Do you believe Online Shopping in Malaysia?
Are you a Malaysian? Have you ever buy something online? I have decided to write about this after I saw this post by Boon on his blog. It’s a true story about his colleague who has ordered a toy Elmo from Parkson online & eventually did not received the item that was ordered because of some stupid reasons that were given by the manager, which is just so ridiculous! Do check out the post & read the whole story
It seems that most of the Malaysians are conservative minded, they prefer to buy something only when they can see the item in front of them rather than giving out their own credit cards number online; This is perhaps the major concern of those people who wants to buy something online as they feel insecure. But think of this: You do not need to go through the hassle of finding car parks and stuck in the jam for hours, isn’t that why E-Commerce sites were created? So Malaysians, better change your mind now & start supporting online shopping! (Only that I will have customers in the future for my business, you also don’t want to see me doing nothing after graduate, right?)
I felt sorry for what was happened to Boon’s colleague & as a student who’s pursuing E-Commerce in a local college, I really have to consider my choice of choosing the subject again. Thanks for their “contributions”, online shopping may not be popular in Malaysia for a while.. Why don’t they just learn something from Exabytes? Their costumer service are just excellent, at least they won’t sell something that is out of stock but still placing the particular item on the first page 
So, would you still buy something online in Malaysia?
thanks for the linkback pal
You ‘re welcome!
I do online shopping lo… Just brought my SLR lens from US last few months.
my opinion that online shopping only will work for those soft thing such as software and hosting service, will not work so nice for tangible thing…
well, i dun believe in online shopping..
firstly i dun get to see the product, i might end up purchasing someting tht is not up to the quality.
secondly, i dun trust online payment, especially in their security system.
third, long wait in getting the item
fourth, need to go thru lotsa hassles if to get back refund
:That’s great! How much is it?
:Yup, totally agree, people here will only buy the products when it’s in front of their eyes
:I do agree of your 4th point, they will just refer you to someone else until you run out of patience asking for the refund…
Yup, we need times to adopt the western culture and behavior. I’m from business schoool. Sometimes, i notice some students do not even touch computer and blame ecommerce is not going to work in Malaysia.
I did my own research for my school project. The main factors Malaysian do not shop online are:
1. Lack of trust from the merchant
2. Malaysian love to touch and see (even they dun buy, haha)
3. Malaysian claimed it’s slow in shipping
4. Some Malaysian claimed they are worry of credit card fraud
Btw, i own the TMX Elmo as my collection.
U r from business school too? Yeah business rocks, especially E-Commerce! Well, I asked my friends & it seems that they also have the stereotype that E-Commerce won’t work well in Malaysia. What a pity…
Sometimes, we cant blame them. As the merchant itself do not trust our “Islamic Country” and among the top fraud country in the world… e.g. Paypal
Btw, I’m not influencing Malaysian not to venture in EC. In fact, i put high hope in future EC. We might the market leader who dominate the Malaysia’s EC in the future? I sense it.
I did before in lelong.com. It is safe. I think the problem of Malaysian seldom purchase online because of the culture and environment here. Crimes and Fraud everywhere…If the biz is 100% safe and we can get 100% what we see in the website. I don’t thing it will be a problem.
I hope e-commerce can be popular in Malaysia one day. I hate drive car to shopping mall….car park, traffic..fees…TIME…
Well, I would buy online, but not clothes.
Thingies that I would probably purchase online are:
- Digital products (Games, Softwares etc)
- Electronic thingies
Definitely not clothes!
Need to try out the clothes on myself first before deciding it is fitting enough for me, etc.
I currently live in the US and i buy a lot of clothes online. I think one of the problems is the delivery charges, a lot of websites charge unreasonably for shipping.
But the good thing about buying online in US is that they provide paid postage stickers, so that we can refund the item if we are not satisfied without having to pay for the delivery back to their store. Besides that, they do price adjustments, let say the price of the item we purchased drops within 14 days, we can just send them an email and they will debit the difference into our card.
I think if malaysian sellers have an established shipping & refund system, it will help a lot for buyer’s to trust them. Besides, with the petrol prices now, i guess more ppl will be tempted to shop online.
I now currently running a online store selling men’s necktie, what do you about this product? Will you buy it online?
Actually during the payment procedure, as long as the store owner using Paypal, Worldpay, Ipay88, etc, your credit card info will not be seen by store owner or anyone else accept the Paypal themselves. So for me shopping online in Malaysia actually are very safe. Before i was expose with EC, i also think that shopping online are not safe and can not be trusted, but after have involve with EC, I feel a lot more confident to buy online now.
I now currently running a online store selling men’s necktie, what do you think about this product? Will you buy necktie online?
Actually during the payment procedure, as long as the store owner using Paypal, Worldpay, Ipay88, etc, your credit card info will not be seen by store owner or anyone else accept the Paypal themselves. So for me shopping online in Malaysia actually are very safe. Before i was expose with EC, i also think that shopping online are not safe and can not be trusted, but after have involve with EC, I feel a lot more confident to buy online now.
i start shop online this year, because i juz move from KL to Kuching, not much fashion things to see at here, so….
i like to shop online actually, i like the feel when received the parcel. some website at malaysia now provide a very good service also. but one serious things i cant accept is the quality is different with what is saw on the website. i also shock after i found that so many malaysia online shopping web already. 2 or 3 years ago, i can only order from taiwan.
i still new in this internet business field. i setup my online shop that sale sarawak craft. at the first 3 months, there is no sales stated. only few month back i start to receive an order from customer.it is quite slow actually but i feel very satisfy because still, there are customer out there who buy product online. but still need more promotion and improvement in my operation to ensure more securiry n comfortability for customer.
