6:05 a.m.
Hello Folks,
Following is one of the real examples to express how difficult
shipping is on our region. This comment has posted in related with F17
media (200 DVD) request from Bangladesh FAms.
<extract>
"Those DVD had arrived long ago, but the FedEx? guys didn't dropped
that package at my address. They gave me papers instead to collect it
from the government custom warehouse. I went there only to found that
I have to pay a huge amount (100 US$+) as some wired
surcharges/duties/fees. I told them these are free gifts and contain
no commercial value. They asked me to collect a NOC from BCC
(Bangladesh Computer Council - the Government's computer authority).
And my application to the BCC got no reply until now. After couple of
follow up over the phone, they replied, they've collected one DVD from
the customs warehouse to check the content and will issue me a NOC few
days later. I called four days later and freaked out, when hared that
no one knows about my application and asked me to apply again.
It seems, it would have been better to produce locally as I did
earlier for Fedora 14.
Anyway, I am closing the ticket. now."
<end of extract>
Found this when reviewing trac tickets, fedora-apac #36
Therefore till we have our next FUDcon please do ask for funds and
prepare our SWAG locally.
--
Regards,
Buddhike Chandradeepa Kurera (bckurera)
7:08 a.m.
Am Samstag, den 10.11.2012, 17:35 +0530 schrieb Buddhike Kurera:
Hello Folks,
Following is one of the real examples to express how difficult
shipping is on our region. This comment has posted in related with F17
media (200 DVD) request from Bangladesh FAms.
<extract>
"Those DVD had arrived long ago, but the FedEx? guys didn't dropped
that package at my address. They gave me papers instead to collect it
from the government custom warehouse. I went there only to found that
I have to pay a huge amount (100 US$+) as some wired
surcharges/duties/fees. I told them these are free gifts and contain
no commercial value. They asked me to collect a NOC from BCC
(Bangladesh Computer Council - the Government's computer authority).
And my application to the BCC got no reply until now. After couple of
follow up over the phone, they replied, they've collected one DVD from
the customs warehouse to check the content and will issue me a NOC few
days later. I called four days later and freaked out, when hared that
no one knows about my application and asked me to apply again.
It seems, it would have been better to produce locally as I did
earlier for Fedora 14.
Anyway, I am closing the ticket. now."
<end of extract>
Found this when reviewing trac tickets, fedora-apac #36
I think it was wrong to close the ticket and raised some questions
there.
1. Has this been reimbursed? It's bad that the requester had to pay
money, but I think Fedora should reimburse him.
2. It seems Harish shipped the media, right? Was the package
shipped with the customs letter. It clearly states the media
are non-comercial and have a value of USD 0.15 each. For 200
media this would be USD 30, so taxes shouldn't be higher than a
few USD.
Therefore till we have our next FUDcon please do ask for funds and
prepare our SWAG locally.
I am not convinced that producing everything locally is better. I mean,
do we have numbers how expensive the local media were and do we know
what quality they had (labels, sleeves etc)? Once we have this
information, we can evaluate what is really better.
Generally speaking need to figure out what went wrong in order to solve
these problems for the future. It seems there was some paperwork needed
to avoid paying import taxes. Do we know what is required and where to
get it?
If we want to improve swag shipping, we need to have all this
information in the wiki, sorted by country. If people request or ship
swag, they should know all technical and legal requirements.
I think building up a list of countries, their problems and possible
solutions would be a good topic for a hackfest at the next APAC FUDCon
or a (virtual) FAD.
Kind regards,
Christoph
[1] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Customs_letter_for_Fedora_media
9:12 a.m.
On Sat, Nov 10, 2012 at 6:38 PM, Christoph Wickert
<christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Am Samstag, den 10.11.2012, 17:35 +0530 schrieb Buddhike Kurera:
> Hello Folks,
>
> Following is one of the real examples to express how difficult
> shipping is on our region. This comment has posted in related with F17
> media (200 DVD) request from Bangladesh FAms.
