Sending and receiving packages in Mexico

I use Estafeta USA for all packages not time sensitive.
You can sign up online. All items are shipped to their Laredo USA warehouse and than trans shipped to Mexico.
They are very reasonable and efficient
For Items under $1,000 USD I will use DHL or UPS.

Priscilla wrote:

Hello,

As an expat, there are inevitably certain items you might want or need from back home, and around the holiday period, many people like to send gift packages.

How easy is it to send and receive packages in Mexico?

Is the public postal system efficient?

Do people tend to prefer using private shipping services? Which ones?

How do the costs of the private shipping services compare?

How long does it take generally to receive packages from abroad in Mexico?

Do you have to pay taxes on items received by mail from abroad?

Are packages delivered right to your doorstep, or do you usually have to go collect them somewhere?

Thank you for sharing your experience,

Priscilla

Shipping and mail are nothing like the U.S.
The post office means well and tries but often things take weeks or months. I give them at least 3 weeks if there are no holidays coming up. Holidays pretty much stop the mail for months.

DHL and other regular delivery services are much faster. I get most Amazon items in a week holiday or no holiday.  The timing of the delivery is limited to probably the day only, but then that date can move up. None of that between 9 and 5 stuff.
The big issue is the border, will the border let your item through. So tell your family and friends not to choose items like toothpaste or other personal items and foods. Stick to stuff that is clearly an item common to everyone like clothes. I would suggest if they want to send a gift to use Amazon. They can advise you of what can or cannot be shipped to Mexico.
Packages are delivered to your home. and you had better be there all day waiting because if you are not, trying to find your package can be a real problem, taking a lot of time. So being stuck for one day is a lot less hassle than a week searching.
Once I had to make three trips and stand in line for a half hour or more because of a missed UPS delivery. They had changed the delivery date and when I found out I was nowhere near the house. They might deliver to a neighbor in that case, but that's up to the individual carrier.

If there are fees they are usually incorporated into the shipping price.

It all depends. I purchase a lot of stuff online. The companies I purchase from include;
- Amazon US,  Amazon Mexico.  Ebay US, MercadoLibre Mexico,  Mexican companies directly (eg Dewalt).

The things I purchase can arrive via;
- DHL.  Amazon's own delivery service.  FedEx,  FedEx ground, Estafeta, Mexican post

We are lucky in that we have a guard house which lets people in/out and accepts packages.

I have purchased something on MercadoLibre at 2PM and received it at 10AM the next morning.

Ebay's global shipping (really Pitney Bowes) is the most expensive shipping option and not the fastest - but costs are locked in at purchase.

Amazon US also quotes shipping/import fees at time of purchase and I have received rebates from time to time if I am overcharged. It 'feels' like items clear Mexican Aduana in the US.

FedEx ground is the slowest way to receive anything.

We have a 'street address' and a PO box. The PO Box works pretty well, but I'll guess when we have Mexican post sent to the house it may add 2-3 weeks for delivery, and since the mail arrives via motorcycle that limits the size of the item.

Ebay has an arrangement with estafeta (EstafetaMembers) where they give you a PO address in Laredo TX. You can ship a single item(purchase) to that address. When it arrives in TX they will quote you duties/shipping to get it to you in Mexico. This works well for small items of little value.

Estafeta also offers a service called 'MerkaLink' (I think) which I have never used. It is more expensive than EstafetaMembers but it is not limited to only Ebay and you can combine orders from various sources, I understand they can use the same PO address in Laredo.

I re-read your post. I did not touch on sending stuff OUT of Mexico, That can be very very  costly. I have purchased items from the US which have arrived broken etc, When I quote the return shipping the vendors have simply issued credit as the cost was absurd.

When I do send something I use MexPost with tracking.

" It 'feels' like items clear Mexican Aduana in the US."
Not really lobster tail. It's usually Mexico Cd. or In my case Merida. The items tend to be on a plane not just crossing at a physical border. If the Items are already in the Amazon Mx. they come directly because they don't have to be imported.

If you personally are driving across the border you deal with the border you are crossing. The U.S. does not screen your items for Mexico, They just check your passport and flag you on to Mexico where they look at your items.

I use a public postal service. They are very efficient.It costs me 165.00 a year. I love it since I live in Mexico. I even have the address on my drivers license.

Hope this helps

Well travellight - I made my comment because often when I follow the tracking on a shipment it often shows something like - 'In Cincinnati hub' one moment and "Leaving Mexico City hub' the next day. I know Amazon has a large presence in DF and I'm sure they and companies like Costco have worked out logistical details to move bulk.

Yes,
lobster tail I can see why you might think that, but the U.S. is not where packages clear customs. I just wanted it to be clear. If your package was stopped you would see that quickly.  No reflection on you just information based on years of dealing with customs.    and packages sitting in either Mx cd, or Merida, plus the carrier asking what I wanted to do about it. I drove to Merida in one case and they still felt the dental cleaner I was using to clean jewelry was a danger and required a prescription. after a day of haggling, they allowed me to claim the package minus the dental cleaner which they destroyed.

