Again, I'm doing lots of pre-sale research.
Normally, when I sold my guitars, I sent them with Parcel Force and it cost me a fortune. I've also used Hermes, without any problems, but I understand a lot of people don't like Hermes so I would be reluctant to use them now.
As it's likely I'll end up having to ship across to the mainland, I have a few questions:
1). Is sending via a third party company, who contact the courier and they then come to your house the best option?
2). Does the courier bring shipping labels with him?
3).
@Chuffola @lonestar @Wolfetone how do you ship your guitars across the water?
Thanks.
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To be honest, the hassle of a courier is why I haven’t done it more often and I’d have the same questions as you! So I’m left to run the gauntlet of local gumtree nutters which is always delightful.
Interested in in other views on this
• Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@Goldeneraguitars
I know that might sound silly, because no one wants to throw money away, but I usually have a limit on who I'll send with dependant on value - I'd let Parcelforce take a £300 guitar, but I probably wouldn't let them take a £1000 guitar.
The insurance offered is a con, they won't pay out - so that's why I say, what you're prepared to lose, if the worst happened.
I'm confident in my ability to package well, which also means I'm confident that they could use a guitar I send as a football and it would still arrive fine - I think this is the key.
Thankfully have not had to avail of the insurance but certainly paid a premium.
The broker websites tend not to service NI to mainland UK, though will take orders for the return leg - which is nuts. if they do, they're dearer than parcelforce.
Suppose you could pay a fair bit extra for, say, UPS. But why?
So it's parcel force for me.
You can also join parcelforce rewards4u and get 15% off prices. They'll print labels for you if required.
• Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@Goldeneraguitars
Never had a breakage.
So if I don’t have any labels at all, I can take my parcel to the post office and get them to print address labels for me?
https://send.parcelforce.com/
Parcelforce direct using the R4U discount is handy for lightweight domestic shipments but anything over about 4KG or anything international it's cheaper to go via Parcelmonkey.
@gavin_axecaster I don't think parcelmonkey is cheaper from NI.
The other thing about PF from NI is that the 24hr guaranteed service rarely makes it over to UK in 24hrs so not really worth paying the extra.
I might just use Parcelforce in that case.
I was looking on Parcelmonkey and a lot of the suggested options were indeed Parcelforce, so it's probably just easier to go to the Parcelforce website and book it from there myself.
I'll do a comparison when I get a spare minute.
Parcelforce recognises NI as part of the U.K. (leave the political comments to the Off Topic section). This is basically how Royal Mail acts.
Couriers treat NI as “Ireland” or foreign land. Tbf the Irish Sea is extremely expensive to cross for some reason. I can confirm I sent 9 Guitar bodies to the mainland for £25 with parcelforce via parcel monkey. It was fully unsured too otherwise it would have been about £8-9 less.
• Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@Goldeneraguitars