>
> <extract>
>
> "Those DVD had arrived long ago, but the FedEx? guys didn't dropped
> that package at my address. They gave me papers instead to collect it
> from the government custom warehouse. I went there only to found that
> I have to pay a huge amount (100 US$+) as some wired
> surcharges/duties/fees. I told them these are free gifts and contain
> no commercial value. They asked me to collect a NOC from BCC
> (Bangladesh Computer Council - the Government's computer authority).
> And my application to the BCC got no reply until now. After couple of
> follow up over the phone, they replied, they've collected one DVD from
> the customs warehouse to check the content and will issue me a NOC few
> days later. I called four days later and freaked out, when hared that
> no one knows about my application and asked me to apply again.
>
> It seems, it would have been better to produce locally as I did
> earlier for Fedora 14.
>
> Anyway, I am closing the ticket. now."
>
> <end of extract>
>
> Found this when reviewing trac tickets, fedora-apac #36
I think it was wrong to close the ticket and raised some questions
there.
1. Has this been reimbursed? It's bad that the requester had to pay
money, but I think Fedora should reimburse him.
Does he noted about any payment ? but if there is any please do
re-open the ticket and note, we can take care for that for sure.
2. It seems Harish shipped the media, right? Was the package
shipped with the customs letter. It clearly states the media
are non-comercial and have a value of USD 0.15 each. For 200
media this would be USD 30, so taxes shouldn't be higher than a
few USD.
> Therefore till we have our next FUDcon please do ask for funds and
> prepare our SWAG locally.
I am not convinced that producing everything locally is better. I mean,
do we have numbers how expensive the local media were and do we know
what quality they had (labels, sleeves etc)? Once we have this
information, we can evaluate what is really better.
For my experience we can achieve same for less money (when tax
includes with the production cost), it is better to do so with out
doing the event with no swag :)
Generally speaking need to figure out what went wrong in order to solve
these problems for the future. It seems there was some paperwork needed
to avoid paying import taxes. Do we know what is required and where to
get it?
If we want to improve swag shipping, we need to have all this
information in the wiki, sorted by country. If people request or ship
swag, they should know all technical and legal requirements.
I think building up a list of countries, their problems and possible
solutions would be a good topic for a hackfest at the next APAC FUDCon
or a (virtual) FAD.
This is good if can be done. i tried but no success yet.
--
Regards,
Buddhike Chandradeepa Kurera (bckurera)
10:49 a.m.
Am Samstag, den 10.11.2012, 20:42 +0530 schrieb Buddhike Kurera:
On Sat, Nov 10, 2012 at 6:38 PM, Christoph Wickert
<christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> I think it was wrong to close the ticket and raised some questions
> there.
> 1. Has this been reimbursed? It's bad that the requester had to pay
> money, but I think Fedora should reimburse him.
Does he noted about any payment ? but if there is any please do
re-open the ticket and note, we can take care for that for sure.
It is not quite clear to me if he paid or if our media are still stuck
at the customs (which means they are effectively lost).
> 2. It seems Harish shipped the media, right? Was the
package
> shipped with the customs letter. It clearly states the media
> are non-comercial and have a value of USD 0.15 each. For 200
> media this would be USD 30, so taxes shouldn't be higher than a
> few USD.
>
>> Therefore till we have our next FUDcon please do ask for funds and
>> prepare our SWAG locally.
>
> I am not convinced that producing everything locally is better. I mean,
> do we have numbers how expensive the local media were and do we know
> what quality they had (labels, sleeves etc)? Once we have this
> information, we can evaluate what is really better.
>
For my experience we can achieve same for less money (when tax
includes with the production cost), it is better to do so with out
doing the event with no swag :)
I don't think this is funny either way. no matter if we have problems
with customs, if our contributors have pay for stuff, if we loose media
in customs or if we run an event without swag. All of this costs us
money and frustrates our volunteers, thus we should try to change it.
