Monday, September 29, 2025
5:12 a.m. Room 211, Hotel Raja Bot
Chow Kit, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
It’s a bit early to be awake, drinking instant coffee, and typing, but my eyes popped open at three this morning, and then I couldn’t get back to sleep. I’ve been awake since then and busy doing Planet Doug-related things. I’m just about to make a cup of coffee, and I thought I would type up an update while I enjoy it.
The last few days of my life have been dominated by a Lazada drama. I talk about this a lot in my various videos in real time, but I can tell the story here. I mentioned earlier that I had ordered a tripod online through Lazada to be delivered to my hotel. It is the Ulanzi MT-44, and I found it at what I thought was a reasonable price online. I had had success ordering an Anker Nano power bank online, and it was delivered to my hotel without any issues. I was really excited about this possibility of getting tech items delivered to the hotel instead of wandering all around Kuala Lumpur for days trying to track things down in physical stores.
However, with this second order, I’m being reminded of why going to physical stores has its advantages. When you order something online or do anything online, it’s great as long as it works. But once something goes wrong, then things spiral out of control. If you order something to be delivered and it’s delivered, then it’s great. BUT if there is a problem with the delivery, then what do you do? As the Ghostbusters have questioned since the 80’s, “Who you gonna call?” You’re basically stuck with no possibility of contacting a human being, getting information, or solving your problem. You lose all control as you struggle with the Internet and pointless chat bots.
In this case, the problem all started when the delivery guy with my tripod showed up at the Hotel Raja Bot and found the front door locked. That’s common with low budget hotels in Malaysia. They lock the front door magnetically, and the desk clerk has to buzz people in. And that works but only if the front desk clerk is actually at the front desk. The clerk at the Hotel Raja Bot happened to be away from the desk for a few minutes, so the delivery driver couldn’t get in, so he left with the package containing my tripod. He DID try to call me, but I had the ringer on my phone turned off, and I never heard or noticed the call. I guess that’s my bad, but I didn’t think there was any reason for anyone to call me. I was excited about this new system of just having things dropped off at the front desk. It never occurred to me that there would be a problem with that, and I ALWAYS have my phone ringer off.
A bit later on, I noticed that there was a notification on Lazada that an attempt to deliver my parcel had failed. Oddly enough, there was a notification at 12:36 that my package was out for delivery and would be delivered within the next hour. But then there was a second notification one minute later at 12:37 saying that delivery had failed. And THAT was Lazada’s fault. Had I seen a notification that my parcel would be there within one hour, I’d be camped out in the lobby and waiting. But the delivery notification came ONE minute before the “delivery failed” notification. So that made no sense at all unless the delivery driver lived in some kind of strange time bubble.
When I saw that delivery had failed, I started to investigate, and I noticed a missed call on my phone. I realized that was probably the delivery driver, and I quickly called him back. I thought maybe he could turn around and return to the Raja Bot. But the delivery driver was probably in traffic and couldn’t exactly chat. He also didn’t speak English. So after he figured out who I was, he just shouted, “Ring ring!! Knock knock!! Nobody!! I go!!!” And then he hung up.
After that, I was lost in a maze of misinformation and confusion. On Lazada itself, there was ZERO information about what would happen next or what I needed to do. I was expecting to see some kind of information, such as “We will try to deliver your package again within the next 24 hours” or “Contact this number to arrange second delivery”.
I was expecting something. Anything. But there was nothing. The Lazada app told me that delivery had failed and that was it. They offered no clue about what was going to happen next or what I should do or needed to do or whether I needed to do anything at all.
The package had a tracking number, of course. And I tried that. But I live on Planet Doug, so it didn’t work. The deliver company was LEX MY. I looked for the LEX MY website, but I couldn’t find it. I don’t know if it even exists. I did find a whole bunch of websites that offered tracking information, and I entered my tracking number in all of them. And they all said the same thing: “Your parcel can’t be located.” Basically, the tracking number was invalid and wasn’t connected to anything.
I tried to contact Lazada directly, but I couldn’t do that either. I scoured the Lazada app and website, and I found no way to contact them. There was no chat window or contact system of any kind that I could locate. I contacted the online store that sold me the tripod thinking perhaps they could help. Perhaps the package would be returned to them and they would try to deliver it a second time. The store was slow to get back to me, but after about eight hours, they replied to my messages. And they said, “can u chat Lazada center for this problem”. That was their whole message. Essentially, they said it wasn’t their problem. They had sold me the tripod and given it to LEX MY for delivery through Lazada. After that, it had nothing to do with them. It wasn’t their problem to solve. I wrote them some follow-up messages, but they just ignored me after that.
