USPS raised international shipping costs
 

Ouch!

We'd read the news ahead of time, and USPS's site said that they were increasing the cost of International Priority Mail by 8%.

Yeah, right.

Today the beloved flat-rate envelopes jumped from $13.25 to $16.95 (not counting the cost of insurance).

Doesn't that work out to a nearly 28% increase??

And there is no longer any cost savings for commercial rates for these, or for paying for postage online, rather than at the customer counter.

Express Mail flat-rate envelopes jumped from about $28 to $38. (USPS had said those rates were going up 11%.)

(Anybody out there shipping internationally by UPS, Fedex, or DHL? If so... would you care to share your thoughts?)

I think USPS will still beat the others, especially since they charge a customs brokerage fee, which USPS does not.

I wonder about our customers in England, though. When we send packages by USPS, they get delivered by RoyalMail or ParcelForce, and those entities charge their own brokerage fees (though I think they call them something else).

I retired from the USPS 2 1/2 years ago and have lost touch with pricing. I looked up the new rate chart and it is overwhelming. - While researching the rate changes, I saw that it stated 'Adverage' change. There were some prices lowered and some that had no change and some with small increases. The International rates realy took a hit. Rates for Canada and Mexico Flat rate is $12.95 and all other countries $16.95 for the Priority envelopes and small box. I have attached a link to the rate chart. It is quite large and confusing. Has a lot of commercial rates that most of us have no use for. For the International rates scroll appx 2/3 down the pg- http://pe.usps.com/text/dmm300/Notice123.htm#1012541 Another link I found shows the percentage of change. This pg dosen't seem true looking at the pricing you made examples of. Scroll 1/2 way for graph. http://faq.usps.com/eCustomer/iq/usp...#what_specific

I am - and have always been - a fan of USPS, however I think this is the perfect example of "how to lie by using statistics". The chart referenced by the second link advertises a 4.7% increase in "International (includes letters, cards, flats, and extra services)". And they do not mention how that percentage increase is calculated.

Which makes the information of very little use to me, since I cannot understand what the MEANING of it is.

This English girl is certainly buying less from the States now because the postal charges have gone up so much. Sometimes it's still worthwhile, because your prices are so much lower, but it depends on the exchange rate. Time was that your postage costs were much lower than ours, but I'm not sure that's true any more. And I believe you don't have surface mail any more? (though we do, so are all the ships coming back across the Atlantic empty??). That takes a while but was a useful cheaper option if you could wait.
I have a friend in the US who comes over most years, so I usually get her to bring me a bit of fabric and any sewing machine accessories that I need. This year, even better, I'm coming over there!

We don't even have surface mail from New Hampshire across the border to Quebec...103 miles away.

USPS has something called International Surface Air Lift bags. So... is it air? Or surface? I can't tell what it is, much less how to use it.

I buy a lot of my material from the US. Even with the price of a flat rate going up to $16.95 it is still a lot cheaper to buy there than here in New Zealand. Some fabrics you get for US$9yard can be up to NZ$28m, hence why most I buy is from the US. I do from NZ but only if on sale or it's a must need. With the flat rate envelopes I usually buy material up to the limit a seller says it will hold usually too. So in saying all this, the small increase will not deter me from buying from the US

A problem with that here is that if the value of a package is declared at more than 25-30 dollars, it's likely to get stopped by Customs and duty charged. The time that happened to me, it was weeks before the parcel turned up, and it cost me so much that it cancelled out any saving on the fabric.