If producing swag locally is a solution, so be it. I am just not
convinced it is really better or cheaper, we first should evaluate this
carefully. Have a look at the F14 media shown in the ticket, the colors
look horribly off. With producing different batches locally, we will hit
this problem more often.
In Europe we usually don't have any customs problems because if the
European Union. I know we are having a lot of problems in Africa, too,
and usually they boil down to having the right papers for customs, e.g.
a recommendation letter form a politician or otherwise important person.
I don't know what it's like in APAC and I am not to make a decision. But
for me the first thing to do is to try to improve the swag shipping
process before I abandon it in favor of local production (which will
then cause different problems). You can't say something doesn't work if
you haven't tried hard enough.
> Generally speaking need to figure out what went wrong in order
to solve
> these problems for the future. It seems there was some paperwork needed
> to avoid paying import taxes. Do we know what is required and where to
> get it?
>
>
> If we want to improve swag shipping, we need to have all this
> information in the wiki, sorted by country. If people request or ship
> swag, they should know all technical and legal requirements.
>
> I think building up a list of countries, their problems and possible
> solutions would be a good topic for a hackfest at the next APAC FUDCon
> or a (virtual) FAD.
>
This is good if can be done. i tried but no success yet.
Please let me know what the customs requirements for your country are
and where I can find them in our wiki. If I were to send you something,
would I have all the information I need?
Kind regards,
Christoph
1:40 p.m.
Hi Guys,
This case also happens in Indonesia, so I think I can tell you guys about
this, we also can't received around 200 CDs when Harish sent it for our
last FAD in Padang,Indonesia.
FedEx said the CD was confiscated by the ministry of Indonesia by reason of
Import License, because the CD has an expensive value and we must settle
this by paying some tax, but we also don't know how to find the way out.
On Nov 11, 2012 12:49 AM, "Christoph Wickert"
<christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Am Samstag, den 10.11.2012, 20:42 +0530 schrieb Buddhike Kurera:
> On Sat, Nov 10, 2012 at 6:38 PM, Christoph Wickert
> <christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I think it was wrong to close the ticket and raised some questions
> > there.
> > 1. Has this been reimbursed? It's bad that the requester had to
pay
> > money, but I think Fedora should reimburse him.
>
> Does he noted about any payment ? but if there is any please do
> re-open the ticket and note, we can take care for that for sure.
It is not quite clear to me if he paid or if our media are still stuck
at the customs (which means they are effectively lost).
> > 2. It seems Harish shipped the media, right? Was the package
> > shipped with the customs letter. It clearly states the media
> > are non-comercial and have a value of USD 0.15 each. For 200
> > media this would be USD 30, so taxes shouldn't be higher than a
> > few USD.
> >
> >> Therefore till we have our next FUDcon please do ask for funds and
> >> prepare our SWAG locally.
> >
> > I am not convinced that producing everything locally is better. I mean,
> > do we have numbers how expensive the local media were and do we know
> > what quality they had (labels, sleeves etc)? Once we have this
> > information, we can evaluate what is really better.
> >
>
> For my experience we can achieve same for less money (when tax
> includes with the production cost), it is better to do so with out
> doing the event with no swag :)
I don't think this is funny either way. no matter if we have problems
with customs, if our contributors have pay for stuff, if we loose media
in customs or if we run an event without swag. All of this costs us
money and frustrates our volunteers, thus we should try to change it.
If producing swag locally is a solution, so be it. I am just not
convinced it is really better or cheaper, we first should evaluate this
carefully. Have a look at the F14 media shown in the ticket, the colors
look horribly off. With producing different batches locally, we will hit
this problem more often.
In Europe we usually don't have any customs problems because if the
European Union. I know we are having a lot of problems in Africa, too,
and usually they boil down to having the right papers for customs, e.g.
a recommendation letter form a politician or otherwise important person.
I don't know what it's like in APAC and I am not to make a decision. But
for me the first thing to do is to try to improve the swag shipping
process before I abandon it in favor of local production (which will
then cause different problems). You can't say something doesn't work if
you haven't tried hard enough.
