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HP-Collection · 08-01-2020, 08:07 AM

delivery record

On 20 May I bought a calculator from a good friend of ours. This was sent off promptly, but what happened now turned out to be a nerve test for both of us.
The noble part, a RedDot remained on the Postoffice from the 31st of May and did not move a millimeter. In due time we submitted an application for tracking after 6 weeks. A few days later we received a mail from swiss postservice, the parcel actually arrived at swiss customs.
After almost 12 weeks !!! the package has now arrived on my desk.

The American Post seems not to be able to execute its order in the Corona time any longer.
In fact, I had a second parcel that was also left in the States for 5-6 weeks until it arrived after 8 weeks.

Matthias

Didier Lachieze · 08-01-2020, 08:47 AM

12 weeks is really long and you must have been worried about your Red Dot !

I experienced similar delays with a parcel shipped from the US on April 27th and delivered in France on June 17th, almost 8 weeks later. But this has improved and the latest item I received from the US was shipped on July 14th and received two weeks later on July 29th.

AndiGer · 08-01-2020, 12:48 PM

I bought 2 capacitors that drive the printer inside HP-46 / HP-81 (3300µF/35V) in China May 3rd. According to tracking it took the new silk road, i.e. transported by train from China to Europe - and resides at Duisburg station since June 3rd. Still waiting ...

**rprosperi** · 08-01-2020, 01:33 PM

Although things slowed to an absolute crawl at the beginning of the Corona lock-down, they are mostly back to normal, with items taking 2 weeks or less back and forth between USA <--> Europe.

One thing that not has come back to normal are the outrageous prices for shipping from Germany to USA. This seems to not be true from Switzerland, France, Netherlands or UK, so its curious that Germany has not reverted to it's 'normal' high prices.

Anyone know why this is the case?

Maximilian Hohmann · 08-01-2020, 01:49 PM

Hello!

(08-01-2020 01:33 PM)rprosperi Wrote: One thing that not has come back to normal are the outrageous prices for shipping from Germany to USA.

And vice-versa too. Jörg (from datamath.org) offered some nice and interesting calculators for sale during the last weeks, but shipping charges from the US to Germany (+ import duty which is raised on the sum of article price + shipping) would have nearly doubled the price. I also wonder why shipping to and from the US is so much more expensive than from anywhere else.

The contrary is China where sellers do not charge shipping at all in most cases (this must somehow be subsidised by the state to boost exports I suspect) and shipping times seems to be shorter now than pre-Covid. 10 to 14 days for my latest purchases. I also bought some stuff in former eastern block countries recently (Moldova and Ukraine) and the stuff arrived within a week at very reasonable charges and no import duty.

Regards
Max

mfleming · 08-01-2020, 02:47 PM

(08-01-2020 08:07 AM)HP-Collection Wrote: The American Post seems not to be able to execute its order in the Corona time any longer.
In fact, I had a second parcel that was also left in the States for 5-6 weeks until it arrived after 8 weeks.

I'm currently dealing with a similar experience. An eBay package took two days to cross the country from Florida to California, only to get stuck in the regional sorting facility since the 14th of July. I submitted a tracking request, only to be informed that yes, it is in the facility and hopefully will be delivered "soon." I finally spoke to someone on the phone who told me that the USPS policy was to give everyone on a shift two weeks paid leave at home if one shift member tested positive for the flu. He ended the conversation by saying the package was in a sorting cage and he was sure the cage would be loaded on a truck by the 7th.

I suppose we should all be happy that such service is working at all. A first class letter from Malaysia with an HP67 back label mailed late May finally arrived a few days ago! The opportunity to leave feedback to the seller had expired...

~Mark

AndiGer · 08-01-2020, 02:57 PM

(08-01-2020 01:33 PM)rprosperi Wrote: One thing that not has come back to normal are the outrageous prices for shipping from Germany to USA.

On their homepage dhl.de they inform concerning the actual situation:

USA:
At this time, transport capacities to the USA are substantially reduced. As such, special measures are required to maintain the shipping of letters and parcels. [...]
Private customers: Until further notice, the only option available for sending parcels to the USA will be via the Premium service.

"Premium service" means an extra 16 Euro :-(.

