-_-

[blue_soaring]

Just so everyone knows, Etsy sellers that refuse to ship to anywhere but the US annoy the POO OUT OF ME.

Why. Just WHY. It's not like international shipping is some arcane science.

Comments

[haraamis]

I'm right there with you... -.-"

Even worse (for me) are German sellers that don't ship to Switzerland (and there's waaaaaaay too many of them, seriously).

ò_ó

[blue_soaring]

LIFE IS JUST NOT THAT HARD. I mean, seriously. It's not even like I'm asking them to mail it to a village on a migrating ice floe that will make contact with the Baffin Islands on the third of May at 0100 for exactly 23.5 minutes. You go to the post office. You say please send this to Vancouver as cheaply as possible. It arrives at my door two weeks later. IT'S NOT DIFFICULT.

I don't care if your post office is fifteen miles away and you only go there twice a year. Put the damn package in the mail when you're there. I CAN WAIT.

[damned_colonial]

This was my view until I moved to the US and realised how arcane and horrible their postal system is. Now, while it still bugs me, I put the blame on the system rather than the individual seller.

[blue_soaring]

I suppose it's one of those things you refuse to believe until you experience it; I've mailed stuff to myself from the States and didn't really see an issue. My view of the post office is thus: you tell them where you want to send a package, they ask you how fast you want it to get there, then you give them money and they get it to where you want it to go. Sellers don't have to touch customs except to say that yes, the content of this package is not a bomb and is worth however much.

I'd be more willing to forgive taxes confusion, because omg USA, you and your 4533827 different rules depending on where you live in the same damn country.

In conclusion, I reserve the illogical right to be annoyed with people who can't seem to do what some other random percentage of the population seems to have no trouble with. \o/ GO ME.

[damned_colonial]

That's assuming you can *find* a post office. When I moved here I spent months asking around for "where's the nearest post office? really? REALLY?" because I work in a commercial downtown area and there isn't one that I can realistically get to at lunchtime.

Both Canada and Australia have some kind of licensed franchise system where small businesses can have a mini-post-office on their premises. When I lived in Ottawa, my nearest post office was a desk at the back of a 7-11 two blocks from my house. It was open late. This does not exist in the US... or rather, there are all these little shops that will ship stuff for you, but they do UPS *and* FedEx *and* USPS *and* sixteen other things, and the pricing is ludicrously complicated, and they screw you round by over-charging for USPS services, and anyway they're not listed on usps.gov so when you ask "where's my nearest post office?" it won't list anywhere you can send stuff via USPS, it will only list "official" post offices.

My understanding is that round here, people buy stamps at pharmacies or through ATMs, buy packaging material for shipping at office supply stores, and send actual packages by weighing their own and printing labels online. If that's how you do it -- never actually going to a post office -- then actually having to go to a PO to sign a customs form, show ID, and send something internationally is a bit of a drama I guess.

Me, I just never send anything anywhere. If it's not digital, they can do without.