> > Generally speaking need to figure out what went wrong in order to solve
> > these problems for the future. It seems there was some paperwork needed
> > to avoid paying import taxes. Do we know what is required and where to
> > get it?
> >
> >
> > If we want to improve swag shipping, we need to have all this
> > information in the wiki, sorted by country. If people request or ship
> > swag, they should know all technical and legal requirements.
> >
> > I think building up a list of countries, their problems and possible
> > solutions would be a good topic for a hackfest at the next APAC FUDCon
> > or a (virtual) FAD.
> >
>
> This is good if can be done. i tried but no success yet.
Please let me know what the customs requirements for your country are
and where I can find them in our wiki. If I were to send you something,
would I have all the information I need?
Kind regards,
Christoph
--
ambassadors mailing list
ambassadors(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/ambassadors
2:20 p.m.
On Sun, 2012-11-11 at 03:40 +0800, Prima Yogi Loviniltra wrote:
Hi Guys,
This case also happens in Indonesia, so I think I can tell you guys
about this, we also can't received around 200 CDs when Harish sent it
for our last FAD in Padang,Indonesia.
FedEx said the CD was confiscated by the ministry of Indonesia by
reason of Import License, because the CD has an expensive value and we
must settle this by paying some tax, but we also don't know how to
find the way out.
... And I thought Nigerian Government was twisted. Looks like this
issue is global.
I experienced this for IDLELO5 event early this year for 600-CD/DVDs.
FedEx works closely with customs and often routes their shipping through
them for approval. Sometimes, the goods end up in the hands of a
rule-book extremist. Its hard not to be entangled under one clause or
the other in the custom rule-books here despite the clarity of the
accompanying declaration letter. What solutions have I found so far?
here:
(1) Make friends with one local FedEx official (an honest one) and
exchange phone numbers. A good friend will always look out for your
shipment and corner them when they arrive. You may want to give tips to
such friends (I don't call this bribery because all they do is to make
sure the rules are applied fairly and speedily without milking you dry
-- extortion).
(2) Make sure the Event organizers or Government bodies involved in such
events are notified early about these shipments. When you do this, they
could raise memos to Custom offices to treat the shipping as government
property -- that gives you first class treatment. (welcome to
bureau-crazy) :-)
Regards
Onyeibo
8:59 p.m.
Hello Everyone,
Greetings. :)
I use to have this in our biweekly APAC meeting agenda. :)
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Meeting:APAC_Ambassadors_2012-06-09
"...Locally created media / swag as an option? ==> strongly suggests inquiry on
funding your initiatives Local production? -..."
I strongly suggest that for the countries such as Bangladesh, Indonesia as well as other
countries where imported goods have tariff "tax" and other problems to have this
conducted via locally produced. :)
Food for thought. :)
Sending positive Fedora energy to your computers now. :v)
Please have a Great Fedora day and/or evening! :~)
Thank You
Sincerely
=-=-=-=-=
- David -
=-=-=-=-=
David Ramsey
---------------------------------
猿も木から落ちる
さるもきからおちる
Even monkeys fall from trees.
Even experts make mistakes.
=
Fedora Project's Japan & Maryland Ambassador dramsey(a)fedoraproject.org
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Dramsey
With sixteen (16) x86_64 computing cores, 80 GB of RAM and eight SATA
Seagate 7200.12 - 500 GB harddisks.
With sixty-four (64) x86_64 computing cores, 256 GB of RAM and 1TB harddisks.
The system definitions are at the following URL:
*
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Dramsey#Using_embedded_code_have_upda...
=
10:48 a.m.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Christoph Wickert"
<christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com>
To: ambassadors(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2012 11:49:25 PM
Subject: Re: [Ambassadors] APAC Shipping experience from Bangladesh
I don't know what it's like in APAC and I am not to make a decision.
shipping But for me the first thing to do is to try to improve the
swag process before I abandon it in favor of local production (which
will then cause different problems). You can't say something doesn't
work if you haven't tried hard enough.
