AliExpress complaints triple in Korea amid rising overseas e-commerce grievances

Customs officials look at products purchased directly by Korean consumers from overseas e-commerce platforms at Incheon International Airport's logistics center in Incheon on Nov. 11. [NEWS1]

Korea witnessed a 16.9 percent surge in complaints tied to direct purchases from overseas e-commerce malls last year, aligning with the accelerated expansion of Chinese e-commerce giants like AliExpress and Temu into the Korean market.

The overall number of complaints related to direct purchases from overseas e-commerce malls rose to 19,418 last year from 16,608 a year ago, according to the Korea Consumer Agency (KCA) Friday.

Complaints filed against AliExpress, the e-commerce platform under China's Alibaba Group, nearly tripled in Korea in 2023 from a year earlier, soaring from 228 to 673.

Major complaints are about product quality, late or missed deliveries, misdeliveries, lack of products, no reflection of order cancellations following delivery delays and a lack of tracking information on the delivery path and time.

Consumer rights groups have said the government needs to generate new rules to prevent damage to consumers from unfair market practices by multinational companies like AliExpress and respond to such damage.

Alibaba focuses on business-to-business transactions, while AliExpress is mainly a business-to-consumer marketplace.

The KCS, an organization under the Korea Fair Trade Commission, said it is in talks with AliExpress to set up a hotline to resolve consumer complaints.

BY SEO JI-EUN, YONHAP [seo.jieun1@joongang.co.kr]