Postal Security

[offshore]

New border security arrangements in the USA, have just increased the cost of mail into the USA.

A new charge has been levied in Australia to cover these added costs.

The charge of $9.00 has been set by The UnitedStates Government. We have not been given specific information as to why theyhave chosen a specific weight, however, we have been recently made aware ofchanges which I have detailed below.

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Please note that due to the ongoing heightened border protection and increasedaviation security measures introduced by the US Government applying to inboundfreight being sent to the US, a review by the US Transport Security Authorityhas modified the lower threshold from 453grams to 500grams. This is in effectfrom the 14th December 2010.

The US Aviation Security Surcharge of $9 will now apply from the 14th ofDecember 2010 to all items above 500g in weight. Previously the $9 surchargeapplied to items over 453g.

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Australia Post will continue to pass on this charge until such time as the USGovernment no longer applies this fee. We have been given no indication of howlong this fee will be in place.

My query is really as to who should be meeting these charges.

If the USA wants more security, shouldn't they pay for it?

Here in Oz, we are hit with some fairly outrageous post fees compared with say a similar parcel from USA to Oz, so this added impost really rubs salt into the wound.

It will mean for instance, the cost of me shipping one of our tool kits from Oz to the USA will jump from $36.50 to $45.50.

Sheesh, the $36.50 was bad enough, the extra $9.00 really makes things difficult.

Personally I think if the US Government are so concerned about postal security, then the costs should be born by the government from general revenue, not applied as a special add on cost, and passed on to the sender of the parcel!

Every time an Australian spends the extra $9.00, it does absolutely nothing for any increased security in his homeland!

Offshore

[HauteHippie]

Uncle Sam raises import fees, here in the form of a "security surcharge". The foreign senders increase their price for shipping goods to the US to offset this cost increase. And the consumer in the US ultimately bears the burden of this increase.

This is how is should work, as an indirect consumption tax in the US. I think a direct consumption tax, i.e. collecting a surcharge from the recipient like a tariff is actually less efficient.

Dipping in to the general budget, a.k.a piling on more debt.... must stop.

[KB]

I stopped shipping from Australia a long time back as I couldn't justify the extra cost per item to cover postage.

I just sent off 2 shirts to the US that I donated to the RG benefit raffle and that cost over $40.

Unfortunately this postal rise is out of your control, you need to raise your prices to cover the extra expense.

Ken