So after I recently let go of my 1016 Explorer, it left a 36mm hole in my heart and I was hankering for something similar to take it's place. My heart was set on a modern Omega, but almost no one was selling this specific model. I finally found a seller in Europe, on Chrono24. I offered him his asking price. It was a private individual, not a dealer, and he wanted me to pick it up, and pay cash. Since I was in the USA, this was a non-starter. Over a few days I convinced him to accept Chrono24 Trusted Checkout. At that point I thought "yess!" I had the watch! However, once he started accepting Trusted Checkout a slew of other buyers wanted to buy the watch now. And the seller didn't want to ship outside the EU for fear of shipping loss. I had the feeling of defeat - when victory was so close! There were sharks in the water now, had to act quick! Again, I had to convince him that shipping loss was shipping loss whether or not he shipped to a neighboring EU country or the USA. I offered shoulder the shipping expense and send him my insured Fedex label. Convinced him that I was probably the most reputable buyer he would ever have for the watch he was selling. Convinced him that he would expend the least amount of effort and least amount of cost selling it to me. "Give me 24 hours" he said. The next day he agreed to sell to me, yes! I started to make payment, but you know what - you can't use a dealer's account to buy! Dagnabbit! So I opened a second, personal Chrono24 account to make the purchase (because I have never previously purchased a watch on Chrono24). And again started the process to pay via credit card.. ..Turns out Chrono24 when you pay by credit card uses a feature called "3D Secure" which was not supported by all banks in the USA. My bank was one of them, but it took me a day to figure this out.. Argh! So I had to spend several days to wait for my bank to activate a wire template for Chrono24. OK paid, this should be the last thing right? But then when the seller went to the Fedex office the next town over, the Fedex guy would not accept the package because it did not have a proper customs declaration, and left without dropping off the package because he did not know how to fill one up. Not his fault.. but ..ARGH! So I went online and found the PDF for the EU specific documentation, filled it up for the seller, and emailed it to him. Now he just needs to put the darn thing in the box and stick the labels and completed customs forms I provided. The back and forth has been going on for a week now. Tomorrow will be Monday and my seller will try again. Hopefully no more hiccups this time. Seriously, I've bought dozens of watches in a single go multiple times, but none of them had me expend 1/10th of the effort to get this one piece. And its not even that particularly expensive.
That is quite a bit of effort to put into this purchase. I'm hoping all that time invested pays off on a piece you're very happy to own. Keep us posted and give us some hints on what you're lusting over?!!
I feel this story has some more twists and turns before its conclusion. You'll appreciate the watch a whole lot more when its on your wrist.
In the future, if you (or any of the other established members) have issues with sellers not wanting to ship outside the EU, let me know and I'll be happy to handle the transfer.
."I had the feeling of defeat - when victory was so close! " I had the same feeling when I wanted to view one of your watches in NYC and was informed you were actually in San Diego
Life has many twist and turns. There's a growing possibility that I'm moving back Update: well its 430pm where my seller is right now, and the label tracking number has not moved..
Update 2: package left the Fedex facility in europe. Scheduled delivery tomorrow morning??? That's quick! Hopefully this is just a tele-movie not a TV series. Now that it's safely on the way, no way to jinx it now so I'll spill the beans - was it that easy to guess? It is a 36mm Railmaster 2504.52.37 - strap version. With fresh Omega service papers, so I have the going-in assumption that this is a mint piece (but I could be wrong).
Update: Looks like I spoke too soon. The current status on the tracking is "Improper or missing international paperwork, contact Customer Service". I called Fedex, they will need to get the info from Europe and will call me back. Argh!
