Completed MJOLNIR: The minimalistic – but not boring – 9.7L Case

[Nobodyseven]

Did you guys pay for the customs duty tax when your case arrived in your country? I just paid mine 24.82 Canadian.

I think I also need too. Stucked on Customs. Today I'll call Fedex.

 

[runsamok]

I did not have to pay customs on mine, UPS to Canada back in June.

 

[Trikel]

Still nothing for us in the remaining 2%. This week seem to be Chinese Holiday so I suspect we should just wait ANOTHER week! Yaaay! /s


Tbh, all the delays (false promises) and frustrations have made me completely numb towards this project. I've been super enthustiastic about SSF building and now I'm just considering to leave it all.

 

[nik3563]

As I understood, we payed for shipping and customs when we ordered the case. The mail I received for my order from Thor zone in May says:

Shipping method​

Standard (incl. customs/duties)

 

[Nobodyseven]

I've received today the case. Shield of Founders panel has small damage and 1 bigger scratch. Also I need to pay additional customs. Basically the case is nice, all of the corner guard were on the correct place. No any scratch on the surface.

 

[AlexTzone]

For the non-UPS shipments, i.e. where we ship through a 3:rd party/freight forwarder, setting the customs and taxes payment to ourselves hasn't been possible (we've discussed this with all 4 freight forwarder that we currently use and everybody said the same thing). This is unfortunate but will get the cases out there much faster than if we wait for the UPS situation to resolve itself (no idea when it'll happen and nor does our UPS rep know...great).

Anyways, we'll refund any difference in shipping between what you have paid to us and how much we pay to our freight forwarder. However, the shipping climate is insane right now (and has been so for a while) so we've basically underestimated shipping costs for almost every region, but we'll cover these losses ourselves.

 

[jerm_ph]

It is very unfortunate that the only reason I signed up to SFF.net is to be able to contact Alex to raise my concern. I hope the reason was better and different.

I paid 565 USD total (437 for the case, O2 panel and booster cell + 127 for shipping incl. customs/duties). Now, I might be paying more or I might not be able to get the case.

Right now, if I list the pros/cons for supporting this project, I can't justify that I made the right decision:

Pros:
1. Beautiful case (assuming no damage during packing and shipment) and THAT IS IT.

Cons:
1. Expensive
2. Ahh. Just too many to mention. You get it.

If the case arrives with damages, the only pro will not be there anymore. Just the cons.

 

[AlexTzone]

It is very unfortunate that the only reason I signed up to SFF.net is to be able to contact Alex to raise my concern. I hope the reason was better and different.

I paid 565 USD total (437 for the case, O2 panel and booster cell + 127 for shipping incl. customs/duties). Now, I might be paying more or I might not be able to get the case.

Right now, if I list the pros/cons for supporting this project, I can't justify that I made the right decision:

Pros:
1. Beautiful case (assuming no damage during packing and shipment) and THAT IS IT.

Cons:
1. Expensive
2. Ahh. Just too many to mention. You get it.

If the case arrives with damages, the only pro will not be there anymore. Just the cons.

The vast majority of people will not be affected and in a case such as yourself (where shipping fees have been so high) will likely get some money back.

 

[For_Science]

Anyways, we'll refund any difference in shipping between what you have paid to us and how much we pay to our freight forwarder

Could you clarify this statement with an example? It somehow sounds like you aren't going to just straight up refund what people are getting charged as extra customs duty.

If "difference in shipping between what you have paid to us and how much we pay to our freight forwarder" = additional customs duties, perhaps you should just say that for simpletons like me

 

[AlexTzone]

Could you clarify this statement with an example? It somehow sounds like you aren't going to just straight up refund what people are getting charged as extra customs duty.

If "difference in shipping between what you have paid to us and how much we pay to our freight forwarder" = additional customs duties, perhaps you should just say that for simpletons like me

Let’s use an example with @jerm_ph who paid 127 for shipping and taxes. Now that we don’t have the option to select taxes on ourselves during the shipping stage it will look like this:

• Refund = $127 - (shipping cost we pay the freight forwarder, say ~$80) = $47

• Once his case reaches his country he most likely will be unaffected, but in some cases there may be tax (say ~$30 based off what @Hexxagram said), which he has to pay.

By the end of the day @jerm_ph should still be wealthier by $17. It’s important to note these are just example numbers and we’ll know what they actually are once everything is shipped.

Basically, we’re going to back to shipping without taxes and refunding people the difference between what they paid and what we pay to ship their case. For the minority that actually get charged during import we’ll not be involved (we don’t have money to both refund the shipping difference and pay additional taxes they may get charged).

However, for anybody who paid something like $60 for shipping I wouldn’t expect to get a refund since almost every country we ship to costs us more than that. The shipping climate is severe now, especially for someone like us that calculated prices during a period before this happened. I don’t think anybody wants us to wait until things calm down again (when?) or ship by boat (to low volume and would probably arrive in mid 2022 due to all port congestion) instead of 5-7 days express.

 

[For_Science]

Let’s use an example with @jerm_ph who paid 127 for shipping and taxes. Now that we don’t have the option to select taxes on ourselves during the shipping stage it will look like this:

• Refund = $127 - (shipping cost we pay the freight forwarder, say ~$80) = $47

• Once his case reaches his country he most likely will be unaffected, but in some cases there may be tax (say ~$30 based off what @Hexxagram said), which he has to pay.

