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What is an international courier?

An international courier specialises in moving goods to worldwide destinations, with a particular expertise in the extra documentation that’s needed when you are sending something beyond the boundaries of the EU. Whether it’s vital documents to South Africa or a present to your son on a gap year in Laos, international courier routes cover over 250 countries and territories. All the leglislation involved can seem insurmountable if you’re an infrequent user of international couriers, but using a site such as DeliveryQuoteCompare.com, will make the task much easier.

Finding suitable International services when couriering your goods

By adding details of your internationally bound consignments to DeliveryQuoteCompare.com, you’ll be put in contact with rated courier companies that specialise in global courier services. These couriers will then come to you with a quote and precise details of the service they can offer for the particular goods you want to send overseas.

This way there’s no need for you to know all the laws and legal requirements when using the services of an international courier (and believe us, there are quite a few!) as only companies who are experienced in couriering items worldwide will respond. They will also help you with the forms you may need to fill in to send goods internationally, such as a proforma invoice or tax documents, so there’s less for you to worry about.

Using global courier solutions to grow your business

If you’re involved in buying and selling second hand goods on the internet, or own a small UK-based business, expanding your trading to include international customers is very enticing. Finding cheap couriers that can offer the service you want will open up international opportunities and make having clients worldwide a viable option. Alternatively if you simply want to send presents and goodies to friends and family in far-flung places, international couriers will be able to provide the solutions that you require when sending items globally.

International courier costs versus level of service

Once you’ve received your free quotes from the international courier firms registered on our site, you can compare them in terms of cost and service. The more pricey quotes probably include extra services such as insurance, guaranteed collection times and signature on arrival. If your consignment is time critical or precious to you regardless of the monetary value, these sorts of premium services might be worth opting for.

On the other hand, the very cheapest international courier solutions will not include these services, but if cost is the most important factor for you then this can work. One thing worth bearing in mind is that whatever level of service you opt for, the quotes you will get from DeliveryQuoteCompare.com will almost certainly be cheaper than going directly to the main international couriers as a one off customer with just one parcel or consignment to send.

Guidelines & restrictions when employing the services of worldwide couriers

We can’t express this enough. If you are paying for a service provided by an international courier that includes insurance for your items, you must make sure you adhere to that company’s requirements for dispatching goods, or else you stand a chance of having your insurance not pay out in the event of a claim. It’s all pretty much common sense stuff. For example, if the goods you want to send are on their high-risk list, there’s no point in paying extra for insurance, as they won’t pay out anyway.

Each courier will also hold a database of things they will refuse to carry internationally, but if you use our site to tell them exactly what you want to send and the courier quotes for a particular service, that means they are prepared to take; again this saves you the time and effort of trawling through all the ins and outs of terms and conditions for each international courier looking for the most appropriate service.

Similarly, try and be as accurate as possible when describing your consignment. If you guess the measurements and they are wrong, you won’t get an accurate quote and may end up paying more. Most international couriers will submit a quote on the basis of volumetric weight against actual weight.

Again, our customer rated international courier firms will assist you with the calculations, so don’t worry, but if you’re mathematically inclined, volumetric weight in kilos is length in cm x height in cm x width in cm divided by 5000; this will then be compared to the actual weight of the package and whichever is greatest will be used by the courier as a basis for the cost of the service.

Preparing your items for international courier dispatch

After carefully selecting the level of service you want, preparing your items ready for being couriered half way around the world is an important factor. Our advice is to use strong, rigid cartons, double-lined if possible and to select the correct size – too big and it can collapse, too small and it can burst.

Inside the box, make sure you wrap items separately and place them away from the edges of the carton and not touching each other. Fill any empty space around them with newspaper, polystyrene chips or bubble wrap to avoid movement during transit. And remember, marking ‘Fragile’ on the box is not a substitute for goods being poorly packaged up for their international journey!

Another handy hint is to make sure you’ve tightened any transportation screws on electrical gadgets if they have them. Once your items are all packaged up, seal with high quality tape and make sure any old bar codes are removed (you don’t want it going to Washington DC when the service destination was Kuala Lumpur) and you’re ready for your international courier to come and pick it up.

International Couriers Related Links

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