Friday, January 22, 2010

Why are USA International Packages Taking Longer Than Usual To Get To The UK and Other Eurpean Countries?

Have you checked the weather lately? Northern Europe including the UK is getting hit hard with bad weather conditions that is effecting transportation.

The Royal Mail Web Site Report that "Mail services across the country have recovered well after recent disruption, however further fresh falls of snow recently in Wales and Gloucestershire, may have disrupted some delivery and collection services this week, especially in some of the more rural areas."


Deliveries and collections should be made today in all parts of the country.  Royal Mail announced today that they plan and delivering mail as usual "...Following the recent bad weather, we reinstated the next day delivery guarantee for Special DeliveryTM items posted from Friday 15th January and due delivery from Monday 18th January; the next day guarantee remains in place across the country at this time."

First Class Mail International Packages from the USA to the UK that have normally taken 10 - 14 days to arrive are have been taking anywhere from 2 - 6 weeks. There are many reason for this including:

  1. Disruptive weather in the UK and/or in the USA.
  2. USA mail may be running slow.
  3. UK mail may be running slow.
  4. UK customs maybe holding the package for some unknown reason.
This has become very frusterating for customers expecting packages in a certain time frame.

What you can do? Most USA packages do not have tracking numbers unless they are shipped  Priority or Express Mail and these will often be changed by the local post office to meet their barcoding system. Many times these packages are sitting at the local postal service waiting for the customer to pick them up and pay the custom fees and taxes associated with the importation laws and regulations of the destination country. If you haven't received your package from the USA in 2 weeks, we recommend that you check with your local postal company and open and inquiry. USA postal services will not allow you to open an inquiry on an international package that is not delivered in less than 6 weeks from its shipping date.

2 comments:

  1. Great information !

    Yes, the weather has been bad all over the earth this year.

    Your post will help folks to understand that it might take longer to get their orders in the mail.

    Organically Yours,
    Diana

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you Diane. I hope that folks find this article helpful. Your post are welcome.

    Becky

    ReplyDelete