All that said, a proportionate approach to packaging is vital. Take a look at the parcel below. The package on the left was cased in the box on the right. Quite a difference.

Now. If you were selling delicate items. Glass. Ceramics. Precious collectables. Such a package would be entirely appropriate and absolutely desireable. But this despatch contained business cards. It was a consignment of entirely unbreakable small cardboard sheets.

It was submitted by a Tamebay reader who wrote: “It’s ludicrous to send something like business cards in such a huge box. It’s a waste of card and paper for starters.”

And he’s right. But surely all’s well that ends well? The goods arrived in one piece, didn’t they? What’s the whinge?

“I ordered the business cards in good time. I was out on the Wednesday. Once I got through to the call centre on Wednesday evening after work, they couldn’t promise re-delivery on Thursday or Friday. I needed the cards on Saturday. I ended up taking a 40 mile round trip to collect them from the depot. I doubtless spent more on petrol for that journey than on the cards themselves. But more annoyingly, collecting them was a needless waste of time.”

And the crux of the matter? “I won’t be buying from that company again. It’s so frustrating because the box of cards on their own would easily have gone through my letterbox. It was totally unecessary hassle.”

The problem for Amazon merchants is that whilst Royal Mail will deliver to the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands at normal postage rates couriers won’t. Not only are they more expensive to deliver to for heavy items, but couriers classify the Channel Islands as an International Destination and charge International tariffs.

Merchants will either have to swallow the loss on courier fees when shipping to off shore destinations, or increase shipping costs (or prices) across the board to take into account the increased costs.

As Jade of Storage And Home Solutions says “How am I supposed to accurately charge for a courier delivery to a customer who lives in Birmingham, when I will have to charge the same to a customer who lives in Guernsey. Even though this could cost 5 or 6 times more!“.

I can understand Amazon wanting to make it attractive for residents of the off shore Islands to purchase from Amazon, what I can’t understand is how they don’t appear to have realised that the cost to deliver to these locations is significantly more expensive than to the mainland UK.

It would be reasonable enough to include locations such as the Isle of Wight as “UK Street” as they’re classed as part of the UK. However whilst the Channel Islands are British Crown Dependencies they are not part of the United Kingdom and in fact are not even in the EU.

International destinations such as the Channel Islands cost more to deliver to. The problem for sellers is how to deliver to them at the same cost as domestic UK deliveries.

Dear Seller,
We are writing to let you know about a change to the UK shipping regions in your Amazon.co.uk seller account. As of 21st March 2012, deliveries to the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Jersey, as well as other off-mainland locations, will be included in the main “UK Street” shipping region.
We are making this change in order to ensure a consistent delivery experience for buyers on our site. Customers can now shop in confidence knowing that they will be charged the same rates for delivery to addresses throughout the UK, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
Your “UK Mainland Street” delivery rates will be automatically applied to the new “UK Street” region. If you wish to modify your current pricing, click the “Shipping Settings” link on the Settings tab in your Seller Central account, and then click the Edit button at the top of the Shipping Model section.
To find out more about changing your shipping settings, enter “Shipping Settings” in the Search box in the upper-right corner of the main seller Help page, or click “Configure My Shipping Settings” under the Configure Account Settings heading.
Thank you for selling on Amazon.
Amazon Services Europe

UK Mail specialises in offering innovative parcel, mail and logistics services designed to provide local and international business which suit all their clients’ requirements. Formerly known as Business Post Group, UK Mail has built up their business intuitively over the last 40 years in order to offer some of the most competitive and client-oriented services on the market.

The leading mail delivery and logistics organisation has a national network which consists of over 52 sites and 2,500 vehicles; enabling them to offer customers a fully-integrated service which places their best interests at the core. Whether parcels, letters or pallets; UK Mail can deliver a solution that’s 100% geared towards their customers’ requirements.

UK Mail strives to serve as a dynamic organisation well-equipped to serve clients of all sizes, and from a wide range of different industries. UK Mail’s loyal customer base ranges from giant mobile phone networks to local family-run businesses. They are a company who embraces innovation and strives to take heed of any new technologies which could contribute to the convenience and quality of the services they offer.

Services Designed for Your Business

UK Mail offers a number of carrier services to multinational clients, including stores which operate solely online; delivering parcels, mail and pallets to the addresses specified in a 100% secure and conscientious fashion. Their services are aimed at business-to-business (B2B) organisations which require time-efficient services; having supplied such services to companies including O2 and Talk Talk.

The company is thoroughly delighted to have built-up such an extensive list of international clients and business customers, whom all rely on UK Mail to consistently provide a high level of service that other providers find hard to match. Irrespective of the size of their client’s business, UK Mail has complete confidence that their diverse and high quality services will meet their needs.

Amongst the services available from UK Mail are parcel delivery, mail, courier and specialist logistics, online, and IT solutions and services. The company prides themselves on offering advice and guidance to customers who are unsure of which service is right for them, and cite customer satisfaction as their highest priority in everything they do.

