If you ship with UPS, here's a tip that might save you some money. It would have saved us over a hundred dollars on our last package. If you print your labels from the UPS website, you know that you are asked for the dimensions which are used to calculate the total costs. I didn't actually measure our box, which was fairly large and just made some guesses. I did this a few times while shopping for prices and the dimensions I finally input for the final charges were a few inches off from when I was shopping for prices (bad math skills). The result: a hundred dollar difference. I didn't realize this until our customer asked for more information on the shipment and I had to go back to the receipt. I called UPS to find out if they actually measure or weigh the package at any time because I thought that I had been a little too liberal in my measurements. The answer, sometimes they do, but they don't adjust down. If you estimate that the package weights 30lbs. but it really weights 15lbs, then you are paying the 30lbs charge. So, with UPS, guess low or actually measure it.

Labels: tips