Hi Christoph, Buddhike et all,
Thank you for raising this issue and discussing on it a lot.
Media/swag should be one of the biggest problems in APAC up to now.
We need to balance between the quality of media/swag (when producing
them locally in a small amount) and the difficulties have to face
(when getting it imported).
With a small amount of media/swag (I meant hundreds), it's difficult
to order a local to produce them for us (or in a very high cost) so
producing at one place and shipping them in the whole region may be
a wise way. However, we faced a lot of issues to get them imported.
Actually, Harish sent me once about 2-3 years ago but I could not get
them imported because of too high tax. I remember that he wrote a
total of $200 in the attached invoice. So, it's easier for us when
the total is just about $30 (thanks Christoph for your cool idea)
Moreover, I think building a list of import issues categorized by
country for APAC should be a critical task. We should focus on this
issue in the next APAC meeting.
I would like to propose our steps:
1. Create a wiki page to list all issues by country.
2. Discuss more (in APAC meeting) to clarify all of them.
3. Try, share experience and improve the whole process.
I hope the process will improve much after several releases. It it
works well, we will have a big improvement in promoting Fedora.
We can not know where it goes if you do not start.
I created the wiki page [1]. Everyone, please fill your issues in.
[1] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/APAC_Media_Shipping_Issues
Kind regards,
Tuan
6:36 p.m.
Hello Everyone,
Tuan, I like your idea and fully support your initiative. Please keep up the great
momentum! :)
We can do it! :)
Sending positive Fedora energy to your computers now. :)
Thank You
Sincerely,
- David -
Date: Sun, 11 Nov 2012 23:48:05 +0700
From: tuanta(a)iwayvietnam.com
To: ambassadors(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
Subject: Re: [Ambassadors] APAC Shipping experience from Bangladesh
----- Original Message -----
> From: "Christoph Wickert" <christoph.wickert(a)gmail.com>
> To: ambassadors(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
> Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2012 11:49:25 PM
> Subject: Re: [Ambassadors] APAC Shipping experience from Bangladesh
>
> I don't know what it's like in APAC and I am not to make a decision.
> shipping But for me the first thing to do is to try to improve the
> swag process before I abandon it in favor of local production (which
> will then cause different problems). You can't say something doesn't
> work if you haven't tried hard enough.
Hi Christoph, Buddhike et all,
Thank you for raising this issue and discussing on it a lot.
Media/swag should be one of the biggest problems in APAC up to now.
We need to balance between the quality of media/swag (when producing
them locally in a small amount) and the difficulties have to face
(when getting it imported).
With a small amount of media/swag (I meant hundreds), it's difficult
to order a local to produce them for us (or in a very high cost) so
producing at one place and shipping them in the whole region may be
a wise way. However, we faced a lot of issues to get them imported.
Actually, Harish sent me once about 2-3 years ago but I could not get
them imported because of too high tax. I remember that he wrote a
total of $200 in the attached invoice. So, it's easier for us when
the total is just about $30 (thanks Christoph for your cool idea)
Moreover, I think building a list of import issues categorized by
country for APAC should be a critical task. We should focus on this
issue in the next APAC meeting.
I would like to propose our steps:
1. Create a wiki page to list all issues by country.
2. Discuss more (in APAC meeting) to clarify all of them.
3. Try, share experience and improve the whole process.
I hope the process will improve much after several releases. It it
works well, we will have a big improvement in promoting Fedora.
We can not know where it goes if you do not start.
I created the wiki page [1]. Everyone, please fill your issues in.
[1] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/APAC_Media_Shipping_Issues
Kind regards,
Tuan
--
ambassadors mailing list
ambassadors(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/ambassadors
4182
days inactive
4184
days old
ambassadors@lists.fedoraproject.org
8 comments
6 participants
participants (6)
-
Buddhike Kurera -
Christoph Wickert -
David Ramsey -
Onyeibo Oku -
Prima Yogi Loviniltra -
Truong Anh Tuan