By the end of the day @jerm_ph should still be wealthier by $17. It’s important to note these are just example numbers and we’ll know what they actually are once everything is shipped.

Basically, we’re going to back to shipping without taxes and refunding people the difference between what they paid and what we pay to ship their case. For the minority that actually get charged during import we’ll not be involved (we don’t have money to both refund the shipping difference and pay additional taxes they may get charged).

However, for anybody who paid something like $60 for shipping I wouldn’t expect to get a refund since almost every country we ship to costs us more than that. The shipping climate is severe now, especially for someone like us that calculated prices during a period before this happened. I don’t think anybody wants us to wait until things calm down again (when?) or ship by boat (to low volume and would probably arrive in mid 2022 due to all port congestion) instead of 5-7 days express.

Thanks for the clarification, it makes sense to at least me now. I wish you all the best for the upcoming orders, and also hpe the shipping scene gets better!

 

[Shinken1]

For the non-UPS shipments, i.e. where we ship through a 3:rd party/freight forwarder, setting the customs and taxes payment to ourselves hasn't been possible.

I don’t feel it’s cool to just mention that you didn’t pay the shipping taxes now. Hopefully very few have taxes to pay.
I remember backers received their Booster Cells in the same box as their Mjolnir even though they paid quite a bit for additional shipping.
Then there is the Kickstarter stretch goals that were dropped.

These things happen but in the above cases ThorZone didn’t mention anything in advance, it was just “a surprise”.
Some could say it is so you can pocket some extra cash.
I do not think that’s the case but would suggest you make these changes clear in advance as it can leave a bitter taste for some of your customers.

 

[AlexTzone]

I don’t feel it’s cool to just mention that you didn’t pay the shipping taxes now. Hopefully very few have taxes to pay.
I remember backers received their Booster Cells in the same box as their Mjolnir even though they paid quite a bit for additional shipping.
Then there is the Kickstarter stretch goals that were dropped.

These things happen but in the above cases ThorZone didn’t mention anything in advance, it was just “a surprise”.
Some could say it is so you can pocket some extra cash.
I do not think that’s the case but would suggest you make these changes clear in advance as it can leave a bitter taste for some of your customers.

It’s something we learned today, basically after reading that some got to pay taxes. The freight forwarders are a new method and we can’t know everything about them in advance, that’s why we did a test with 5 cases (which have fulfilled their role in giving more insight).

Booster Cell freight is nowhere near enough to cover what is actually costs to ship such a package by express (even if it’s small), so we had to put them inside the boxes (still increased the costs a lot because the weight increased).

 

[aoyamajia]

Hey, I received an email from thorzone that Gmail flagged as suspicious, asking me to confirm what I ordered, a picture of my payment card and my driver's license. Just want to confirm that this is legit and I'm not being phished before I reply to it

 

[AlexTzone]

Hey, I received an email from thorzone that Gmail flagged as suspicious, asking me to confirm what I ordered, a picture of my payment card and my driver's license. Just want to confirm that this is legit and I'm not being phished before I reply to it

It's legit, I noticed some peoples orders got flagged as "high risk" by Shopify so we're taking a couple of extra steps just to confirm that they are who they say they are and that the cards they paid with are actually theirs. In short we're asking for:

• Picture of ID card to verify identity
• Picture of payment card (only the last 4 digits and name) to verify the card is actually theirs
• A short description of what they ordered

Less than 0.5% of all backers got marked as high risk. Also, we sent the emails out from both contact@thor-zone.com (official email) and thorzonetech@gmail.com (unofficial email) to make sure one of them doesn't end up in some spam folder.

 

[Hexxagram]

My Mjolnir case just delivered to my doorstep today (Oct 5th) via DHL. I guess my case is 1 of the 5 test shipments? It took 6 days in transit from HongKong to Canada. Will post photos later.

 

[Hexxagram]

After 1 year and 4 months wait, it's finally here. The box arrived intact. DHL handled it very well.
(Batch 1)

O2 Panels and the exterior of the case are perfectly smooth, kinda like MacBook. No nicks, no scratches and blemishes.

But there are few issues. Like some of the others I didn't get lucky with these tempered glass panels. Upon inspection I noticed mine has small chip on both panels as you guys can see.
And the front aluminumpanel rattles. Is there a way to fix it?

Build time!
RYZEN 5600X
RADEON 6800 XT

Overall, I am pretty happy with my Mjolnir. Thank you very much Alex for this beautiful case! I really hope everyone gets their cases before the year ends.

 

[AlexTzone]

THE LAST KS/B1 CASES ARE SENT!!

We'll reach out to the remaining backers through email and provide their tracking numbers (around Monday/Tuesday).

Cheers guys

 

[ARC1T3CT]

Build time!
RYZEN 5600X
RADEON 6800 XT

Overall, I am pretty happy with my Mjolnir. Thank you very much Alex for this beautiful case! I really hope everyone gets their cases before the year ends.

In order to build it proper, you’ll also need:

1. Tweezers

3. A rubber band.

 

[Sharknose]

THE LAST KS/B1 CASES ARE SENT!!

We'll reach out to the remaining backers through email and provide their tracking numbers (around Monday/Tuesday).

Cheers guys

Almost exactly four years since the first post (Oct 14, 2017) announcing the Mjolnir (and Thor eGPU case). Congrats on seeing it through Kickstarter and production during a global pandemic.