
As U.S. Postage Rates Continue to Rise, the USPS Gives the Chinese a 'Free Ride' - Integer
https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2017/11/05/how-the-usps-epacket-gives-postal-subsidies-to-chinese-e-commerce-merchants-to-ship-to-the-usa-cheap
======
timthelion
The level of skew that "free trade" has created is pretty insane here in
Europe. Shipping to Berlin is cheaper from China than it is from Prague. But
that's not all. If I make an electronic device in Prague, and sell it to
someone in Berlin, I am legally required to mark it with my address and a CE
label. Regulators can then write to me and demand documentation on the devices
safety, and if I don't comply within 8 days, I can be forced to pay a large
fine and destroy all European inventory. However, the Chinese manufacturer,
can and does, put a fake address on the CE label, never has to go to the
trouble to document safety, and has no European inventory that could be
destroyed in the case that the EU decides the device is unsafe. Its just plain
cheaper, and less risky, to develop and produce a device in China and then
ship in in small quantities as demand arises.

~~~
icebraining
On the other hand, that's exactly why I only buy cheap crap from Chinese
online stores, while I spend real money on EU stores, since they provide
safety and warranties. I quite like the balance, personally.

The shipping rates are certainly weird, and I do think they should be
reviewed, although I think the internal rates are too high, but I admittedly
don't know the cost structure.

~~~
kogepathic
_> although I think the internal rates are too high_

They would probably be cheaper if they weren't subsidizing postal rates for
other countries.

I find it amusing when you have a problem on AliExpress and the seller
suggests you mail it back to them. Unless the product has a very high value it
almost always costs more than the product's value to send it back to China.

Luckily AliExpress customer service seems to realize this and will often grant
refunds without requiring you to return the product.

eBay really sucks on this regard; it's very difficult to get a refund for a
defective item without paying handsomely to ship it back.

~~~
hackits
_Hint_ if you check out paypal you can get a free return postage for your
item, its just hidden away on the web-site but they offer it.

~~~
0care
Is this with paypal everywhere or just through ebay?

~~~
hackits
Yes (everywhere) not just through ebay, URL
([https://www.paypal.com/au/webapps/mpp/returns](https://www.paypal.com/au/webapps/mpp/returns))

Pay with your PayPal account and we can refund your return shipping costs if
you need to send anything back – up to $45 per return and 8 returns each year.

------
totalZero
> As Amazon’s Vice President of Global Policy Paul Misener pointed out:

> “The cost to ship a one-pound package from South Carolina to New York City
> would run nearly $6; from Beijing to NYC: $3.66.”

> While sending that same one-pound package from New York City back to Beijing
> via USPS International Mail would cost in the ballpark of $50.

Someone should really do something about this!

~~~
lwansbrough
The problem is worse here in Canada. My friend does a significant amount of
business with Chinese companies, and he says this is due to a UN treaty which
classifies China as a developing country.

~~~
AdamSC1
Example, I had a friend who was recently looking to start an wholesale
business in Canada. Let's pretend for sake of the example that he was selling
widgets.

He found he could import 300 widgets from China and have them landed in
Toronto for a shipping fee of roughly $17. To ship that same set of widgets
from Toronto to a store two cities away was going to cost him $349.

In fact for $17, he could send 1 widget within the same city he was in
directly to a customer.

It gets even worse if he wants to send that package of widgets to the states
for something like Amazon FBA. Once again, it would cost $17 to ship directly
from China but would run him $1400 from Toronto to New York.

------
Freak_NL
This is well-known to anyone who ever looked into AliExpress and other Chinese
online stores. Most of the stuff you can buy there has free shipping to pretty
much everywhere. The reason why is known too (international postal
agreements).

What surprises me today is that nothing seems to have changed yet. Last year
it was rumoured that the free ride would gradually end starting this year, but
so far the Chinese retailers don't seem to be impacted much — shipping costs
are effectively zero for customers in Europe and North America.

If you are unfamiliar with this weird side-effect of the global economy, it
helps explain why brick-and-mortar shops selling cheap Chinese stuff for mere
cents can exist with a meaningful profit margin.