I reached out to local people who might be able to tell me how the Lazada system works. And I was told that when there is a problem with delivery, the courier will keep the package and then try again later in the day or the next day. Nothing on Lazada said this or explained this, but that’s what people told me. So I gave up on my attempts to figure anything out, and I just waited. I waited the whole day and then for all of the next day. And nothing changed. There was no update on Lazada about trying to deliver the package again and no information about what I should do.
With no other option, I decided to just call the driver again. In the Lazada app, there is a clear listing of the driver’s name and a button I can click on to contact him. I really didn’t want to do that, but I had no choice. So I clicked on this button, and to my surprise it showed me a phone icon. So I guess my only choice was to click on that and call him on the phone. So I did. And this delivery driver yelled at me for about twenty seconds again and then hung up. But in the middle of all the angry yelling, I heard the word WhatsApp. So I guessed he was angry that I kept calling him and bothering him while he was driving, and he wanted me to contact him on WhatsApp.
My thought was that I would have LOVED to contact him on WhatsApp. I hate phone calls and I never wanted to call him in the first place. But that’s the only option available on Lazada. Lazada provided a Contact button that automatically places a phone call. There is no WhatsApp option there. BUT I realized that now that I had called him, there would be a record of his phone number in my phone app, and with that number, perhaps I can find his WhatsApp account. I was successful in that, and I sent him a WhatsApp message containing a screenshot of the delivery attempt that failed plus the tracking number and my question. Basically, I wanted to know if he was going to try to deliver my package again. I was getting tired of waiting. I was like a prisoner at the hotel sitting on pins and needles as I was trying to figure out how to get this package.
And my delivery driver was just as unhelpful as the online store. The delivery driver DID reply to my WhatsApp message, which I appreciated, but his reply wasn’t much help. He wrote,
“this day i don’t where this parcel”.
I had no idea what meant, and I had no choice but to write back to him and ask him if he could explain. His follow-up replies were just as confusing, but the basic idea was that just like the online store, he felt that my package was no longer his problem. He’d brought the package back to the “Lazada hub” and that was it. He had no idea what happened to it after that, and he certainly didn’t care. He offered no suggestion about when or if they might try to deliver it again. Nor did he have anything to say about what I should do. He wrote, on three separate lines,
“Your parcel”
“This day I don’t now”
“Where the parcel now.”
And other than the yelling and the hanging up and these cryptic words, he had no other wisdom or help to impart. Contacting the delivery driver was a dead end.
And that was kind of the end of it. There was nothing else I could do. And then, a day later, on Sunday morning while I was having brunch with Daryl and the boys, I got a notification from Lazada. It was at 10:08 a.m., and it said, confusingly:
“Awaiting for delivery. Your parcel is on the way.”
I really had no idea what this message meant. “Awaiting for delivery” and “Your parcel is on the way” seem to be exact opposites. Is the parcel waiting for delivery or is it on the way? And there was not even a hint of when this magical and wonderful delivery would take place. This hour? This day? This year?
Daryl and the boys went on from our brunch to enjoy coffee, but I could not join them. If this parcel really was “on the way” I felt I needed to be at the hotel to receive it and make sure nothing goes wrong this time. So I went back to the Raja Bot and settled in to wait. And I was ready to go this time! I had everything turned on and I monitored everything. The second I heard even a peep about a delivery driver coming anywhere near the Raja Bot, I was ready to leap to my feet and rush down to the lobby and out onto the streets if need be.
THAT was almost 24 hours ago. I waited all day and all night and there was no delivery. In fact, there hasn’t even been another update or even change in the original information. The original notification said my parcel would be delivered on September 26th. And it STILL says my parcel will be delivered on September 26th. That hasn’t changed. I checked Lazada just now, and the notification from 10:08 yesterday morning is still there. And it still says “Your parcel is on the way.” But there is no other information at all. It doesn’t say what day this will happen. It certainly doesn’t say what hour. It doesn’t even dare guess at a week or year.
It’s Monday morning as I write this, and I suppose the hope is that the parcel will arrive today. But I likely won’t even be here anymore. I’m checking out of this hotel this morning. So unless the parcel arrives before noon, I will have to somehow coordinate with the clerks at this hotel to hold the package for me (IF and WHEN it shows up), and I will return to get it.
I suppose it’s a lucky thing that we’re only talking about a simple tripod gizmo that costs 60 ringgit. If I never get this tripod, it’s not going to be the end of the world. At this point, I’d be better off just going to Low Yat Plaza and buying one off the shelf. I’ve wasted and invested far more than 60 ringgit worth of time in just trying to get this package delivered. The stress has probably taken two weeks off my life. At this point, this tripod had better be the most amazing tripod in the world and I’d better get HUGE amounts of use out of it to make all this drama worthwhile.