What everyone has to remember is the up front cost of shipping, is only part of the equation....Unfortunately there is an international border between us and ALL couriers UPS, Fedex, etc. broker shipments "in house" at the border, and charge for their services.....USPS and Canada Post include the brokerage in their price (other than a $5 handling fee, that is hit and miss if they ever charge it).
We Canadians have a federal sales tax as well as a Provincial sales tax in some provinces on virtually everything we buy and Canada post is supposed to collect that on all items we buy out of any other country.....Having said that, I can't remember the last time I had to pay any tax on anything that came in the mail, and I get a lot of stuff shipped to me..It's very hit and miss. I have been 100% raped by UPS consistently though.
There is one other thing I've been noticing. USPS is telling customers that packages over a certain weight MUST be shipped "Priority".......I have a feeling that's what happened with Mark's shipment. Maybe things have changed, but it used to be anything could be shipped up to 60 pounds "Expesspost" which still has insurance and tracking...........I think either things are changing, or there are a lot of untrained USPS employees, that don't know that there are other options.
Rob that is exactly what has changed my only options now are Priority or Express which was $50 higher even yet. This was checked at two different post offices and the USPS website verified it as well.
The USPS should be sued for even using the word tracking as they do not have tracking. They say they do but it's a joke. I was told up front that tracking or delivery confirmation was not available on shipments to Canada as well.
No delivery confirmation will stop me from shipping to Canada from eBay etc as the buyer now only has to say he never got his package and we have no way to dispute it.
I made this shipment to a AS member anyway as I believe that most are up and up straight shooters but it's still risky now.
I don't want my name ran through the muck either.