Overseas Freight Charges - particularly to Australia

[CarlG]

Originally Posted by 2rosella

OK,
I had received some items from a vendor in the USA, I won't mention their name but the company rhymes with "Rider".
It was for some small items and 2 spark rods. The length of the spark rods are about 31 inches, but the carton the goods came in was a whopping 54 inches with so much packing at each end to take care of the empty space. Because of this length USPS would not take to ship to Australia so the vendor said that they had to ship FEDEX. Total cost of the freight bill was US$122 !
I had a carton ship by the same vendor a few months ago which was much smaller, more weight & the spark rods could have easily been packed inside, that was shipped by USPS for only US$60.
I got Ripped Off on this one ! I'm not impressed !!

I've had similar experiences with this same vendor shipping to Alaska. Even when things would fit in a "flat-rate" USPS box, they ship them in a much larger box, grossly overpacked as described above.

Having said that, MOST of the time, they do a fairly good job of packing and following my instructions to ship USPS flat-rate. There have been several times that I have been burned, and complaints to management do no good at all.

I still use them as one of my primary sources, just knowing that I may get burned on the freight from time to time.

OH, and they aren't the only one. Shipping to Alaska seems to parallel what the guys down south are dealing with.