FYI Sea/Air Shipping cargo options from Bangkok to the USA

[lsemprini]

Recently I went on a search for an economical way to ship 84kg of cargo from Bangkok to the USA.  I did not have any particular need for fast shipment and instead was focused on price.  My particular cargo (books) is not dutiable (that is, there is no import tariff) on entry to the US.

 

I wanted to publish my results in case it helps other readers in the same situation. 

 

These are the things I wish someone had told me before.

 

My general findings were that:
 

 

• for cargo that is very roughly 60kg or less, it is generally cheapest and definitely easiest to use the good ol' Thai Post.  Thai Post services are quite cheap for these small cargo sizes (1110B/kg for 3 month boat, 1900B/kg for 1 month SAL, 2950B/kg for 10 day air, maximum 20kg/box so you will have to split into multiple boxes) and you have zero customs clearance hassle for non-dutiable items.  For latest prices see: https://www.thailandpost.co.th/index.php?page=rate_result&country_code=US&weight=4900&language=en
   
• for cargo that is, say, around 200kg or more (such as personal belongings for moving house or a large commercial cargo shipment), is cheaper to go with a Freight Forwarder and do a 3 month sea shipment.  That is especially true if your cargo is big enough to fill an entire shipping container.  A Freight Forwarder organizes getting your cargo to the port, merging your cargo with other cargo in a shipping container, dealing with the extreme unbelievable bureaucracy and graft at the originating and terminating ports, getting your cargo out of the terminating port, and (if you pay extra) getting your cargo from the port to you.  There are HUGE fixed costs associated with this service.  For example, bureaucracy fees at the port of Oakland, CA, USA are often around USD $600 per shipment before you start adding fees that are per weight or per cubic meter.  So, this is only worth it for huge shipments.  Whenever you use a freight forwarder, get ready for extreme confusion and layers and layers of confusing terms and paperwork that needs to be filled out and nonsense about import/export licenses even though you almost never need them, and the freight forwarder will assume you already know all the terms and will just constantly overwhelm you with terminology that you will have to google constantly.  Furthermore, the freight forwarder WILL NOT tell you how much taxes and duties the terminating country will charge.  You have to research this yourself and you can never be 100% sure until you actually do the shipment.  Some Freight Forwarders refuse to handle personal belongings and some specialize in personal belongings (relocation services).
   
• for cargo that is in-between these sizes, you have to do the research to find out which way is cheaper.  see below.
   
• most people are familiar with "couriers" such as DHL and UPS.  Mostly these couriers only offer air service, so they are generally going to be much much more expensive than Thai Post 3 month boat service, especially if you try to purchase shipment using your own UPS/DHL account (or off the UPS/DHL website) using so-called "retail" prices where you do not get the deep discounts that frequent shippers do. 
  
  HOWEVER, it turns out that a small number of shippers in Bangkok do have access to very deep discounts with DHL or UPS and you may be able to find an "economy air" service (say, around 9 days) that is as cheap or cheaper than the Thai Post 3 month boat service.  You won't even find this "economy air" service offered on the DHL or UPS website; it is only available from third parties who do tons of shipping with the companies.  I suspect that the courier agent companies have to consolidate lots of customer packages into large pallets to get these prices.
  
  A key insight is that a lot of these courier agents with low prices are located where people are doing huge amounts of shipping small items, for example near Chatuchak market (and probably also Bobe and other markets) in Bangkok.  More below....

 

So, having established those basics, here are some examples of Freight Forwarders you can try:
 

EAGLESTHAI  https://eaglesthai.com/shipping-from-thailand-to-usa/ [email protected]

 

TNT FREIGHT FORWARDING https://www.tnt.com/express/en_th/site/ship-to/usa.html (recently acquired by fedex)

 

M&P SINGAPORE: https://www.mp.com.sg/shipping-from-thailand-to-us/ (note all shipments go through Singapore)

 

SIAM SHIPPING https://siam-shipping.com/destination-guide/shipping-thailand-usa/ [email protected]

 

LWS LOGISTICS https://lwslogistics.com/shipping-thailand-to-usa/

 

TRANSPEED http://www.shipping-international.com/companies/transpeed.html   [email protected]  https://www.transpeed.biz/

 

PANALPINA  https://www.panalpina.com/www/global/en/services/panquote/transport_quote.html   (extremely large, bureaucratic company)

 

Logistics2day AKA "I to U Communications" AKA I2U AKA leogloballogistics.com (extremely bureaucratic company)

 

V-Friend Logistics (no English on website) http://www.vfriendlogistics.com/sea-freight.html

 

CPL-Inter http://www.cpl-inter.com/CONTACT-US/
 

Here are the main couriers (TNT overlaps with this category too):

 

DHL https://iexpressbydhl.com/en

 

UPS https://www.ups.com/mobile/quoteService?loc=en_TH

 

FEDEX https://www.fedex.com/en-th/home.html

 

And here are some smaller courier agents located near Chatuchak (and other places too).  You can find more using Google searches of the market name and the words for "shipping" or "send package overseas" all in Thai (get a Thai person to help you).