Find Out More About UK Mail

Whether a client is looking for international parcel delivery, a same day courier, or is interested in seeing how online fulfilment solutions could assist them; UK Mail can deliver.

If you would like to find out more, please don’t hesitate to contact UK Mail or visit our website for further details – www.ukmail.com

(Text provided by UK Mail.)

Ipostparcels offer a service geared towards the business-to-customer (B2C) market in order to offer next day parcel delivery and collection services to suit each individual’s requirements – all for an affordable, low price.

Customers name the collection address of their choosing; allowing them to choose whether parcels are collected from home or a place of work to ensure parcels are more likely to be received by the recipient, and not inconveniently sent to the local depot because the recipient was not available. Customers also have the option to make use of ipostparcels’ network of 52 depots placed around the UK for a drop off or pick up service, allowing them to save even more money on their delivery charge.

This innovation offers a viable and more convenient alternative to queuing at the post offices, and is particularly well-suited to eBay sellers as it affords them the opportunity to send their products often for an affordable price.

Services and features for Online Sellers

ipostparcels’ eBay service allows customers to sync their eBay accounts to ipostparcels; allowing them to instantly populate the ‘quote and book’ form on their website with any of their sold items. This gives the customer immediate access to next day delivery.

Offering security to customers is a paramount consideration for ipostparcels, and they ensure that their customers’ details are kept secure and confidential at all times. eBay does not inform ipostparcels of their users’ account or password details in order to maintain rigorous security standards for additional peace of mind.

ipostparcels can collect customers’ parcels and undergo a fast next day delivery that’s guaranteed to reach the recipient in the timeframe promised by the seller. Being able to guarantee a quick delivery the very next day will encourage the seller’s customers to leave positive feedback ratings and thus encourage repeat and extended future business.

These benefits are all available for very low comparable prices, which has made this particular bespoke service one of the most popular.

Many Amazon deliveries are handled by Yodel and according to the FT, Yodel are failing to deliver some 15,000 parcels a day. Their parcel volume is up from 1/2 million a day to 1.5 million and they’re struggling to cope. Demand is up 20% on that forecast with the surprised realisation from Yodel chief Jonathan Smith, that “This appears to have been a very strong online Christmas”.

Yodel were formed by the merger of HDN and DHL Home Delivery and are now the second biggest delivery network after Royal Mail. If they can’t cope at Christmas than how are the smaller guys faring? Let us know if you’re courier has coped admirably or if you’ve had a major fail with upset customers

My favourite post is the one where they’ve dug deep into the depths of Google to find a page where the Google engineers have created a one off custom landing page for a search result. If you want to see it visit the P4D blog or simply do a Google search for the word “Askew“.

The Business Model

P4D is a courier service with a twist. They’re one of only a few official partners of the major courier companies like City Link, DHL, TNT, Fedex, YODEL, Parcelforce and Palletways, offering heavily discounted parcel and pallet delivery prices to smaller businesses and individuals. They built their own booking systems in-house with an aim to keep them as easy to use as possible and they can integrate your shopping cart with your shipping account to make deliveries simpler still – no more manual entry ever again!

P4D differs from the competition because they’re a software company at heart looking to make the parcel delivery process hassle free, but as well as low prices they also pride themselves in offering exceptional customer support – especially when things go wrong. They answer emails quickly and oftentimes out of hours, plus they’ve a dedicated Customer Service team to take your calls.

The Software Solution

In 2008 Stephen teamed up with Chris Black – Chief Geek! P4D already offered cheap deals, but Chris designed systems that were instant, intuitive, and for regular senders took away all the admin headaches. Customers sending more than 200 parcels a month became P4D Pro customers with even cheaper tariffs and a courier service to suit their business, plus access to online invoicing, file uploads for delivery addresses, and full customer support as well.

P4D now offers a wide choice of courier services – whatever it is you want to send they’ll do their best to find you a solution, but for regular shipments their website quote tool simply works it all out for you. They can link up to any online shop, not just eBay, and have their own API (you’ll know one if you have one!) for technical bods wanting to integrate their shipping account with their sales.

They even offer their customers the opportunity to carbon offset their deliveries with a clever bit of code that calculates how long your shipment spends on the road or in the air, and you can also ‘round up your pound’ for their chosen charity, which changes every three months.

Find out more

If you’d like to find out more about P4D, Steve or his Account Managers will be more than happy to chat with you. They’ll get to know your business and work out how low they can get your tariff, plus determine which courier service best suits your needs. Otherwise, you might find the answer to your question already listed on their website in the FAQ section.

If you’re not a regular sender, but you’re looking for great deals and an easy booking system, you can get an instant quote online 24/7 for the very next parcel you want to send or get some advice from a P4D Customer Service Guru on 01295 267200.

Keep in touch

P4D have a strong online presence with a growing community around the web. Find them on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and many smaller networks.

Be sure to meet their Superhero and introduce him to your friends! .

The news has been full of horror stories suggesting that in no time at all Royal Mail will be charging as much as £1 for a 1st class stamp, but that’s unlikely to happen in the near future. The price of a 2nd class letter stamp (currently 36p) will still be capped by the regulators and too high a differential between 1st and 2nd class would simply result in customers abandoning 1st class post.

