The Trump administration said last month that it will abolish tax exemptions for small packages entering the US starting August 29th.
The move sparked a surge in announcements from postal services, including France, the UK, Germany, Italy, India, Australia and Japan.
The United Nations Universal Postal Coalition (UPU) said postal operators have already been advised by 25 member states that they have “stopped outbound postal services to the United States,” citing uncertainties particularly related to transport services.
It said the suspension will remain until it becomes clearer about how U.S. officials plan to implement the announced measures.
The UPU did not provide a list of postal services they heard.
Established in 1874, an organization that counts 192 member states warned that the new US measures “contains substantial operational changes to postal operators around the world.”
Starting Friday, UPU said on behalf of the US Customs and Border Protection Agency that mail will need to be delivered to the US to the US “to collect customs duties from the sender in advance.”
India’s Ministry of Communications said over the weekend that Trump’s executive order issued last month required US authorities to require transport officials or other “qualified parties” to collect and transfer tariff duties.
However, “Some important processes relating to the mechanisms of designating ‘qualifying parties’ and collection and remittance of obligations remain undefined,” the statement said.
Under the new US measures, individual customers can send documents and items worth up to $100 as gifts to the country without being taxed.
However, anything beyond its value is expected to be hit with the same tariff charges that apply to other imports from the sending country.
In other words, 15% of European Union countries and 50% of India countries.
And last week, German post office DHL warned that even exempt items would be subject to additional checks to prevent the service from being used on the product.
rhm/