 

MADD http://www.madd.co.th/branch/chatuchak-weekend-market-branch (extremely low UPS prices; 5 locations across BKK)

 

Inno Cargo https://www.innocargo.com/index.php?route=contact (acts as a TNT/Fedex agent with lower prices)

 

Cargopoint Express http://www.cargopointexpress.com/a_36870_19069_Contact-us.htm (also lower-than-retail air prices)

 

Enjoy!

 

 

Edited October 5, 2019 by lsemprini

[Matzzon]

Your prices when you say the cheapest up to 60 kg and give the numbers for Thailand Post is totally off tthe planet of reality.

With Fedex International Priority you can send up to 44 kg for about 11500 baht in total. If you take and send 88 kg that will then be 23000 baht. You are stating that 1110 baht/kg should be cheap. How can you do that when it amounts to over 60000 baht for 60 kg?

UPS quote you around 25000 baht for 60 kg to USA with a delivery time of only 3 days.

[lsemprini]

1 hour ago, Matzzon said:

Your prices when you say the cheapest up to 60 kg and give the numbers for Thailand Post is totally off tthe planet of reality.

With Fedex International Priority you can send up to 44 kg for about 11500 baht in total. If you take and send 88 kg that will then be 23000 baht. You are stating that 1110 baht/kg should be cheap. How can you do that when it amounts to over 60000 baht for 60 kg?

UPS quote you around 25000 baht for 60 kg to USA with a delivery time of only 3 days.

 

APOLOGIES -- there was a typo in my original post (I would like to correct the original post, but the forum software will not let me do so any more).  Those prices shown were for a 4.9kg package, not per kilo for a large package.

 

The correct rates for Thai Post for the maximum size box (20kg) as seen on https://www.thailandpost.co.th/un/rate_result/?country_code=US&weight=20000 are:

 

	Int’l Parcel-Surface (3 months)	3210B for 20kg =	160.5B/kg
	Int’l Parcel-SAL (30 days)	6400B for 20kg =	320B/kg
	Int’l Parcel-Air (10 days)	10450 for 20kg =	422B/kg

		So that works out to 9,360B for 60kg by 3 months sea service (3 20kg boxes), which is cheaper than Fedex and UPS.   Sorry for the confusion and thanks for spotting the typo!   Also, if you use the Thai Post calculator to calculate only 1000g as opposed to 20,000g, you will get much higher prices, but that's not what you would actually pay for a set of large (20kg) boxes.

[Matzzon]

9 hours ago, lsemprini said:

 

APOLOGIES -- there was a typo in my original post (I would like to correct the original post, but the forum software will not let me do so any more).  Those prices shown were for a 4.9kg package, not per kilo for a large package.

 

The correct rates for Thai Post for the maximum size box (20kg) as seen on https://www.thailandpost.co.th/un/rate_result/?country_code=US&weight=20000 are:

 

	Int’l Parcel-Surface (3 months)	3210B for 20kg =	160.5B/kg
	Int’l Parcel-SAL (30 days)	6400B for 20kg =	320B/kg
	Int’l Parcel-Air (10 days)	10450 for 20kg =	422B/kg

		So that works out to 9,360B for 60kg by 3 months sea service (3 20kg boxes), which is cheaper than Fedex and UPS.   Sorry for the confusion and thanks for spotting the typo!   Also, if you use the Thai Post calculator to calculate only 1000g as opposed to 20,000g, you will get much higher prices, but that's not what you would actually pay for a set of large (20kg) boxes.

Ok, I understand. Anyway, still thailand post will be more expensive and not cheaper when you compare to the same types of delivery.

Thailand post 60 kg by air taking 10 days for 31000 baht can not be considered cheaper than UPS by air in 3 days for only about 25000 baht.

Same with the calculation of 88 kg. Thailand post would take 42000 baht while Fedex would charge under 25000 baht.

Nevermind, but you should have you facts straight after you changed and double checked. I am sending parcels regulary about 12 times per month.

[lsemprini]

3 hours ago, Matzzon said:

Ok, I understand. Anyway, still thailand post will be more expensive and not cheaper when you compare to the same types of delivery.

