Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to protect against the risk of a contingent or uncertain loss.
The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or simply the Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the United States, its insular areas and associated states. It is one of a few government agencies explicitly authorized by the Constitution of the United States. As of 2023, the USPS has 525,469 career employees and 114,623 non-career employees.
Canada Post Corporation, trading as Canada Post, is a Crown corporation that functions as the primary postal operator in Canada.
United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) is an American multinational shipping & receiving and supply chain management company founded in 1907. Originally known as the American Messenger Company specializing in telegraphs, UPS has expanded to become a Fortune 500 company and one of the world's largest shipping couriers. UPS today is primarily known for its ground shipping services as well as the UPS Store, a retail chain which assists UPS shipments and provides tools for small businesses. UPS offers air shipping on an overnight or two-day basis and delivers to post office boxes through UPS Mail Innovations and UPS SurePost, two services that pass on packages to the United States Postal Service for last-mile delivery.
Package delivery or parcel delivery is the delivery of shipping containers, parcels, or high-value mail as single shipments. The service is provided by most postal systems, express mail, private courier companies, and less-than-truckload shipping carriers. Package delivery is different in each country, and how packages are delivered is closely connected with the cost for delivering to that country as well as population. In 2019, China, The United States, and Japan were the leaders in package delivery while Latvia, Macau, and Iceland were the bottom three. The population of the bottom three barely totals 2 million while the population of the top three tops totals more than 2 billion. Package delivery is an every day occurrence in the US while many other countries do not have this luxury.
In transportation, freight refers to goods conveyed by land, water or air, while cargo refers specifically to freight when conveyed via water or air. In economics, freight refers to goods transported at a freight rate for commercial gain. The term cargo is also used in case of goods in the cold-chain, because the perishable inventory is always in transit towards a final end-use, even when it is held in cold storage or other similar climate-controlled facilities, including warehouses.
Registered mail is a postal service in many countries which allows the sender proof of mailing via a receipt and, upon request, electronic verification that an article was delivered or that a delivery attempt was made. Depending on the country, additional services may also be available, such as:
A courier is a person or organization that delivers a message, package or letter from one place or person to another place or person. Typically, a courier provides their courier service on a commercial contract basis; however, some couriers are government or state agency employees.
A post office box is a uniquely addressable lockable box located on the premises of a post office.
Within the United States, a commercial mail receiving agency (CMRA) is a private business that accepts mail from the Postal Service on behalf of third parties. A CMRA may also be colloquially known as a mail drop. A mailbox at a CMRA is called a private mailbox (PMB).
Marine insurance covers the physical loss or damage of ships, cargo, terminals, and any transport by which the property is transferred, acquired, or held between the points of origin and the final destination. Cargo insurance is the sub-branch of marine insurance, though marine insurance also includes onshore and offshore exposed property,, hull, marine casualty, and marine losses. When goods are transported by mail or courier or related post, shipping insurance is used instead.
Military mail, as opposed to civilian mail, refers to the postal services provided by armed forces that allow serving members to send and receive mail. Military mail systems are often subsidized to ensure that military mail does not cost the sender any more than normal domestic mail. In some cases, military personnel in a combat zone may post letters and packages to their home country free of charge. Modern military mail services are provided by most armed forces around the world. In some nations, individual service branches may run their own military mail program.
Parcel post is a postal service for mail that is too heavy for normal letter post. It is usually slower than letter post. The development of the parcel post is closely connected with the development of the railway network which enabled parcels to be carried in bulk, to a regular schedule, and at economical prices. Today, many parcels also travel by road and international shipments may travel by sea or airmail.
Dimensional weight, also known as volumetric weight, is a pricing technique for commercial freight transport, which uses an estimated weight that is calculated from the length, width and height of a package.
A flat fee, also referred to as a flat rate or a linear rate refers to a pricing structure that charges a single fixed fee for a service, regardless of usage. Less commonly, the term may refer to a rate that does not vary with usage or time of use.
La Poste is a postal service company in France, operating in Metropolitan France, the five French overseas departments and regions and the overseas collectivity of Saint Pierre and Miquelon. Under bilateral agreements, La Poste also has responsibility for mail services in Monaco through La Poste Monaco and in Andorra alongside the Spanish company Correos.
Surface mail, also known as sea mail, is mail that is transported by land and sea, rather than by air, as in airmail. Surface mail is significantly less expensive but slower than airmail, and thus is preferred for large or heavy, non-urgent items and is primarily used for sending packages, not letters.
The United States Postal Service (USPS) provides Priority Mail Express for domestic U.S. delivery, and offers two types of international Express Mail services, although only one of them is part of the EMS standard. One is called Priority Mail Express International and the other service is called Global Express Guaranteed (GXG). The latter has no relation to "EMS" International service as provided by the EMS Cooperative.
Eurosender is an online platform for booking door-to-door logistics services in Europe. It provides postal, courier and freight forwarding services. The company was founded in 2014 by Slovenian entrepreneurs Tim Potočnik and Jan Štefe.
A package redirection scam is a form of e-commerce fraud, where a malicious actor manipulates a shipping label, to trick the mail carrier into delivering the package to the wrong address. This is usually done through product returns to make the merchant believe that they mishandled the return package, and thus provide a refund without the item being returned. It can also be done by the seller, generally by creating fraudulent online stores or creating fake listings on sites such as eBay or Mercari. This makes it very hard to perform a chargeback, as the tracking shows the item has been delivered. This is also known as an FTID scam, standing for Fake Tracking ID. When this scam is successful, the tracking number will show that the package has been delivered to the correct address, when the package was instead delivered to a different address. This package is generally empty or filled with garbage. However, this scam has mostly been “patched” via new technology provided by the various couriers globally. It is estimated the scam cost retailers £18,000,000,000 in lost revenue.