i wonder if i can buy something from amazon … but it seem that the shipping is only to US region … you live there …show me a way how to buy item from amazon n ship to malaysia ….
the problem is clear as my thesis is on it.if u interested follow me to see why this is happening.future will be changed after my publish
Actually some stories like these do exist not only in Malaysia and even in the US, go and see reseller ratings, so many people complain of service quality and not receiving products from website sellers. I buy my computer stuff from Fusion IT. It is a local Malaysian company, and they always contact me, keep me updated a lot of people have been quite happy with them. I hope more online sellers locally follow their example.
the problem is the other way around now.. last time it was Malaysians who dont want to shop online.. now because of the huge number of fraud credit card transactions coming from Malaysia, a lot of online retailers NO LONGER WANT to sell to Malaysia.. so sad
I was trying to purchase something, and went through almost 20 stores that dont want to ship to Malaysia, even though I use secure payment method such as Google Checkout or paypal in addition to normal credit card payments.
Something to reflect on, huh?
hey SkaRn,
If you’re trying to buy something from overseas, try this shopping directory:
http://www.intletail.com/malaysia
It lists many online shops that ship to Malaysia.
Can try this directory for those who want to buy from malaysia online retailers – http://www.malaysiaonlinestores.com
Why not? It is depends on which website you shop, where you shop and how you shop. I have been shopping online for more than 5 years but never get cheated.
As a friend of mine told me, Malaysia E-Commerce is 10 years behind compared US, perhaps it sounds true as we Malaysian are not welling to accept the challange. We wait till we see advertisement drop into our mailbox, Then we rush out to Giant, Carrefour or whereever. If you ask me, I was conservative till I tried. Never try never know. My sis from Canada told me she even purchase her groceries online.
Hai bloggers
You guys, is the best people online I’ve met. Hai! I would it be great that you all come and help me in this small research (serious one~) that I do to complete my study. I’m doing a research about online purchasing in our country (malaysia). I would like you opinion, suggestion, critics and so on about our online purchasing environment. What is your concern toward online purchasing. If you get have some time can you guys pm me through my email (), I would like to pass on my short questionnaire.
Together we can show our concern in the future online purchasing in the country.
Thank You
I hope there will be more scope for Online Shopping in Malaysia because I just launched a brand new online shop selling beauty products.
But just a bit of research showed that most online shops in Malaysia use Paypal (but in US$) or Internet banking transfers or cheques. But I think the key is still to have good customer support to reassure potential customers.
Even if people may not want to buy beauty, skin care or make up products online (some people are very rightly selective in buying their beauty products), it will at least get the brand out there and you may be inclined to try something new if you see it in shops or magazines.
I’m watching the scene closely – one day I do hope that there will be many local shops selling great products securely online to the point that people will be able to have a peace of mind to shop online.
Support local businesses!!!
hi there,
I too am experiencing this problem ever since i moved back from London to Malaysia last yr.Staying in London has not only shown me how fast,efficient and reliable their online service and postal system is but the one thing that left a big impression on me was their customer service.
Most major retailers n department stores know the importance of online businesses that they will sell n deliver clothes,books,cooking,electronics etc even daily groceries to your door .Refunds or delivery problems are immediately looked into n they will make d effort to call or email you.Any mistakes or problems and u will deffinitly get an apology.
They are so confident of their online business as mostly everyone there is educated and has proper business ethics as opposed to Malaysia.Their websites r constantly updated daily,they r easily to contact via phone/email/chat, n d best thing is they always handle problems almost immediately as they take pride in the reputation n d image of their business.
Online shopping in London was like heaven to me.
Well u can imagine my dismay when i came back here thinking Malaysia is just as advanced as the UK .So i tried to purchase things from the UK just to end up at the checkout and not find Malaysia listed in d drop down box.I have been through almost 18 major clothing retailer sites only to find they do not deliver to Malaysia citing that Malaysia has high fraud rate.The other problems i found was
1. The shipping charges r costly n would at times cost almost nearly as much as d product itself.
2. Product being sent out fr overseas UK/US/JPN r very fast but once it enters Msia that is when it gets slow.So u should hv sum kinda tracking num2 check for urself.
3. Parcels are mostly opened/tempered with or in some cases lost.(esp electronic accessories)
4. Customer service is almost nonexistence here .
5. Most Malaysian websites r not updated,no quality control n looks ‘dodgy’.
Its not entirely bad but i am of course just highlighting the obvious problems.
8 out of 10 sites i would want to buy dont ship to msia.
5 out of 10 times my parcel is always opened whether its oversea or within msia.(even a Xmas card sent fr HK)
Overall,i would say its pretty disappointing and disgraceful compared to Taiwan/Korea even Thailand!
So in the end whose job is it to take care of this inconvenience?
What would it take to better the system and clear Malaysia’s “top fraud country” name to the world just so retailers would ship here?
Are Malaysian’s really that untrustworthy?
customer: the thing that bother me the most would probably be the shipping cost, I guess it won’t be long before I leave Malaysia
Do you think if i set up a e-commerce page selling product but put only RM is workable if later i go for overseas market, say US, France, etc.? Do you think those buyer willing to buy in RM (which will be convert by their credit card company to their local currency then.)?
Thanks.
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I stumbled across this blog whilst researching online spending in Malaysia. I can’t find much information! However I was amazed at how negative some of your respondents were to your article. If you have time, why don’t you run a similar article today and see how people respond and if their attitudes have changed?
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i love to do both online shopping and online window shopping for goods and other stuffs :..
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