Posting a 1.250 KG Family Tree Album Parcel to Australia

[Mick]

Hi all, I have been collecting wedding photos from everyone in our family I could as part of my family tree research. At least with weddings a date can be found, unlike "Auntie's" tin of good old photos with no names or dates on them :-)

I have made some albums up with 5 generations of wedding photos in them and 72 photos in each album. They are small and neat looking with general family information about each family and were possible a later in life photo too, it shows us aging!

I have four to post to Australia, (from the UK) I do not have any special scales but on my kitchen scales the package weighs 2, 1/2 pound or 1.250 KG.

Are there different postal methods I could ask for? Is all post Air mail now?

I do not begrudge the postal charge but just wondered if there are options ? Mick.IOW.

[Dave Liquorice]

Other half sent a plate (as in china) to Oz via surface mail a year or s= o back. Took around 3 months to get there but it did and in one peice.

for 1.25kg world zone two would be =A318.50 and arrive in about = a week or less. Surfacemail =A310.06.

[Nick Odell]

Apart from waiting for the next time you or a kind friend or relative flies out there, Royal Mail is probably going to offer you the cheapest options from anonymous small packet/printed papers upwards. I suggest you take a look at royalmail.com and play around with the weights and delivery methods and see what looks best to you. And if you find you are on the margins of a weight boundary you can play around a bit to keep within specific limits. From your point of view, you might save money by combining some or all of them but the gesture you are making might wear a little thin if Aunt Jessie has to stump up a number of dollars to get part of the consignment over to Aunt Arabella on the other side of the continent.

Nick

[The Natural Philosopher]

courier them. I will NOT be cheap.

Id guess at £15-£25 each

[Dave Liquorice]

IIRC from looking just now, surfacemail has 2 kg limit. Airmail might be

2.5 kg riseing to 5kg for printed matter.

[Jim K]

does "printed matter" have to be in a plasticy see though "bag"/"envelope"? IOW offering no protection, and general treated as publications & chucked about etc?

Jim K

[Nick Odell]

No

Nick

[Adam Aglionby]

Printed matter can go by a lower rate , but it goes by slowest non priority route.

A decent Post Office is always a great help, my local main P.O. is `king useless, make rules up because not sure of what they are doing. Local sub P.O. are experts at either cheapest or fastest route depending on what customer needs and will pay for. Royal Mails site is good for getting ballpark numbers on cost,

Parcel2go put 1.25kg at just under 30 quid to Australia but 10kg at just under 60 quid if can get them distributed internally from Aus.

Cheers Adam

[Mick]

Thank you all for the help.

Airmail seems the best solution if it is around £20.00 or so. I will tell the clerk it is just photos in albums and hope for the best.

A lot of effort has gone into processing and grouping the albums.

If surface was a quarter of the Air mail price it would have been worth thinking about. Mick.IOW.

[Man at B&Q]

Oh FFS! You've found Usenet. Is it really that fecking difficult to find the Royal Mail website?

MBQ

[Man at B&Q]

Which bit of "the maximum weight is 2kg, apart from books and pamphlets where the max weight is 5kg" suggests a "might be"?

After that it's Parcel Farce or courier. I regularly split parcels that would over 2Kg as it can work out cheaper to send two separate airmail parcels.

MBQ

[polygonum]

It is *much* easier to post the same question here AND soc.genealogy.britain.

[Dave Liquorice]

Do you not know what "IIRC" means? Unlike some I don't state things as fact if I'm unsure.

[Man at B&Q]

You said you had just looked!

MBQ

[Dave Liquorice]

At prices for 1.25kg. The weight limits where only passing information and ICBA to go and look again to check that had remembered correctly.

[Mick]

Options other than Royal Mail?

The parcel cost £14.66 by Air Mail. Mick.

[Mick]

Is posting to two groups separately the same as cross posting then?

I asked in both groups because I thought there would be different views on method of sending?

Mick.

[polygonum]

I think it is not the same - though some groups reject all cross-posts so it is not always an option.

Cross-posting (limited, of course) allows all viewers to see each others' responses and hence avoid saying the same thing again, repeating 'research', whatever.