Importing
Parcel Cargo
Understanding the Entities:
Who Are the Parcel Courier Companies
The current top three parcel courier companies are FedEx, DHL, and UPS, except they aren't really just three companies anymore, but each of them a nebula of subsidiary organizations to segment and optimize their operations with sophisticated finance planning. That works really well at scale, and for the internal management, but it does come at a cost to how they standardize and are able to offer services. For those who fit comfortably within the defined parameters of their standardization, the benefits are very real. For those who need to articulate or resolve anything outside those same standards; their barriers are Herculean and the experience absurdly harrowing. Each company has their quirks and their proficiencies, but all of them must honor your wishes if you designate your own customs brokerage for entry. There are other parcel couriers, but the industry model is essentially commoditized and represented by those three.
Most importers don't know they have the power to control customs brokerage, and the parcel courier companies aren't keen to advertise it!
Understanding the Process:
Stages of Freighting with Parcel Courier Companies
Understanding the Paperwork:
Import Documentation for Parcel Cargo
All air cargo importations are required to include four major components, with additional requirements depending on the goods being transported. Each air cargo shipment must start with:
1. Commercial Invoice / Receipt of Purchase
2. Packing List / Content Details
3. Parcel Shipping Label
4. Courier Arrival Advisory
Each of the four requirements must have at least one document as evidence, but the documentation should accurately reflect the physical shipment. If for example a shipment includes contents sourced from multiple purchases, each corresponding invoice or receipt should be included to document the whole. If multiple parcels are being grouped together for the same importer, on the same shipping instance, each parcel's shipping label should be included to match against the packing list detail and invoices.
For more about import documentation requirements, please check out our dedicated page:
Understanding the Dynamic:
Insights on Parcel Cargo
Parcel Cargo is very similar to air cargo shipments, which are usually used for low density & time sensitive goods, but the parcel courier companies have specialized in aggregating many small shipments together onto the same trip (usually a flight.)
According to the 2020 data from The International Council of Clean Transportation, airplanes are among the lowest cargo-fuel efficiency vehicles. They rank at about 1 ton-mile per gallon; meaning that for each gallon of jet fuel, 1 ton of cargo could go 1 mile equivalence in a plane. Resultantly, the cost of this mode of transport is usually the highest relative freighting method with a significantly high dependency on fuel prices. As the courier company's vehicle assets are private, they have a higher flexibility to accommodate market shifts or freight demand when compared to public airlines running scheduled lanes.
Size and timing seem to be the primary drivers for parcel cargo shipments, where even small shipments could be directed to ocean container aggregators if timing, or perhaps environmental spoilage did not prevent it. Some sellers use air shipments to expedite their billing cycles or regulate inventory costs, and the parcel carriers are nearly on the same timing scale to mimic strategy. Depending on the courier company and the specials or temporary advantages they can offer, sometimes parcel freighting comes in cheaper than it would through an ocean freight forwarder. (It is not often, but it does happen.) The elevated security environment does lessen the traditional risk of cargo theft, but replaces effect with a different and even larger exposure from the combination of lost parcels and low-level employee sabotage (physically or informationally.) The companies do their best to stop that stuff, but failures persist and cycle with turnover. In best cases, parcels get lost or misdirected to the wrong facility, and are eventually delivered. Worst cases include parcel cargo theft or manipulation fraud. No system is perfect, but scale operators can afford to neglect problems and afford to use abandonment as a customer service aversion strategy.
In most cases, the criticality depends on how simple and small the shipment is. If any products are subject to federal agency controls, special permitting, or otherwise require precise importation treatment: the shipment is too complex for the subsidiary automatons to understand, and will lead to as many or more problems than there were incentives. If all products are simple enough to warrant no or minimal governance oversight, the parcel shipment will likely flow through the courier operations as optimization intended.
Understanding Next Steps:
Let's Work Together on Parcel Cargo
Just because these companies have vertically integrated, they have not especially expanded proficiency. The big courier companies are very proficient at the physical movements and last mile delivery. They are not so proficient when it comes to customs, compliance treatment or optimizing from the customer's perspective. Let them do what they do best, carry and deliver your freight. Save yourself time and heartache and designate Pilotfisch Solutions as your customs broker, so our proficiencies bolster that gap.
You get the best of both worlds to avoid the bureaucratic maze running and accruing or fabricated charges while they twiddle thumbs.
Pilotfisch Solutions is well experienced with importing parcel cargo, and we have the solutions experience for spectrum of potential issues in parcel cargo. In addition to the compliance activities involved with your parcel cargo's customs clearance, we continue to manage your shipment's logistics so that parasitic costs are avoided, and unavoidable holds are mitigated. Our success depends upon your shipments' successes, and we want each parcel cargo shipment to succeed!