On Thu, 2006-03-16 at 07:06 -0500, Olin Lathrop wrote:
> Tim N9PUZ wrote:
> > The world's Postal services are a marvel. I can get packages to some
> > European countries quicker than I can get them to a couple of US
> > destinations.
> 
> Hmm.  My impression is that the US postal system is really very decent.  For
> under $10 I can get a PIC programmer from Massachusetts to an obscure
> outpost in central Alaska in two days (yes, this has happened).  But try
> getting something a few hundred miles north of here into Canada and it costs
> twice as much and takes 4 times as long.  I don't know what they do up
> there, but even dogsled would be faster.
> 
> I once got a letter from someone in southern Ontario, and noticed it has a
> US stamp on it postmarked in Buffalo NY.  Out of curiosity I asked him about
> it, and he said they pay a courrier company to drive mail bound for the US
> over the border and dump it at the Buffalo post office.  This was cheaper
> and quicker than mailing it from a Canadian post office.

Odd. I find the Canadian postal system very good. Time for a post card
to reach the west coast from Toronto is on the order of 2 days.

Personally I always ship to the US with Canada Post/USPS, it's by far
the cheapest, and just as reliable as the couriers.

I've had far more problems with the courier companies (FedEx, UPS and
Purolator have all made weird mistakes).

The only error I've experienced recently was a large letter destined for
Austria taking a stopover in Sydney, Australia. Given the very similar
spelling of the names (in english) of the two countries it's
understandable, but still very annoying.

Now, if you are talking about commercial shipments Olin that is a
different story. Any shipment of "value" can be intercepted by customs,
and customs has been know to take it's sweet time. 4 days is a short
amount of time for a package that passed through customs in my
experience.

Note that this delay is universal, whether you use the postal service or
a courier company.

TTYL

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