'Thought I was staying next to a supermarket': When group buying becomes a neighbour's nightmare

Singapore

High foot traffic from group buying can inconvenience and disturb those living nearby, as one neighbour of a group buy host in Yishun experienced.

Group buy purchases along the corridor outside Candice Goh's flat. The entrance to Ms Goh's home is on the right of the first photo, and her windows are located above the boxes. Her neighbour's doorway is in the background. (Photos: Candice Goh)

SINGAPORE: When Ms Candice Goh moved into her Yishun flat in 2019, her next-door neighbour was already in the business of hosting group buys.

This did not bother her at the time, and she did not complain as she did not want to disrupt her neighbour's livelihood.

But earlier this year, the group buying volume increased to the point where deliveries were arriving three to four times a day, four to five days a week.

In a single day, a closed-circuit television camera outside Ms Goh's home captured about 40 people coming to her neighbour's corner unit to deliver or collect group buy purchases.

The neighbour would leave the items in cartons that lined the corridor, often coming up to right under Ms Goh's windows. Purchases were not sorted beforehand for each customer.

This meant that sounds of people rifling through the cartons under the windows would drift into Ms Goh's flat from early in the morning, quite often lasting until midnight.

"It's supposed to be a peaceful place to stay but instead now we (have) every day, people walking up (and) down," Ms Goh, who is in her 50s, told CNA.

"I really for a moment thought I was staying next to a supermarket, you know?"

Group buying involves people in the same estate banding together to place bulk orders for items in order to cut delivery costs and enjoy discounts from suppliers.

The goods can vary. Ms Goh said her neighbour has hosted group buys for fresh produce like vegetables, eggs and durian, as well as clothes and assessment books. At Chinese New Year, cartloads of mandarin oranges arrived.

Group buying has gained traction in recent years, fuelled by community restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic. A search on Instagram turned up about 50 group buy accounts, with more organisers also on Telegram and WhatsApp.

Last year, the government announced an Alliance for Action (AfA) to facilitate group buying in the heartlands, co-led by the Housing and Development Board (HDB) and the People's Association.

Ms Goh was dismayed by this, saying that even though the government is trying to help small businesses, homes should not be used as a "storage, distribution area or minimart".

Group buying has benefits such as encouraging interaction between residents and supporting small businesses, a media release on the AfA said.

But the AfA also aims to find solutions to "disamenities" from group buying. These include hogging of loading and unloading bays, the frequent use of lifts to transport goods and clutter in corridors, which poses a fire risk.

In Ms Goh's experience, the high foot traffic alone is enough to cause a headache.

"It's the frequency of the people coming ... you don't know who they are. And then people just keep walking past your house, sometimes even knock on the wrong door," she said.

"People staying in a walkway like next to the lift ... maybe they are used to it. But definitely not for us, it's really a nuisance."

In CCTV footage viewed by CNA, customers could be seen and heard standing under Ms Goh's windows and talking to her neighbour as they retrieved purchases from cartons along the corridor.

While most of the videos were under a minute long, some transactions lasted more than a minute and one went up to almost three minutes as the customer selected her items.

Ms Goh, who lives with her boyfriend, said she has been disturbed by people talking on the phone outside and knocking on her neighbour's door if they had problems with their purchases.

The late hours at which some customers arrive have also affected her sleep as the noise can be heard from her bedroom.

She recalled one incident involving a delivery of peaches. Customers who came earlier in the day had chosen the best ones of the lot, leaving the less appealing fruit for the latecomers.

One woman who came towards the end of the day started "screaming at the top of her voice" outside the flat, but the neighbour did not come out and deal with the customer, said Ms Goh.

The high footfall also led to litter, an incident where a customer riding a personal mobility device almost hit an elderly neighbour at the lift, and some even stealing bricks used for the flowerpots outside Ms Goh's home.

The frustration built up until a fight broke out in March between the neighbour's husband and Ms Goh's boyfriend, who made a police report after that.

Ms Goh said she hoped authorities would consider regulating group buys. "Maybe you can charge them a fee to operate a counter downstairs. So ... the delivery is downstairs, their customer is downstairs, they don't come up to the house."

While Ms Goh had a difficult experience, group buy organisers who spoke to CNA said they have not had similar complaints from hosts’ neighbours.

One of them is Sengkang Group Buy, which has two collection points in the estate and more than 9,000 followers on Instagram.

Asked about minimising disturbance to neighbours, co-founder Cheryl Guo said: "We need to make sure all orders are correct from vendors upon receiving the items, and they have to be on time as well."

Groupbuyssg, which has more than 6,400 members on Telegram, no longer has collection points as it fully transitioned to islandwide delivery during the pandemic.

But co-founder Winson Lee said he has heard complaints from customers about other group buys, such as food safety concerns over frozen food being left outside the host's flat.

When Groupbuyssg still had collection points, Mr Lee said the organisers would strongly encourage hosts to establish a good relationship with their neighbours.

"In fact previously many neighbours of our hosts are themselves participants of our group buys. And they appreciate that they stay next to hosts so they can collect their items easily without having to pay for delivery."

Mdm Jolene Lim, a host who lives in Queenstown, said her neighbours have asked her about her group buys out of curiosity, but have never complained about it.

She has hosted group buys for more than two years, usually on a weekly basis. The scale is "much smaller" now that most people have returned to the office.

She usually asks customers to state the timing of their collection in advance and will get their purchases ready. "Prepare in advance so they can just grab and go instead of waiting," she said.

For now, Ms Goh has found some relief from her predicament, although it is uncertain if that will last.

Earlier this year, she lodged complaints with HDB and her town council. It took some time, but her neighbour was eventually served a few warning letters and asked to attend a meeting with authorities, according to Ms Goh.

It helped that she had set up the CCTV outside her home at the suggestion of the town council, as this provided evidence of the footfall at her neighbour's house.

When Ms Goh spoke to CNA in late April, deliveries had slowed to once a day for the past two weeks, and the neighbour would bring the items downstairs for customers to pick them up.

More recently, she said the group buying had stopped entirely as the neighbour appeared to have left the country.