 3rd-party shopping services before but this new service from HalpU.com seems to integrate Amazon shopping quite well.
This is what we realized after trying out the service earlier today. HalpU (sounds like a play on “help you”) basically pulls Amazon’s database of listings and gives you the option to make the purchase and process everything else for you.
The site basically shows direct search results of Amazon products which you can add into your own cart for shipping to the Philippines. HalpU does not pad the listed price of the items but indicates a processing fee.
When you check-out, they will also add a shipping and handling fee (in our case, it was just $55 for 3 items) along with the total price that is converted to Philippine Peso (Php48 : $1). You can opt to pay via over-the-counter of banks, online banking (BDO, BPI, MetroBank, PNB, UCPB, etc) or 3rd-party partners like SM, Cebuana, LBC, etc. This is basically an option offered by DragonPay as their payment processor.
The reduced processing fee is bacause HalpU has an Amazon Prime account that makes delivery to their US forwarding address practically free. HalpU also pre-calculates the size of the box of your entire order so it can provide you the best size for the whole delivery (they charge by size instead of weight) and calculates processing fee from there.
There are 3 box sizes — 23” x 16” x 17” ($55), 23” x 20” x 17” ($65) and 24” x 18” x 24” ($75).
Everything seemed so smooth until we realized the delivery time to Metro Manila takes between 6 to 8 weeks. This is because shipments are done via sea and the boxes are considered balikbayan boxes that have reduced custom fees and taxes. There are order limits too — max of 6 items at a time.
If you want speedy delivery (other services only takes between 10 to 14 days), HalpU is definitely not be for you. But, if you’re after lower processing and shipping fees or making huge or heavy orders, then HalpU should be more cost-effected. We’ll try to order bigger items next time. We’ll update this post once our Amazon Echo, EyeFi and Nike FlyKnit Chukka arrives sometime in March.
You can learn more about HalpU here.
Hello, can you pls update this article? Did your package arrive on time?