Thailand post 60 kg by air taking 10 days for 31000 baht can not be considered cheaper than UPS by air in 3 days for only about 25000 baht.

Same with the calculation of 88 kg. Thailand post would take 42000 baht while Fedex would charge under 25000 baht.

 

Well as I mentioned in my OP, it really depends what the goal is.  In my case, as I stated in the first paragraph of my OP, my goal was to ship as cheaply as possible and the amount of time for delivery really didn't matter.  That is, 3 month delivery was just as valuable as 3 day delivery for me this particular cargo.  This is actually a fairly common case for expats---if you're going to meet your cargo in a few months when you go home, it doesn't matter how fast the cargo ships.  So in that case, price is more important, and Thai Post 3 month boat service wins on price for 60kg over UPS/FedEx/DHL.

 

If you are shipping stuff in a situation where speed helps, then definitely by all means UPS/FedEx/DHL is going to be a better value.

 

[TheJoker999]

Any recommendations for air freight? I tried searching up freight companies to no avail. Shipping parcels around 1-5kg worldwide, especially to US & UK. Any recommendations? Does not need to be super express. 

[Skallywag]

Woops - just re-read and you list the cargo as "books".

Comment was not applicable

 

 

Edited October 6, 2019 by Skallywag

[lsemprini]

5 hours ago, truemove said:

Any recommendations for air freight? I tried searching up freight companies to no avail. Shipping parcels around 1-5kg worldwide, especially to US & UK. Any recommendations? Does not need to be super express. 

 

Since you want faster than 3 month service, I think that would fall under the case where the couriers like DHL/UPS/FedEx are both cheaper and faster than Thai Post, but you've got to enter your particulars into their freight calculators above to be sure.  And it's probably a case where using one of those courier agents at Chatuchak etc. will save even more money.   The Chatuchak courier agents I listed above can all converse in English; MADD responds particularly quickly.

 

I don't know of any other category of shipper beyond the Thai Post, the couriers (DHL/UPS/FedEx) and the Freight Forwaders.  There might be other categories, but I haven't found them. 

 

Most of the Freight Forwarders do both sea and air, but in both cases you're going to need a massive cargo to make the significant fixed cost (and bureaucracy) worth it, so you're left with Thai Post, couriers, and courier agents.

 

 

 

Edited October 6, 2019 by lsemprini

[lsemprini]

 

Another useful resource:  If you end up choosing either the couriers (UPS/FedEx/DHL) or a Freight Forwarder, or in some cases the Thai Post, you will need to think about whether your particular goods will lead to the following charges on entry to the USA:
 

• import duties (aka import tariffs)
• import taxes, and the related subject of needing a US import license

In my case (books) there is no duty, but other cargo may have duty.

 

These fees are up to the whim of the customs department in the US and will be charged to you separately when the goods enter the US.  For example, in the case of FedEx, the FedEx person who delivers goods to your door in the US will want a check from you in the amount of the duties and taxes.

 

Fortunately, for duties it is quite easy to figure out by using this US customs website.  In addition to listing duty percentages directly, this website also gives you the all-important "Harmonized Code" ("HTS" code / "HS" code) describing your goods that you will need to use in the shipping paperwork:

 

https://hts.usitc.gov/?query=book

 

For import taxes and import licenses, things are more murky.  https://www.usa.gov/import-export  The good news: for most cargo, there are no taxes at all and no license is required coming into the USA.  The bad news: figuring out if you have cargo that does means reading this absurdly long document that no human being could possibly parse: https://www.cbp.gov/document/publications/importing-united-states

Fortunately, UPS has a tool to help you calculate estimated taxes and duties.  You might have to log in with a (free) UPS account first, but then you go to:

• Shipping (along the top of the screen)
• More Shipping Options...International Toolset (UPS TradeAbility)
• Estimate Landed Cost
• ... follow the many steps ...

In the end you get a "Landed Cost" which (for no obvious reason) includes the cost of shipping your items, plus their best guess of import duties and import taxes (the part you care about), PLUS the actual value of the cargo that you typed in (ignore this part).

 

FedEx has a similar tool (again a login may be required) under Customs Tools...Estimate Duties and Taxes.

 

If you use a Freight Forwarder, they will be very very paranoid about you needing an "export license" (from Thailand) and an "import license" (to the US).   In almost every case you don't need either one, but you will have to spend some effort convincing them so by quoting the relevant law.

 

 

 

[TheJoker999]

this thread saved me from hours of searching, would be great if you could add more chatuchak agents, they are cheap as hell