I was the recipient of one Lucky Draw, a winner of Creative ZEN Neeon 6GB MP3 player when I threw my name card into the lucky draw pile in the recent National Achievers Congress 2007.

I was using the law of attraction as expounded by the Secret DVD by thinking and receiving an MP3 player be it an iPod or any other. And I thought it was working when I received an email in my inbox informing that I won the lucky draw to my surprised joy.

The company that provided the prizes is located in Singapore and it was very kind of them to courier it over to me because I resided in Malaysia. They said it was no problem to send it over, all they needed was some documentation like a copy of my passport and address details for verification and I provided it happily. I was waiting patiently as the days go by waiting for the parcel with my gift.

After a long weekend, a noticed was left on my desk from EMS Poslaju which to my horror, stated that the Creative MP3 player was impounded by the customs official. In order to receive it, I have to either go over there all the way to KLIA airport customs for self clearance or appoint Pos Malaysia as forwarding agent by paying them about RM50 to clear the custom procedure. Either way it was a loser to me, because the distance from where I am to KLIA airport is very far away, considering the amount of time, petrol cost and toll, and parking I have to pay to get to the custom office for clearance is more than the RM50 for paying Pos Malaysia for clearance.

In addition, I will have to pay some taxation of which I have no idea how much they will charge me. If I were to go over there myself they will probably ask for some “coffee-money” so to speak just to get it cleared (I know some people had to endure this problem to get their goods!) or if I need it to be done in the nice and proper manner than I will just have to appoint Pos Malaysia as agent.

It left me in a very frustrating position. Why must they have this kind of procedure? Why must I pay for some thing that should be free and should be freely delivered right to my doorstep?

If other courier service was used there would not be this kind of incident. I doubt there would be this kind of problem if DHL, FedEx, OCS or some other courier company were to be used.

I simply cannot understand the logic for this tomfoolery way of earning a quick buck from unsuspecting consumer who has to pay for unnecessary inconvenience. What were the stupid customs people thinking? To think that greed was behind the motivation for this inconvenience makes it so pitiful. Does it mean that every item that was to be sent via EMS Poslaju would be impounded by customs? Yes, I think so, judging from my past experience when receiving samples from my HQ, every item that was sent via EMS Poslaju was impounded without any reason.

So when the personnel from Pos Malaysia called me up and ask me whether I want the cargo to be cleared and delivered (and that also not right up to my doorstep, I still have to collect it from the Brickfields Poslaju centre!), I decided to have that item sent back to sender. Guess what? They said the item will be returned one month later! I said, “What? One month? By then the item would be stolen!”

I told them if they should return it to the sender, they should return it today and not one month later. I don’t know whether they will follow my instruction, but I guess I will just to check with them later and see what happens.

Great! Now how am I going to collect my little lucky (unlucky?) draw gift?

So never, ever use EMS Poslaju for receiving any item into Malaysia. Better yet, don’t even use their service for anything that requires going in or out of the country. It would just be too much hassle!

In the end, a friend suggested paying EMS the RM50 and be done with it. After all the Creative Zen Neeon was about RM600-700 in the market. So much for Malaysia Boleh! As long got dollars and cents definitely can get things done. No wonder corruption is crippling the country.

Related post:
EMS Poslaju Malaysia Contacts
Never use EMS Poslaju for incoming package – my poor experience with EMS
Pos Malaysia Postal Rates from July 2010