From plushies to sushi: Is there anything Indonesia’s ‘jastip’ or personal shoppers won’t buy? (VIDEO)

KUALA LUMPUR, May 1 — If you’ve ever come across Indonesian social media postings you might have seen the word jastip.

Jastip Is just the shortened version of the phrase jasa titip — its literal translation meaning “entrusting service” but it’s basically what Indonesia calls personal shopper services.

In Malaysia, personal shoppers also advertise themselves as “trusted.”

Whether locals here got the inspiration from jastip is anyone’s guess.

While many jastips operate locally in Indonesia, many offer buying services for items from abroad with many Indonesians working outside Indonesia taking the opportunity to make some extra cash when they fly back for visits.

Yet the biggest differentiator between Indonesia’s “I will buy this for you for a fee” couriers and ours is that they’ve become a big enough phenomenon to attract the attention of their government.

Pay your duties

In 2024, Indonesia’s Trade Ministry announced that jastip providers bringing in goods from overseas would need to comply with regulations, such as paying the applicable import tax on goods surpassing allowable thresholds.

Currently under new rules introduced in 2025, Indonesians when traveling overseas will not be charged for personal items valued at up to US$500 (RM1,985) but should they exceed that, there is a flat 10 per cent customs duty applied to values that exceed the limit, as well as standard VAT rates.

However unlike previously, there will be no import income tax applied to personal belongings even if they exceed the threshold but obviously items bought for jastip customers will not fall under the “personal item” category.

Yet while the new scrutiny of their hustles means their profit margins are no longer as lucrative, many jastip sellers still carry on their trade as evidenced by how many jastip posts can be found all over social media with X (formerly Twitter) turning up hundreds of posts by jastip shoppers.

These personal shoppers can be found haggling in Bangkok’s markets, queuing at Indonesian Big Bad Wolf sales, buying fan merch or even concert tickets in South Korea or cute anime goods in Japan.

Why are they popular?

By the time many officially imported goods make their way into Indonesia, their prices usually become fairly inflated due to import taxes, duties and of course, retailer markups.

While a huge shipment of goods would definitely be flagged by customs, jastip couriers are a lot more flexible and can offer prices that are competitive even with their usual buyer fees included in the price.

With international leisure travel still a luxury for many Indonesians, buying imported goods via jastip saves them the hassle of a passport and airfare especially with the current ongoing West Asia crisis.

What do you mean, sushi?

Getting takeaway sushi from Bali for someone in Jakarta should, to anyone with common sense, be a bad idea.

That did not stop a personal shopper from buying the raw fish delicacy from Bali’s well-regarded Philadelphia Sushi (now going by the name Filadelfia) for influencer Lily Kenzie.

The influencer put up a video showing how excited she was to get the sushi but then starts complaining about how it smells, before taking a bite and then complaining the sushi seems to be basi (gone bad).

Philadelphia even had to make a TikTok saying they had not commissioned any jastip services and they followed proper food preparation guidelines.

While all that sushi drama happened in 2024, it seems that has not deterred other personal shoppers from doing the same though with better results.

Ice, chillers and cooler bags exist so some enterprising personal shopper or courier probably figured out a way to fly sushi out quickly and without it spoiling too fast.

This is what I surmise because I popped onto TikTok to find a woman happily showing off and eating her sushi shipped all the way from Bali (yes, the same restaurant) to her place in Jakarta.

Personally I wonder how it made it through Jakarta’s infamous traffic.

Malaysia does have people who offer personal shopper services, advertising on social media and sites such as Carousel but they’re not nearly as much of an institution as Indonesia’s enterprising jastip shoppers but then our currency is also a lot stronger.

How will personal shoppers survive the current West Asia crisis? In the busy world we live in, I wouldn’t be surprised if some people decide paying a little extra is worth avoiding the hassle of queuing for the next hot thing or jumping on a plane.

In related-but-not-quite-news, Indonesia’s Chikuro, a maker of Japanese-style crispy chicken rolls, is apparently such a hit with Malaysians they’re buying them in bulk to bring home and just recently a TikTok reseller going by the handle @emma_delicious_bakery managed to sell 500 of those rolls in just two hours.

It goes to show that personal shoppers, at the heart of it, are really no different from the average entrepreneur in understanding the market and being able to cash in on trends.

That’s the kind of savviness many business owners will need in trying times like these so while some of you might laugh at jastip and their clientele, being able to make decent money for decent (mostly) work is no joke.