Just a heads up: Increased USPS shipping fees started today

I think the type of service for shipping or delivering depends on the actual location. I live in a very small city, and the USPS people are great. Fortunately, I have never had any issues with USPS, UPS, or FedEx, but have received packages with more evidence of rough handling from FedEx than from the other two.

Funny about surcharges.

The fuel surcharge that most of us understood and accepted started when gasoline was around $4/gal just a few years back. Now it is around $1/gal in some places.

In the mid 1970's, there was an increase in the cost of sugar, and candy machine operators raised the price of a candy bar from 15¢ to 25¢ (if memory serves me right), and posted a note on the machine to explain the higher price. A few months later, the price of sugar returned to what it had been, but not the price of the candy bars.

Just my 10¢

Alex

I think one of the best comments in this thread was about packing!  When I pack something for shipment, I make sure NOTHING can more inside the box, or inside the inside box!  In a standard locomotive box, I add some padding to insure that the contents can't move AT ALL in any dimension.  For unboxed items, they get wrapped in several layers of bubblewrap all around, then packed tightly in peanuts so nothing moves in the box.

When I get stuff that hasn't been packed properly, I'm normally fixing bent stuff, gluing broken pieces back on, etc.

PACK IT PROPERLY AND YOU'LL HAVE A MUCH BETTER CHANCE OF IT ARRIVING IN ONE PIECE!

Listen to GunrunnerJohn!

Thanks for the pricing heads up.  It will alleviate my shock, as I just listed several items for auction with fixed shipping.  Sad to see the online discount go, but I was going to use that method as much as possible anyway.  Also, my auction site passes on their commercial discount.  I will see next week what changes there.

George

I am somewhat hesitant to buy over the internet.  Recently I have had issues with USPS packages received.   One box of twelve boxcars looked fine on the outside.  After opening the box I saw that one corner had been severely caved in at some point.  Only the newer style Lionel plastic insert saved the cars.  One plastic insert was so severely damaged it retained that shape.  I was unable to get the creases out of the Lionel car boxes.   I did order two engines from a forum member and begged him to make sure he packed them super good.  He did a pretty good job but the box came with about a 1 inch diameter hole punched in the side.  Luckily the puncture did not go farther than the two inches of peanuts he had inside.  I stopped the mail carrier one day and asked what should I do if the box shows damage.  They had no idea.  I mean do I need to take to the local post office and wait in line to open it in front of the clerk?  And then what?  Another advantage of buying at a train show.

One box of twelve boxcars looked fine on the outside.  After opening the box I saw that one corner had been severely caved in at some point.  Only the newer style Lionel plastic insert saved the cars.  One plastic insert was so severely damaged it retained that shape.  I was unable to get the creases out of the Lionel car boxes.

If the exterior shipping box was OK, how can you blame the carrier? How does just a corner of an inner box get damaged when the exterior box is fine?

It seems to me that either the inner box was damaged before it was packed, or whomever sent you the trains did not know how to pack them.

I have received some trains that were so poorly packed that it was amazing that they got to me in one piece. But they do.

Ah well......... I guess with lousy US $ exchange and rip-off shipping costs it's time for this Canuck to do a hobby u-turn and find something different.

I recently purchased a Dept 56 building on ebay. In the course of talking with the seller he apologized because the box wasn't in the best of shape. I mentioned not important I wasn't buying to resell, just to enjoy and I didn't care about the box. (I didn't mean that I didn't want it though!) He took it upon himself to remove the dept 56 bldg from it's original box so it fit better in the Priority box, no packing, no peanuts or bubblewrap or anything, just a ceramic building rattling around! Guess what, it made it here in one piece. Unbelievable.

I'll say, too, that about half the packages I get are so poorly packaged I don't know how in the world the contents arrived undisturbed. 

My war story is a UPS delivery that I saw thrown onto my porch.  It contained a plastic diesel dummy in one of those repro Lionel boxes with the address on it - no cushioning whatsoever.  Of course, it was in pieces when I opened it, but there was no particular problem getting a refund.  The seller was upset, though, because he had to take the loss.

Labeling,  "Fragile" means nothing anymore,  although the way some manufacturers pack things you would think child labors were at the helm; Too many short cuts for things traveling thousands of miles in shipping containers!

RJR posted:

I have found that the flat-rate packages usually cost more to send that regular priority mail by weight.

I've found the same thing when sending packages around the east coast, but once I start sending things midwest or west coast, the flat-rate can be a big savings.

Tim

DennisB posted:

The USPS no longer offers a discount when printing your Priority Labels online. ...

Yes... that's what I encountered today when I calculated a shipping quote for someone.  Exact same rate online as at the Post Office retail counter.

Now we're all being penalized for the bozos who walk up to the retail counter with an unpacked or poorly packed box, then expect the postal clerk to securely pack the contents of the box for them! 

Chris Dunn posted:

I have used USPS almost exclusively over the last year for 20-30 shipments and have had a uniformly positive experience.  I switched from UPS because the Post Office is cheaper and faster, which I expect to continue even after this increase. 

I've had the same experience, and have shipped a lot more and for a lot longer.  Been using USPS Priority Mail almost exclusively for the past 10 years with fine results.

Ingeniero No1 posted:

 

In the mid 1970's, there was an increase in the cost of sugar, and candy machine operators raised the price of a candy bar from 15¢ to 25¢ (if memory serves me right), and posted a note on the machine to explain the higher price. A few months later, the price of sugar returned to what it had been, but not the price of the candy bars.

 

True with most things. As the saying goes, it's sticky on the downside.