Buying Chinese books in USA

[querido]

Oh, never mind my post #17.

It didn't work.

It got far enough to list it in "pending transactions" on my credit card statement, but they didn't get the money and canceled the order.

[gato]

Querido, did your try calling your bank again to ask them what happened with the purchase?

[BertR]

Weird, I ordered twice at Dangdang with a VISA card issued by an American bank and never had any problems.

[querido]

gato: I'll do that this morning.

[querido]

They got the money but the order failed.

I'll show you what that looked like and how to fix it.

THE PROBLEM:

My bank said the charge was approved and the item moved from "pending" to "posted" on my statement.

When I click on

查看未结订单 View open orders

Nothing listed. (It should show your order awaiting shipment. When it ships it moves into the order History on this page.)

When I click on

在线支付订单/查看电子帐户 Online payment order / view e-account

It says this (translations by Google/Wenlin/Me)

目前您的帐户中总余额有￥ The total current balance of your account 356.50元， (<< the cost of the item)

其中订单占款￥ Among order form make up for amount? 0.00元，

还有可用余额￥ Remaining available balance? 356.50元。 (<< Look. "available balance"? :huh: . When it ships all three numbers go to zero and the item moves into the History below.)

Seconds after making an order, they send an info email with projected shipping date and a tracking number. Later they send something like a notice of successful payment.

When I did this before and thought I had succeeded (post #17), I did not get the second email until 24 hours later and it had this line (translation by Google):

您曾于过去的24小时内在卓越亚马逊网购物，目前卓越亚马逊网尚未收到此订单的款项。为保证您能及时收到订单商品，请您尽快安排付款。如果您选择的是网上在线支付，请点击下面的“立即支付”链接支付订单。如果您已经完成支付，请忽略此邮件。

Your 24-hour period in the past distinguished Amazon Shopping, Amazon and the current outstanding amount has not yet received the order. To ensure timely receipt of your order merchandise, please arrange payment as soon as possible. If you choose online payment online, please click the "immediate payment" link on the payment order. (<< ignore that) If you have completed payment, please ignore this message.

THE SOLUTION:

Unless I'm mistaken, and be patient and careful to verify this in your case, the above indicates that *you need to reorder the item*. This fact is in their "help" and is also mentioned in a thread somewhere. If your attempt to get through Payease/VbV fails, you must reorder to try again. That order number can't be reused.

The last time I tried to pay looked as I described in post #17. This time, upon reordering (with the addresses and credit card info preloaded as they were before), the purchase went through, with a new order number, **without going through Payease/VbV** (evidently because they already had my money sitting in that "Remaining available balance", above.)

*This* time they sent that second email in 20 minutes but it had this line:

您已经完成了如下订单的支付，感谢您在卓越亚马逊购物，祝您购物愉快！

You have completed the following order of payment, thank you for your excellent shopping Amazon, I wish you a happy shopping!

The quickest indicator of success, just as at Amazon.com, is if you go back and view the item you just bought, it will tell you at the top of the page that you already bought it:

友情提示(handle). 您曾于 10年 9月 11日 购买过此项商品. 查看该订单.

Tips (handle). You had 10 years on Sept. 11 bought the product. View the order. (You already bought it on 11SEP10.)

SUMMARY:

1. Register your credit card with Verified by Visa.

2. Call your bank's credit card "member center" to ensure that purchases from *Republic of China* are not blocked.

3. When placing the order they say to use Internet Explorer, and without Googlebar. (Both IE and Google Chrome have worked for me.)

4. Then place your order and look for the above email message and Tip.

Good luck!

[Meng Lelan]

What about buying Chinese print magazines in the US, any online source for that? Here I can't walk out the door to any newsstand and buy any mag I want in 中文.

[querido]

Meng Lelan: Bookseed (in San Francisco) has a big selection of periodicals here. See the subcategories on the left.

Also: I finally found a bookstore (in Maryland) with a posted policy on finding anything published in China, for a fee. "Books are not limited on Chinese language learning, can be any books or media in Chinese, English, Japanese, Spanish, French, Arabic and Potala (Tibetan) which are published in mainland China." I've never done business with this one. Anyone?

[Gleaves]

Thanks for this info, querido. I've failed at ordering from dangdang in the past, so maybe I'll give it another try.

I've also used Bookseed a few times and have enjoyed the service. Reasonable price and shipping, just not a huge selection. I have not heard of eChina.

[ChineseBooksUSA]

If you're interested in learning Chinese, some popular titles are Chinese Made Easy (Level 1 - Level 5) from Joint Publishing or Integrated Chinese from Cheng & Tsui. It really depends on the learner's age.

If you're interested in ordering books from amazon.cn or dangdang.com, you can try sending us an email at orders@chinesebooksusa.com to get a quote. We've shipment from China monthly and can send a single copy if you need it more urgently....

Give us a try, we're located in New Jersey, USA.

[Meng Lelan]

Do you carry any wall calendars for 2012 totally in Chinese? Something nice and pretty, not like the free ones they give out in the supermarkets.

[yellowpower]

think that VISA and MasterCard both have a secured verification for credit card holders that you can register your card online before using your card to shop online, your local banks will have info on this. This is to prevent fraud, etc. Third party payment handlers need to be recognised éapproved by the credit card companies or something to that effect.

Best to check with your bank for use of credit card for online purchases and whether you need to have your card 'secured' first and if any countries have restrictions placed on them