Albert Chan · 08-01-2020, 03:06 PM

(08-01-2020 01:49 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote: The contrary is China where sellers do not charge shipping at all in most cases
(this must somehow be subsidised by the state to boost exports I suspect) ...

Actually, shipping is subsidized from the other side. Go figure Big Grin

npr.org Planet Money pod-cast, Episode 857: The Postal Illuminati

Benjer · 08-01-2020, 05:13 PM

I suppose I had something of the opposite experience. I recently purchased an item online and received a message from the seller indicating they were in the same town, and would they like for me to have them deliver it themselves. I agreed and received the item less than 12 hours after purchase. Saved on shipping costs too.

Harald · 08-01-2020, 08:00 PM

That is pretty quick by German customs standards. I hardly ever receive anything from outside the EU in under 12 weeks. The longest wait so far was a car part from Australia. 3 days airmail from Australia to Frankfurt. Then 6 month to get through customs. It's not funny anymore. It has become really bad in the last couple of years... I am at the point where I seriously think about not buying from outside the EU anymore. I stopped buying from the US due to ebays global shipping program already. Most sellers are not willing to ship directly to Germany, and the global shipping program is a ripoff. You pay shipping to the distribution center, shipping from there to Germany, so called import duties, and then your package lands at the customs office where you have to pay real import duties on the item price + shipping costs + ebays so called import duties. That way I managed to pay about €120 for a €20 piston I bought a while ago.

**rprosperi** · 08-01-2020, 08:22 PM

(08-01-2020 01:49 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote: And vice-versa too. Jörg (from datamath.org) offered some nice and interesting calculators for sale during the last weeks, but shipping charges from the US to Germany (+ import duty which is raised on the sum of article price + shipping) would have nearly doubled the price. I also wonder why shipping to and from the US is so much more expensive than from anywhere else.

Probably mostly because it's a lot further away. Is it much less to ship to Mexico or Canada?

As for Import and Customs duties, I guess you'd have to ask the German Government. When buying goods from outside US, there is no charge for either for anything under $200, and the few items I've bought from overseas that cost over that, even though declared correctly, also had no charges.

Shipping charges from US to Germany have not changed since the Pandemic; as noted above, things slowed (a lot) initially, but my recent shipments there were delivered within the 12-14 day time-frame that they used to be. One shipment to Netherlands made it in 8 days.

I also understand from several people that paying roughly twice in Germany what an item costs in US is about average and has been for some time, due to the generally higher prices there. Is that not correct?

(08-01-2020 01:49 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote: The contrary is China where sellers do not charge shipping at all in most cases (this must somehow be subsidised by the state to boost exports I suspect) and shipping times seems to be shorter now than pre-Covid. 10 to 14 days for my latest purchases. I also bought some stuff in former eastern block countries recently (Moldova and Ukraine) and the stuff arrived within a week at very reasonable charges and no import duty.

China certainly does subsidize shipping for companies under a certain size; possibly some for larger companies too, but I'm not sure.

One amazing deal I got was purchasing a set of test leads for a DMM. They came from China and cost 0.97 USD, with shipping included. I just had to buy it; it was worth a buck to see if they ever showed up. And they did, in about 3 weeks, and they worked fine (for cheap leads).

I have read that shipping times for some items is completely back to normal, while for other items is still severely delayed. I personally think the damage to China's infrastructure done by COVID-19 is far worse than they admit, thus affecting these items that aren't moving. But I'm a conspiracy theorist sometimes...

**rprosperi** · 08-01-2020, 08:28 PM

(08-01-2020 02:47 PM)mfleming Wrote: I'm currently dealing with a similar experience. An eBay package took two days to cross the country from Florida to California, only to get stuck in the regional sorting facility since the 14th of July. I submitted a tracking request, only to be informed that yes, it is in the facility and hopefully will be delivered "soon." I finally spoke to someone on the phone who told me that the USPS policy was to give everyone on a shift two weeks paid leave at home if one shift member tested positive for the flu. He ended the conversation by saying the package was in a sorting cage and he was sure the cage would be loaded on a truck by the 7th.

