With family and friends living in various countries of the world I would quite often be asked for help in buying products directly from the US. Some of their reasons were about availability, price and shipping. Items were either not available in their country or they were way too expensive or the cost of shipping was prohibitive.
So I began to wonder how big this problem is and did some research. I looked at online shopping in both the domestic and international markets and broke it down into two separate problem areas, Payments and Shipping.
Payments
Consumers the world over love to shop on US websites. The US has more of them than anywhere else and the range of products is extremely wide. Price of goods is usually cheaper than the same item offered elsewhere in the world. Domestic consumers have an advantage over International consumers when it comes to paying for items purchased online because most US vendors will only accept credit cards that are issued by US banks. There are exceptions to that rule if you can find them. With the ever present threat of credit card fraud and identity theft some vendors are declining payments if the credit card address is different to the shipping address.
Shipping
Most vendors offer free domestic shipping, but don’t think it is because they like you, they are only trying to keep up with their competition. Free usually comes with conditions and/or restrictions. Conditions such as a minimum amount spent to qualify or restrictions that offer free shipping within the 48 contiguous states and that is usually as far as they go even when you qualify. To ship to Alaska, Hawaii, APO, FPO, DPO and Protectorate addresses can be a problem. International consumers are not well catered for when it comes to shipping. Several US vendors, if not most, do not ship to international addresses. Shipping international is a different animal so why would vendors who are doing well with domestic consumers want to involve themselves with a different set of circumstances that international shipping would create. Just a thought!!!!
Conclusion
Considering all of the above, I looked for companies that provide solutions to online purchasing problems. Companies that provide such good service, that it makes an online consumer’s shopping experience a good one. There are several companies located in the US that provide some form of online assistance be it, purchasing, shipping, mail collection and forwarding, US address services etc., etc. There are some companies that have a very good track record, however there are several companies that seem to have the same common denominator and that is problems with their Customer Service. Perhaps there is no such thing as perfect service especially when you consider the words spoken by Winston Churchill.
“You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.
While conducting this research it became very apparent that there is room for a company such as Yourwebpass.com to provide a service that consumers should already be receiving and that is a company that provides excellent customer service. My research also turned up an amazing statistic, as of June 2014 there are 3 billion people in the world who can connect to the internet. That my friends is a huge market that cannot possibly be serviced by the companies that are presently providing a service from the US.
I have been involved in customer service in one form or another for the last 40 years either as an employee or an employer. I am well aware that good customer service is the core of any business and without it you have nothing. I have thrown my hat into the ring so to speak and my promise to you the consumer is that ‘Yourwebpass.com’ will endeavor to provide the best possible service that any consumer deserves.
PASS is an acronym for Payment And Shipping Solutions
So I began to wonder how big this problem is and did some research. I looked at online shopping in both the domestic and international markets and broke it down into two separate problem areas, Payments and Shipping.
Payments
Consumers the world over love to shop on US websites. The US has more of them than anywhere else and the range of products is extremely wide. Price of goods is usually cheaper than the same item offered elsewhere in the world. Domestic consumers have an advantage over International consumers when it comes to paying for items purchased online because most US vendors will only accept credit cards that are issued by US banks. There are exceptions to that rule if you can find them. With the ever present threat of credit card fraud and identity theft some vendors are declining payments if the credit card address is different to the shipping address.
Shipping
Most vendors offer free domestic shipping, but don’t think it is because they like you, they are only trying to keep up with their competition. Free usually comes with conditions and/or restrictions. Conditions such as a minimum amount spent to qualify or restrictions that offer free shipping within the 48 contiguous states and that is usually as far as they go even when you qualify. To ship to Alaska, Hawaii, APO, FPO, DPO and Protectorate addresses can be a problem. International consumers are not well catered for when it comes to shipping. Several US vendors, if not most, do not ship to international addresses. Shipping international is a different animal so why would vendors who are doing well with domestic consumers want to involve themselves with a different set of circumstances that international shipping would create. Just a thought!!!!
Conclusion
Considering all of the above, I looked for companies that provide solutions to online purchasing problems. Companies that provide such good service, that it makes an online consumer’s shopping experience a good one. There are several companies located in the US that provide some form of online assistance be it, purchasing, shipping, mail collection and forwarding, US address services etc., etc. There are some companies that have a very good track record, however there are several companies that seem to have the same common denominator and that is problems with their Customer Service. Perhaps there is no such thing as perfect service especially when you consider the words spoken by Winston Churchill.
“You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.
While conducting this research it became very apparent that there is room for a company such as Yourwebpass.com to provide a service that consumers should already be receiving and that is a company that provides excellent customer service. My research also turned up an amazing statistic, as of June 2014 there are 3 billion people in the world who can connect to the internet. That my friends is a huge market that cannot possibly be serviced by the companies that are presently providing a service from the US.
I have been involved in customer service in one form or another for the last 40 years either as an employee or an employer. I am well aware that good customer service is the core of any business and without it you have nothing. I have thrown my hat into the ring so to speak and my promise to you the consumer is that ‘Yourwebpass.com’ will endeavor to provide the best possible service that any consumer deserves.
PASS is an acronym for Payment And Shipping Solutions