I once read that a cargo 747 full of packages had to push the red/green light button (once, for the entire load)  much like you and I at an airport. If that were true, that might explain how stuff moves quickly onto delivery vans (and avoids time in Aduana).

We have sent and received Fed Ex packages from the states with no trouble. Both were fairly small shipments, but were pretty expensive as I recall (envelope sized packages that cost $80 US to receive/I think $50 US to send). There wasn’t anything like the tracking in the US where you know when your package will arrive, you kind of have a day window. I tried to change the delivery online to pick up at a location in town and that DID NOT WORK. They still tried to deliver it to the house, we weren’t home, it took a couple of days to track it down. (They were also completely unapologetic about it- “yeah, it says here to hold at the shipping location. They tried to deliver it to you, but you weren’t home. So now it’s still on the truck.” There was no acknowledgement whatsoever that it should never have been on the truck or attempted delivery in the first place, they acted like we were crazy to think that would happen.)

I have been waiting for my debit card (sent from Mexico to Mexico) for almost six months. They have supposedly resent it twice. But since I’m not home all day waiting for whenever the mail carrier might come, I assume I have missed any delivery attempts. They are supposed to be sending it directly to the bank now. We’ll see how that goes.

My final shipping story is about an international shipment from Brazil. I ordered a piece of art- a plaster statue. The artist sent it four day delivery with DHL. It arrived in Mexico after ten days (Sao Paolo to Cincinnati to Miami to MEX). The DHL tracking info said it was available for pick up here in Oaxaca. I went to the office and they didn’t have it. They said there was a problem and I needed to call. I tried calling, but could never get through the automated system. I tried emailing. I finally received a reply that said that I needed a “sanitary permit”. I replied that since I was the recipient not the shipper I didn’t think I could provide any actual information about the package, and the shipper should have provided it. I asked the artist and DHL Brazil told her that she had everything in order. No one would tell me what a sanitary permit was or how to get one, or where to take it once I had one (they would tell me that it was required because the statue was a “human form” which to this day makes absolutely no sense). I hired a translator in case my Spanish was just not good enough to understand what they were saying. They didn’t tell her anything either except that it would likely cost $3000 pesos. I finally had to get my attorney involved. In the end, it took over a month to receive it, cost a little over $2500 pesos in taxes, storage, and customs fees (plus what i had to pay my attorney) for a statue I had paid $100 US for. I feel like it would have been way better to have it sent to the US and mule it over the border in my luggage.

That situation really soured me on trying to receive anything here, but I’m happy to hear that Amazon and Ebay are working for you guys. I’ll give that a try with something I don’t really care about to see if it works for me here.

there is NO postal service in mexico. ups, fed ex, dhl r the 3 carriers here. spendy tho. i live in juarez mx and my son has a post box in el paso so when i order goodies from WALMART OR AMAZON,  all is sent to his po. box. In el paso. since he works there, he picks up from the po box weekly. now amazon, ships globally, and i have been in correspondence with them concerning having my orders sent directly to my house. other thaN THAT GETTING MAIL HERE SUCKS.

We live in a gated community. Within the last few weeks I received a call from the guards that there was a delivery which needed a signature and my credential. I drove to the gate and signed for the package. Turns out it was our new Costco/Banamex card. The delivery guy had arrived by bicycle ! He just showed up without any idea if we would be home. We live out in the sticks. Even MexPost only delivers mail once a week or so and they have motorcycles.

We have had good success with MexPost over the years. We have a PO Box in the branch, which hardly ever gets real mail. Costs something like 200 pesos/year.  But I would certainly elect to have mail sent there rather than to our street address. From time to time we use MexPost for outgoing mail. We get tracking and the fees are pretty good when compared with FedEx, DHL, UPS. Every year I send the IRS my hard copy return via MexPost and we can track it right into their offices in Austin. Every year we send out our Christmas cards with Mexpost. We do generally mail them out in Oct/Nov.

This is a great topic and a real learning experience for us. We live in Cabo San Lucas and my wife's cousin sent us mail via regular US and Mexican mail systems. We were lucky. It did arrive but it took 2-1/2 months.  We live in a gated community and we have received packages at our home from CostCo, FedEx and UPS.

We now use a mail and shipping forwarding service, Mail Boxes Cabo. We rent a mailbox and pay 28% of the invoice cost for shipping. All of our mail and shipping is sent to San Diego and we receive all in 7 days. I use the same service in sending shipments/mail to the US. Mail Boxes Cabo does a very good job and I am happy it is an option for us to use.

Well, basket,

the sanitation certificate is basically required when they decide something may not be safe, or they never saw it before and don't know what category to put it in. It is usually used for things that could be drugs or foods.
My guess is they didn't know what to make of your artwork and may have been leaning toward porn or not porn. I don't try to analyze their perspective. I just make a mental note of what they question. As for getting the certificate it requires an inspection by a specific government agency and takes weeks to months. I have never had it done. The shipper needs to do it actually. It shows their product is "safe"

Yes, grapenut,

there is a Mexican postal service. It is slow but it exists and works.
Perhaps it just doesn't exist in cartel territory because of risks.