I suppose we should all be happy that such service is working at all. A first class letter from Malaysia with an HP67 back label mailed late May finally arrived a few days ago! The opportunity to leave feedback to the seller had expired...

~Mark

If the item was shipped via Media Mail, this story is absolutely typical these days I'm afraid. Since MM has no guaranteed delivery time, it is treated with the absolute lowest priority, so when a local PO or regional center is slowed by a CV outbreak, the MM sitting there does nothing at all for over a week, sometimes 2. But it is cheap! Smile

I'm still waiting for a small pkg. mailed here from Australia on 31 March. I'm close to giving up, but still hanging on to a (really thin) strand of hope it makes it, as the item is quite rare and basically not replaceable.

**rprosperi** · 08-01-2020, 08:30 PM

(08-01-2020 02:57 PM)AndiGer Wrote:
(08-01-2020 01:33 PM)rprosperi Wrote: One thing that not has come back to normal are the outrageous prices for shipping from Germany to USA.

On their homepage dhl.de they inform concerning the actual situation:

USA:
At this time, transport capacities to the USA are substantially reduced. As such, special measures are required to maintain the shipping of letters and parcels. [...]
Private customers: Until further notice, the only option available for sending parcels to the USA will be via the Premium service.

"Premium service" means an extra 16 Euro :-(.

This is obviously directly related to the cutback of passenger flights to US, which unless you are coming to the NorthEast, still sounds reasonable...

**rprosperi** · 08-01-2020, 08:40 PM

(08-01-2020 08:00 PM)Harald Wrote: That is pretty quick by German customs standards. I hardly ever receive anything from outside the EU in under 12 weeks. The longest wait so far was a car part from Australia. 3 days airmail from Australia to Frankfurt. Then 6 month to get through customs. It's not funny anymore. It has become really bad in the last couple of years... I am at the point where I seriously think about not buying from outside the EU anymore.

Isn't that the very reason that customs processing has become so slow, to convince people to reach that exact conclusion? I've had similar experiences shipping items to Germany; it makes it NY -> Frankfurt in 2-3 days, and then can take 10-30 additional days to clear customs. No organization could be that inefficient, unless it was intentional or the staff is severely under-manned deliberately to achieve the same effect. Seems to be working...

**rprosperi** · (This post was last modified: 08-02-2020 03:57 PM by rprosperi.)

(08-01-2020 03:06 PM)Albert Chan Wrote:
(08-01-2020 01:49 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote: The contrary is China where sellers do not charge shipping at all in most cases
(this must somehow be subsidised by the state to boost exports I suspect) ...

Actually, shipping is subsidized from the other side. Go figure

npr.org Planet Money pod-cast, Episode 857: The Postal Illuminati

Really interesting Albert, thanks for sharing this link!

Go figure indeed...

I doubt even this could account for all of the super-low prices of some of the ultra-cheap items coming in from China, but it clearly helps.

Well worth listening to if you care or are curious about this topic.

Csaba Tizedes · 08-03-2020, 03:30 PM

My personal record from US to Hungary during the COVID attached.
The shipping was USD 4.99-, duration approx 2 and a half day, the item an Infineon XMC 2GO microcontroller. Shipped in a big paper box, size like a book, inside the package the little controller board, smaller than an Arduino Nano.

Harald · 08-03-2020, 08:02 PM

(08-01-2020 08:40 PM)rprosperi Wrote:
(08-01-2020 08:00 PM)Harald Wrote: That is pretty quick by German customs standards. I hardly ever receive anything from outside the EU in under 12 weeks. The longest wait so far was a car part from Australia. 3 days airmail from Australia to Frankfurt. Then 6 month to get through customs. It's not funny anymore. It has become really bad in the last couple of years... I am at the point where I seriously think about not buying from outside the EU anymore.

Isn't that the very reason that customs processing has become so slow, to convince people to reach that exact conclusion? I've had similar experiences shipping items to Germany; it makes it NY -> Frankfurt in 2-3 days, and then can take 10-30 additional days to clear customs. No organization could be that inefficient, unless it was intentional or the staff is severely under-manned deliberately to achieve the same effect. Seems to be working...

Yes, I suspect you are spot on with your evaluation of the situation.