Why is shipping from China free but $16 from Canada?

rjo__

I recently ordered some RoboPi http://www.mikronauts.com/raspberry-pi/robopi/boards from Bill.
I really don't have a problem with the shipping costs, but it is really strange that the two postal systems don't promote trade between the US and Canada.
We are friends…right?

NWCCTV

NAFTA!!!! Also, most of the Chinese sellers have deals with the government that allow them to ship for VERY cheap.

Clock Loop

I will get censored again if I personally type the letters into this white box.

But if you follow links, then its ok.



http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2011/09/29/coke-ceo-says-its-easier-to-do-business-with-communist-china-than-with-u-s/#

http://blogs.reuters.com/chrystia-freeland/2011/04/29/the-u-s-capitalist-love-affair-with-communist-china/


When you understand the nature of the thing, you know what its capable of.

It all has to do with o̶h̶ ̶w̶a̶i̶t̶ ̶i̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶t̶ ̶s̶a̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ ̶s̶p̶e̶c̶i̶f̶i̶c̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶b̶i̶n̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶d̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶s̶i̶t̶e̶.̶

http://www.economist.com/node/21547789

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/is-overregulation-driving-u-s-companies-offshore/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/09/federal-regulations-are-american-businesses-unduly-burdened/


So hurry up and read these links before this thread gets eaten by the ...........
Moderator Monkey,
who clearly is not amused.

Bob Lawrence (VE1RLL)

@rjo__

I really don't have a problem with the shipping costs

Are you talking about shipping costs or shipping and handling?

rjo__

Bob,

You might have a point. Don't know for sure, but I would guess it is mostly shipping.
If it is mostly handling, then I wouldn't have started a thread:) That would be my bad.


Rich

Bob Lawrence (VE1RLL)

@ Rich

. Don't know for sure, but I would guess it is mostly shipping.

If it is mostly handling,

[FONT=Lucida Grande, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]It was just a thought because if we are talking handling then you need to consider that the labor rate is lower in China. Also, out of curiously I just tried the link you provided and I do see shipping and handling. However, I may not have read about the exact items that you ordered. Sometimes shipping includes insurance . Then there are differences in the method of delivery and how long you wait to receive the parcel.Are we talking a few days to receive the goods or 10 + days? When I get cheap shipping from China, it is usually something that weighs very little and can fit into a small envelope. I'm sure China shipping would be more expensive if you had larger items.

Also, generally speaking we have to pay more for most things in Canada. You should see how much we have to pay for a 40 oz bottle of liquor compared to the USA . LOL[/FONT]

RoboPi Full Kit: $49.95USD + s/h
- everything included in the Lite Kit
- Propeller P8X32A-D40 chip
- MCP3208 12 bit ADC
- 24LC512 EEPROM
- DOES NOT INCLUDE A RASPBERY PI
Shipping & Handling

xanadu

There is no such thing as free shipping. You're paying for it. It's less from China because they do far more volume. At least, this is how I've always felt about it.

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Hong Kong Post is probably subsidized by the Chinese government. It's in their best economic interests to do so, since it brings money into the country that might otherwise be scared away by high shipping rates. Also, I'm sure the shipments are consolidated into large containers, reducing the actual per-piece cost to a very low figure.

-Phil

Bill Henning

Hi,

The shipping charges cost me a lot of business.

Canada Post raised rates in February, and eliminated insurance from Small Packet and Light Packet shipping.

The least expensive service they offer for tracked packages is "Tracked Small Packet", and that is limited to $100 insurance.

I am very frustrated by this, even Royal Mail from the UK is cheaper.


Regarding RoboPi shipping:


I charge $16.50USD shipping and handling for one or two RoboPi kits as that's all that will fit in the "Tracked Small Packet" to USA.

You can check rates at http://www.canadapost.ca specifically

http://www.canadapost.ca/cpotools/apps/far/personal/findARate?execution=e1s2

I ship from postal code V3A 6J2

Enter your zip code (say 61350)

The package dimensions are

6.5" x 4.5" x 2.5"

Weight is 0.25kg

Look at the "Tracked Small Packet" price, it includes tracking and $100 insurance.

Here is what the web site shows, I just ran it for y'all:

That does not show a few things:

- I have a "Venture One" discount card, so I'll only pay about $15.87 for shipping
- it costs me about $1.00 for the shipping box, I used recycled filler, so that does not cost.
- it takes my wife about half an hour to go to the post office to drop off shipments and pay, not including filling out address label etc
- costs about $1 in gas

The fact is I subsidize the shipping.

The best way of reducing shipping per item is to buy more. I know, that sounds self serving...

For example, the shipping for 2KG to the same zip in a box twice as tall, with tracking, insured to $400 is about $34

Per unit breakdown:

1 RoboPi Full kit... $49.95 + $16.50 s/h, $16.50 s/h per RoboPi

2 RoboPi Full kit... $99.90 + $16.50 s/h, $8.25 s/h per RoboPi

8 RoboPi Full kit... $399.60 + $33.70 s/h, $4.21 s/h per RoboPi

Hope this helps, I find shipping costs VERY frustrating.

Bill

Peter Jakacki

Look up UPU and terminal dues and transit charges. Basically the way the whole international postage system can work is based on the understanding that even though the sending country gets to keep the money for the postage and the receiving country just cops it sweet that it should balance out because "you send a letter, you send one back", which of course is not the case. So if I get a large box from China the postage is "free" but my country's postal system wears the cost, whereas if I try to send even a small parcel to Sydney say, the cost can be far greater than the value of the item being shipped, yet from China via Sydney it's "free"!!!!!.