~~~
the-dude
There have been changes : PostNL does not deliver these packages at the door
anymore and you have to pick it up at a service location.

~~~
Freak_NL
PostNL seemingly does this only for packages (not envelopes; these are
delivered as you'd expect) sent via China Post containing a '3S' tracking
code. A recent purchase of mine got delivered to my door by PostNL; it was
shipped via 'AliExpress Standard Shipping' which apparently doesn't get
rerouted.

------
OliverJones
Ordinary citizens can't affect this kind of policy. But US and European
megacorporations can surely put pressure on governments to reform this rate
imbalance, can't they?

Can't Amazon, Wal-Mart and Macys counter the influence of Alibaba on the US
government? If not, what the heck. Time to emigrate.

There's a way to solve this problem.

How about adding an inspection at ports of entry for these packages? The
inspections would verify sender addresses, consumer safety, and other
compliance with receiving-country regulations.

It should be possible to get packages through the inspection process
reasonably efficiently. If shippers had the expectation that these ePacket
items would clear inspection in something like 120 days, that should work.

It would serve the needs of customers who really need the cheapest stuff,
preserve safety regulation compliance, and give customers an incentive to buy
from merchants closer to home.

This is slightly tongue-in-cheek, but not really.

~~~
sharemywin
Don't kid yourself there's as much epacket on amazon as aliexpress.

------
kristofferR
Working links:

[https://archive.fo/HafaR](https://archive.fo/HafaR) (page 1)

[https://archive.fo/UyA29](https://archive.fo/UyA29) (page 2)

------
geomark
While the article is focused on shipping from China to the U.S. via e-packet,
it seems China has similar agreements with other countries' postal systems. I
live in Thailand and get free shipping from most Chinese merchants selling on
Aliexpress. Some of those items can be purchased locally and shipping is not
usually free. I've seen comments from people in Australia getting the same
thing. Seems like merchants around the world are taking the same beating on
shipping costs when competing with China.

------
sschueller
This is also a huge problem for the Swiss postal service which has to sort all
mail from China by hand. In the next few years the Swiss postal service will
start to charge additional fees to the recipients of such packages to cover
their losses.

I think a very large problem is that the packages are non standardised which
prevents them from being sorted by machine easily.

~~~
micah94
This is ironically why the ePacket was created as mentioned in the article.
They get their standardization, but continue to lose money. And our (US) rates
continue to rise. Get rid of it and it reverts to U.N. mandated rates which
are even cheaper.

------
sytelus
So package from China to USA costs much much less than other way around
because of an International treaty. More details on treaty is in this article
but I still don't get it why this treaty was made in first place:
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/12/...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/09/12/the-
postal-service-is-losing-millions-a-year-to-help-you-buy-cheap-stuff-from-
china)

------
thisisit
"Cross-border e-commerce is currently one of the fastest growing economic
sectors on the planet, but it is one that U.S.-based entrepreneurs cannot hope
to compete in due to the extreme disparity of shipping rates."

But there are other entrepreneurs who are profiting from this disparity too
and never mentioned in the article - the dropshippers. People are able to sell
stuff easily without having to worry about warehousing, shipping etc

~~~
sharemywin
except more and more people are realizing that they can go to ebay or
aliexpress less your margin.

------
gruez
>Yes, the United States and, in a roundabout way, the U.S. taxpayer is footing
the bil

How can this be? I thought usps was self sufficient?

~~~
cannonedhamster
Internal rates have gone up for USPS customers to subsidize Chinese vendors.
American taxpayers are generally the consumers of the USPS. They are still
self-sufficient.

~~~
gruez
still, it's a roundabout way to say "americans" (more specifically, "americans
using USPS").

------
watchdogtimer
The article mentions E-packet rates apply to packages less than 36" in length
and less than 2 kg (4.4 lbs). What are the rates like for packages that exceed
these dimensions? Are US-based e-commerce sellers any safer if they sell
larger items?

~~~
pashky
From my experience it's indeed that once thing is bigger/heavier than this (or
fragile and must be packed to exceed those dimensions), shipping rate in
aliexpress shops quickly hikes to $20-$80 thus making local options a much
better value.

------
mark212
Article quotes a USPS guy saying the total losses on cross-border parcels is
$71 million.

Compared with the service’s losses of $5 _billion_ this doesn’t strike me as
an actual outrage.

