Does Size Really Matter?
Written by Kelley Hopper on December 2nd, 2009I sell quite a number of china dishes and ship them to customers all over the world. A couple of months ago I sold a large vintage bowl to a customer in Australia. It pays to sell internationally because this buyer was willing to pay more for the bowl that my USA bidders plus they were willing to pay over $26.00 for shipping.
I carefully packed the bowl, put postage on it and took it to the Post Office. I have an area at my Post Office where I can drop off prepaid packages without standing in line but this day there was no line so I went to the counter and handed my packages to the clerk. Good thing I did.
Imagine my surprise when she told me I didn’t have enough postage on the package. In fact, it would cost another $9.00 to ship it to Australia. Whaaaaat!
I had weighed and measured my package then put the information into the my online postage account and printed the label. The price I paid was just over $26.00 which I thought was a lot to pay to ship a bowl. The clerk measured my package and came up with the same dimensions I did, 15″ x 15″ x 15″. The she weighed the package and came up with 3.25 lbs. just like I did. The maximum weight for shipments going First Class International Mail (the least expensive shipping method) is 4 lbs. so I was fine there. But, the maximum dimensions for a box going First Class International Mail is a combined length plus width plus height of 36″. My box was 15″ plus 15″ plus 15″ for a total of 45″. This made the package light enough to go First Class International but too large. I had to decide either to repack the item or pay the additional shipping. Since the buyer had already paid for shipping I had no choice but to put the bowl in a smaller, yet still secure box.
I took the package home and repacked it into a smaller box, re-printed the postage and took it back to the Post Office. All this over 9″. My online postage account didn’t alert me to this and I hadn’t educated myself well enough on international shipping through the Post Office. Now I know.
So what I learned is that if your item weighs 4 lbs. or less AND has a length plus width plus height of 36″ or less it can be shipped via First Class International Mail. If the weight is heavier than 4 lbs. or the combined dimensions are greater than 36″ you must ship it a different method like Priority Mail International.
Had I not had the time to repack this item I would certainly lost money shipping. Now I am very careful when I list an item that I am sure the package dimensions are accurate for the type of shipping I am offering.
You may be thinking that I could have gone back to the customer and requested more money for shipping but that is not the case. It is wrong to ask for more money because I made the error plus I would certainly tarnished my feedback record because the customer would not be happy. I would rather have a customer who may buy from me again than a customer who will never do business with me and will tell all of her friends not to buy from me either.
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Tags: box dimensions, First Class Mail International, Priority Mail International, shipping dimensions, shipping internationally, shipping overseas, shipping weight
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