NWCCTV

For some companies, shipping and handling charges are actually a great way to generate revenue. Several years ago I worked in the Video Duplication business. I was in charge of the Shipping/Receiving Department and was rewarded pretty well for not only saving money on shipping and freight charges but also for generating revenue from the boxes and packing materials we used.

RDL2004

So, a Chinese eBay seller sends a package to U.S. The Chinese government charges them nothing and sends it on to America, where the USPS has to deliver it without receiving any payment from the China Post Office. Of course China must deliver all our packages we send from the U.S. at no charge in return. Yep, that's fair. No wonder the Post Office has to keep raising rates.

Peter Jakacki

RDL2004 wrote: »

So, a Chinese eBay seller sends a package to U.S. The Chinese government charges them nothing and sends it on to America, where the USPS has to deliver it without receiving any payment from the China Post Office. Of course China must deliver all our packages we send from the U.S. at no charge in return. Yep, that's fair. No wonder the Post Office has to keep raising rates.

Try sending stuff to China but I don't think anyone really does though. An agreement was nutted out ages ago to compensate to an extent the countries that ended up with more tonnage to deliver, but I heavily suspect that those terminal dues are at an extremely low bulk rate. I know that Australia Post here only managed to get approval to increase the compensation a little just this year as it is all regulated by the UPU. Do you think that the postal service would even bother if the tonnage shipped and the tonnage received were about equal? No, it's mostly one sided from China.

It might mean that if things were more equal that we would be paying more or paying for shipping from China but by the same token it would probably be practical for us to actually ship small items too.

rjo__

Bill,

Thank you for responding. My actual point is that without a level playing field, it is damned difficult to compete.
You have wonderful products that belong in the market. To me it, the costs of shipping aren't really important, for
many people, that cost might be the difference between ordering or not.

How hard would it be for Canada and the United States to agree… that how ever much it costs, we need to keep
the field level for our small businesses?

Rich

Bill Henning

Hi Rich,

rjo__ wrote: »

Bill,

Thank you for responding. My actual point is that without a level playing field, it is damned difficult to compete.

You are most welcome!

Your post was clear, I knew that like me you were frustrated with the non-competitive Canadian postal rates.

I wrote such a detailed response as most people outside of Canada don't realize how badly this situation sucks, and how it is the fault of Canada Post, and not the vendors.

rjo__ wrote: »

You have wonderful products that belong in the market. To me it, the costs of shipping aren't really important, for
many people, that cost might be the difference between ordering or not.

Thank you for the compliment!

Actually shipping gets a lot better on bigger orders - the Canada Post "Expedited Parcel" service is reasonable, and can handle up to 20kg / $1500 insured value.

Hopefully some reasonable distributors will eventually contact me, so I will have world-wide distribution. Unfortunately most distributors do not understand the internet - here are the most common terms they want that caused distribution deals to collapse:

- 45%-55% discount off MSRP and they only have to buy 5-10 units per SKU
- 35%-40% discount off MSRP and they expect me to drop ship
- consigment of 10+ boards, shipping there on my dime, and they will pay me 50% of what they sell it for
- some don't want to carry my boards fearing it will impact the sales of other boards they sell

Heck, even brand new e-stores, without any traffic, are asking for terms like the above when they contact me!

My margins are not high enough for me to give even 35% off on my products with expensive parts! (unless they order very large quantities so I can get better price breaks as well)

Basically, they don't want to stock, but want a high margin - at least most of the ones I've been in contact with.

And you are quite right about price sensitivity - EZasPi is being seriously outsold on Ebay by cheap (not nearly as good) Pi prototyping boards with free shipping.

Fortunately, I don't depend on Ebay sales, and consulting can be quite lucrative.

I am starting to work on a major marketing campaign, and hopefully people will like RoboPi etc enough to write about what they do with them - that will be the best advertising!

rjo__ wrote: »

How hard would it be for Canada and the United States to agree… that how ever much it costs, we need to keep
the field level for our small businesses?

Rich

Extremely hard.

The conservatives on both sides are not interested in fostering small business, but protecting the markets of large business.

Consider:

- Digikey can do free overnight FedEx for free on $200 orders
- Newark charges $8 for any size overnight FedEx order
- FutureElectronics also charged about $8 for overnight FedEx last time I ordered from them

If I wanted to send a RoboPi FedEx over night, it would cost me close to $40.

Heater.

Clock Loop,

From one of your links: "America is meant to be the home of laissez-faire. Unlike Europeans, whose lives have long been circumscribed by meddling governments and diktats from Brussels, Americans are supposed to be free to choose, for better or for worse."

I had to chuckle at that. As far as I can tell the USA has been a "command economy", in the style of the old Soviet Union but with different motives perhaps, for ages.

rjo__

Heater

We are all free until someone objects to what we are doing. Historically, I think the essential differences that developed all depended upon central judgements of the effect that the overall bandwidth has on the survival and evolution of our cultures. It is far too early to tell which model is most sustainable or even if there is a sustainable model.

But enough of that… if any of you is an expert or even knows an expert on the subject of climate change, I am earnest about trying to get a serious discussion going. We might
be in "call a friend" mode here!!!

This might not be the right place…but for me, it is the only place I want to be right now:)

rjo__

OOPS… thought I was in the global warming thread:)