What the relaxation will do is to remove some of the restrictions which don’t allow Royal Mail to effectively compete with their competitors, whilst retaining the Universal Delivery Service which ensures they deliver to every household in the country six days a week.

The price proposed for deregulation are:

• First Class deliveries – letters, large letters (A4 in size and up to 750g in weight) and parcels
• Second Class deliveries – for large letters and parcels up to 1Kg in weight
• standard parcels
• business mail – metered or franked mail and pre-printed envelopes
• bulk mail – mainly large businesses sending a large volume of post in a single mailing for example, bank statements

Royal Mail will still be required to provide access to their competitors, meaning that the likes of TNT Post and UK Mail will still be able to get your credit card bills delivered. Royal Mail would have the freedom to set the wholesale price to their competitors for access to its network but would be subject to rules regarding the allowed margin between the wholesale and retail prices so they won’t be able to price them out of the market.

Royal Mail’s chief executive Moya Greene has insisted that maintaining the universal services and not having freedom to set prices would mean the company couldn’t survive. The latest proposals which are now subject to 11 weeks consultation should go some way towards addressing her concerns.

What is likely to concern online retailers is how much the cost of sending packages could rise. The good news however is that Royal Mail now have so many competitors in the packet delivery space that that alone should ensure Royal Mail have to remain competitive if they want to keep your business.

It’s worth remembering that Royal Mail have to provide a more comprehensive Universal Service than anywhere else in Europe. With that in mind if you want to make your voice heard you can submit your response to the public Universal Postal Service consulation on Ofcom’s website up until the 5th January 2012.

FBA or Fulfilment by Amazon means that you never again have to pick and pack a single order, or if you choose they can fulfil your day to day run rate products leaving you more time to manage your business and source new suppliers and products. It doesn’t even matter if you’re selling on your own website and eBay in addition to Amazon – they’ll still pick and pack all of your orders on your behalf.

Sellers can now also benefit from Amazon’s European Fulfilment Network – You ship your products to a fulfilment Centre located in your home country (e.g. in the UK) and they can be subsequently made available at the seller’s choice on Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr and Amazon.it. Currently FBA is available for orders Sold on Amazon in all EU Marketplaces but in the UK you can also use it for Webstore and UK Multi-channel Fulfilment orders.

If you’re about to have your Christmas stock delivered and would like to cut down your order processing time on Amazon and your picking and packing time for website and eBay orders then Amazon FBA might be worth taking a serious look at. Of course if you have excess stock left at the end of the Christmas period you can request Amazon return it to you at any point in time. FBA could work out more cost effective than taking on additional temporary warehouse staff and having to train them at the busiest time of the selling year.

One other advantage is that some Amazon categories such as Toys are closed to new sellers over the next few months as Amazon refuses to let their customers down over the Christmas period. However even if you’ve never sold on Amazon before you can still sell in the Toys category if you let Amazon fulfil your orders with FBA.

Do you already use Amazon FBA, or would you consider doing so over the Christmas period? What would stop you trying the service with a couple of product lines and what could convince you to put the majority of your fast selling lines into Amazon and let them fulfil your orders for you?

TNT has secured Guernsey Post as a client, which will see well-known high street brands use the service with their deliveries being handled by TNT Post UK. Current projected volumes are 17 million items in the first year of operation with the company targeting vendors who use websites sites such as Kelkoo and eBay to promote their products.

However don’t get too excited at the prospect of a competitor to Royal Mail. Firstly TNT are targeting businesses who generally have a minimum volume circa about 250 items per collection. That puts the service out of reach of most eBay businesses, but the volume requirements will also depend on format, geographic location and volumetrics (size and weight).

Click to embiggen

Our expansion into packets and parcels is a key part of strategic growth plan in the UK. We have applied our principles of innovation, customer service and value for money to this new offer. We aim to improve customer satisfaction and reduce costs. Online retail packets and parcel delivery is a growing trend within the postal sector and our focus is to be the main provider in this sector.
Nick Wells, CEO, TNT Post UK

There is no one sector that TNT Post will specifically target but CD’s DVD’s, toiletries, computer consumables are some of the sectors. Weight and format specifications will depend on the service .

Many retailers will be somewhat disappointed that the launch of a new service is probably unsuitable for them due to the volume requirements. I’m however more disappointed that the fulfilment will still be via third parties such as Royal Mail. However TNT Post UK, are the largest private sector postal operator in the UK and the chances are that once established they’ll start to eat away at the market share.

Doubtless TNT Post UK will also start rolling out “final mile” delivery services probably starting in the cities where they have the greatest mail volumes, in fact TNT Post have been running trials since way back in 2008.

File this under “One to watch” and don’t plan on jumping ship in the near future, not that is unless you’ve got a daily delivery volume of 250 parcels per day, in which case let us know if you’re going to trial the service, how much financial saving TNT Post offers you, and what the delivery experience is like.