Contents
Even the smallest of goods must be recorded and declared. Apparently, not everyone at Swiss Post knows that either.
The rule is clear: according to international customs regulations, shipments of goods abroad must be recorded and registered electronically without exception. This regulation also applies to letters with a content. However, this can obviously also be forgotten internally, as the case of a postal customer from Sursee shows.
After a wedding in Germany, the customer wants to send a USB stick with pictures from the party to the neighboring country. He searches the internet for information about the costs, stamps the envelope and hands it in personally at the post office counter. The clerk at the counter told him that he had even slightly overstated the envelope, the customer recalls in the SRF consumer magazine “Espresso”.
But the happy surprise does not find its way to Germany. The envelope ends up back at the sender three days later.
The customer was undoubtedly badly advised by us.
The customer is at a loss and contacts «Espresso». There was obviously a mistake here, apologizes Post media spokeswoman Nathalie Dérobert: “The customer was undoubtedly badly advised by us.” The counter staff in that branch were informed accordingly and made aware of the applicable rules for goods shipments abroad.
Without exception, all consignments of goods, no matter how small, have had to be digitally recorded for three years, according to the Post spokeswoman. The declaration must include the sender and recipient data, e-mail address, telephone number and the value of the goods.
Help at the counter costs five francs
The criticism of the “Espresso” listener, according to which the help for such programs on the Internet is “anything but easy to understand”, counters Dérobert by pointing out that you can also get help at the counter for a fee of five francs.
In the second attempt, the USB stick found its way to Germany.