About boots and not only ...

I would like to share my experience with international express delivery services. I think many have a "humorous" experience, and we will tell about his own.

A year ago, for the next partner conference in Prague, we decided to make souvenirs for all regional offices of ESET. Matryoshka - ordinary, vodka - for an amateur, made a batch of boots. The boots were not simple, but with rhinestones and ornaments, the logo of ESET and a postcard with an explanation in English of what it is. The party was 200 pairs. These are 3 healthy table-sized bags each. Those. a lot, in a suitcase you will not take away. Then they began to look for express delivery, who can deliver it to the Czech Republic. It turned out that there were no applicants ... Some demanded a list of about 20 documents that need to be collected (certificates, product licenses, etc.), which we physically did not have time to collect, others asked so serious sums that it was scary :-)
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As a result, the only one who agreed (but also very expensive, delivery cost several times more expensive than the boots themselves) was DHL. We must pay tribute, the company itself issued all the papers and in 2 days delivered to Prague. The address of the recipient was - the hotel "Hilton", we ourselves have sent the same. And here the cargo was detained, the local customs almost “arrested”. The cargo, in their opinion, is commercial - for sale, customs duty is payable, something around 8-15 euros for each pair of boots ... With regard to delivery, application of rhinestones and "customs clearance", the cost of the boots approached LLOYD shoes or PRADA shoes.

Of course, we tried to explain that in the summer in Prague we don’t need felt boots, and they have a logo, and a postcard on each pair, and our company works in the field of IT, etc. It didn’t help. In the end, we asked our headquarters to help, because we decided that Slovaks with Czechs would quickly find a common language, if only because they understand each other. And only after a personal conversation of our colleagues (faxes, emails did not help), we were able to pick up the cargo, we were believed that this was indeed a souvenir and their partners from South Africa, Australia and Indonesia would not be carrying it.



Somehow we sent a souvenir (t-shirt, etc.) to our fan from Ukraine, which often helps - sends out fresh viruses. Shipping cost was equal to the cost of a ticket to Kiev and back.

But recently our headquarters sent us a package with souvenirs (samples), the name of the company carrier will not be called. Cargo for some reason was detained on the border with Belarus (cargo - rubber mat for shoes, cardboard robot, flags, stickers, and so on. The cost is not more than a couple of hundred euros). There was a shortage of papers, in a couple of weeks, in some magical way the cargo got (!) To another international carrier company, as no one knew, neither the carrier nor at least those people with whom we communicate. The pool of documents and requirements for them was so complicated that the procedure took almost 3 months to complete. As a result, we decided that it was easier to send a person on a business trip — to take samples or refuse the cargo altogether. But it turned out to be not so easy to refuse, almost a matter of jurisdiction ... The cargo has not yet been received, the cardboard robot and shoe mat lie somewhere in thousands of kilometers from us in a customs warehouse.

And how are you? There were such cases?

PS Next time we want to take 200 baseball bats, this is our company souvenir.