In my experience you have to be very clear with what you need an answer to, and be very proactive in the communication. Once shipped I got my order quite quickly: it was delivered in 9 days from Hong Kong to London. I went with XDB shipping and had a tracking code, all in all a good shipping experience.
As for my situation with the fork, Chris has forwarded the pictures I already shared here, as well as a short video I had of the fork to the engineers. I hope it can get resolved that way. Best case scenario they would send me a new fork, I can return the one in my posesssion if they would like that.