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Posts Tagged ‘East Ocean e-Imaging’

Review: Home Delivery Photo Printing from eoe Online

February 27th, 2009

This is the second part of the blogger review program for my experience with eoe Online.

In the first part of my review previously, I had hope it will arrive to my mailbox safe and sound, nice and neat.

Well, it didn’t.

It didn’t reach my mailbox at all. It reached my doorstep instead, with me having to sign the receipt of photos I ordered online, just like ordering McDonalds or a Dell laptop.

I never had thought the online photo printing service includes home delivery. πŸ™‚ But there’s no complaints at all, unless there isn’t anyone at home to sign it and will need to head to the post office for pickup.

The package was delivered through Skynet courier service and it took less than 3 working days for it to arrive. (It might depends on your location I think, but in my area of Selangor, it seems quick!)

The photos are printed in Kodak papers.

As I printed 50 pieces of photos, they come in two photo albums contained in a cardboard and then wrapped with the Skynet bag. Nice and neat πŸ™‚

Although this is a review post and my personal take to its online photo printing (including home delivery) is “above-average satisfaction”, I think at least few might not be be convinced to its online service just from reading these reviews.

So I guess it doesn’t really do justice to eoe Online if I am not able to get my readers at least a visit to its website or give it a thought on printing their photos online.

Hence, let me go into the details of my online photo printing experience.

For a start, head to EOE Online at http://www.eoe.com.my/

1) Go to E-Print

Select ‘e-print‘ under Shopping menu.

There are two options for photo upload : File Upload and Easy Upload.

I would recommend Easy Upload as it will enable you to select and upload multiple files easier. Do note that this option is only available for Internet Explorer browser. For non-IE users, you will have to use the normal File Upload.

2) Select Easy Upload

After selecting Easy Upload, it will prompt for the installation of an Active-X control to your browser.

Click on the top bar to continue installation.

3) Install Active X

Internet Explorer will prompt a typical Active X installation dialog as following:

Click on the Install button to continue.

4) Select photos to print

After the installation completes, you will be able to browse for your photos in your computer in the web page just like a Windows Explorer.

Select the photos you want to print, or right click on the photos for other available options.

5) Click Upload button and wait until all photos uploaded

Once you have completed your selection of photos to be printed, continue with the “upload” button and the Active X will display a Upload progress display and you will have to wait until all the photos are uploaded to the system.

6) Select print size and quantity

When you have finished the photo upload, then you are given the choices of print size and quantity.

Let’s say if you would like to have a piece of 4R for every photos, key in 1 into the 4R and the select “apply to all”.

One cool feature of this EasyUpload or the online printing system is that it will alert you if your photos resolution is not good enough for the print size you have selected.

7) Check pricing

The view pricing link on the right displays the pricing for your prints and also the minimum resolution for the photo size.

The number of photos you selected for printing multiplied by the weight will give you a rough estimation of the delivery charges.

8 ) Check delivery

The delivery rate link on the right displays the charges for the photos shipment and delivery.

9) Confirmation

When you’re done with your printing options, click on the “purchase” button to confirm. You will be able to view the summary of your prints.

You still have the option to return to the previous options to change or continue to add the prints to cart. You can also continue to add photos until you decide to make the purchase.

10) View Cart

Your shopping cart will list the printings you have selected and getting you ready to make payment and complete your online printing.

Prior to check-out however, you will need to do a quick registration with the system and provide the delivery address.

11) Checkout

When you proceed to check out, the total charges will be display. Total of your prints with the delivery charges is then known here.

There are three payment options and this way it allows more choices for users to shop, allowing students without credit card to use bank-in, or those who does not have credit card or do not like to pay with credit card online to use Maybank2u.com. The credit card payment option supports Visa and MasterCard which are the major credit card merchants available.

12) Payment Confirmation

Complete your payment with the options you are most comfortable with.

For instance, if you have selected Bank-in payment option, the confirmation display the further action you will need to take.

13) Order invoice

The order invoice is also display at the end of the order submission.

You may choose to print the invoice for easy reference. πŸ™‚

If you have made payment, all you need to do is just wait for delivery!

All in all, it was quite easy if you are computer literate.

In other words, if you’re using computer to do other online transactions or visiting websites, getting your photo printed via eoe Online is as easy as ABC. You do not need to be a programmer or a hacker to figure your way out.

Even if you have trouble with the online printing, I found that they have a Live Support system to help online users. Another plus point for good customer service.

During my trial of the Live Support system, it was way past midnight. I have waited for a few minutes and there was no response, so I decided to abandon the chat. I hope there are dedicated support staff for this feature, else it will be a waste or just to act as aesthetics to a very well developed online printing system. This Live Support might be the only drawback of the Eoe Online printing system if it is not being handled professionally. However, customers still have the alternative to contact via the Online Contact Form.

I do have some tips for the photo upload though. Try resize the photos you would like to print before uploading and it should save you a lot of time. If the ActiveX could resize it before upload, that would’ve been the best. Do note that there are minimum resolution for the photos if you perform a manual resize, like what I have mentioned in Step 6) above. Check out the details from this page.

Price wise, its promotional period which runs until 31st March 2009 for 4R and 5R prints are a good deal. In my opinion or experience, usual print shops charges between 0.50 cents and 0.60 cents for each 4R photo. Even with shops which offer a percentage of discounts like 10% or 20% with membership cards for photo printing, the 0.30 cents 4R by eoe is still a comparable deal. I’d still hope the price is a permanent online pricing and not a limited promotion sort of thing. So if you’re printing after 31st March 2009, try sort it out yourself if you could get a better deal elsewhere.

In my humble opinion, eoe Online could be the very first Malaysian website of a digital print/services chain store to offer online photo printing other than its offline services from their retail stores.

East Ocean e-Imaging (M) Sdn. Bhd. is a wholesale/retail chain fully owned by Pisces Trading that provides photo printing and imaging services to end consumers. East Ocean e-Imaging’s services include analogue and digital printing, customising, and retouching of photos.

Eoe could be among the early initiators in Malaysia’s online printing service arena, but its parent company Pisces Trading has a longer history.

Since inception in 1976, Pisces Trading (M) Sdn. Bhd. has grown to become a leading local company specialising in the distribution of a comprehensive range of photographic equipments and accessories for the Malaysian market, ranging from films to batteries, analogue cameras to digital cameras, and memory cards to digital storage solutions of various major brands.

Checking out the details of East Ocean e-Imaging and Pisces Trading eventually led me to know eoe Online is not just a fly-by-night website. It could be a well thought idea from businessmen who knows internet is another source of income for business already running offline and it does not risk itself from being outdated by the global advancement in technology.

Being a web developer myself, I think Eoe online printing system could be in-house developed or a purchased system. It is definitely a well designed and developed system, and it does the job well for the customers who would like the convenience of doing things online, just like banking and shopping.

My hats off to EOE. πŸ™‚

Malaysia, Photography, Review , ,

Review: eoe Online Photo Printing Service

December 19th, 2008

eoe = East Ocean e-Imaging Sdn Bhd

eoe Online is a photo retail chain selling photographic products, including digital and analogue cameras, digital camcorders, digital storage media, color negatives, batteries, and other camera accessories. We also provide printing and studio services.

I came across the website http://www.eoe.com.my/ this year and was actually quite amazed by their huge number of retail outlets, especially that they have outlets located in Tesco hypermarkets and Jusco shopping centers.

I coudn’t recall if they were providing online photo printing service at that time though.

Recently when I visited the site again, I saw their advertisement on their online print promotion.

You can easily print your digital photos into hardcopy 4R and 5R sizes at RM 0.30 and RM 0.50 per piece respectively.

I am not so sure the about the price you can get from the usual brick-and-mortar photo shops, but the last time I printed, they charged me RM 0.60 per 4R and only RM 0.50 per pieces if I print over 100 pieces.

So you can imagine what I think of this promotion. It’s actually quite a good deal. πŸ˜€

And besides that, eoe Online are going to deliver the print orders for FREE if the total amount of order comes to RM 35 or above (117 4R or 70 5R).

The usual print price is here and the delivery charges is here.

I have just made my first online print order of 50 pieces for FREE as they are having a blogger review program.

The online upload process took me slightly more than one hour for my photos of around 80MB. Even if I were to copy it and print it in a shop, they would’ve asked me to return in an hour too. So it’s actually quite nice to get the photos printed from the comfort of your home and get it delivered to you.

You can have the option to get it delivered to your own house or somebody else’s. πŸ˜‰ Then you can opt for credit card payment, Maybank2u payment or Bank-in to their account and fax in the slip. The three choices enables one to choose the payment they are comfortable with.

And yes, you will need to register as a member and get your email validated. Their website/portal itself seems to be a social website too, quite cool for a photo printing and camera shop! πŸ™‚

I have yet to receive my printed photos, so do return here to check out my second part of the review soon and see if it is truly worth getting your photos printed online.

Hope that they will get into my mailbox safe and sound, nice and neat. Haha….

Malaysia, Photography, Review , ,