Australia.--Limits of weight and size, same as in Great Britain.
Postage rates, 6 pence (12 cents) for the first pound, and 3 pence (6
cents) for each additional pound.
Germany.--Greatest weight, 50 kilograms (about 110 pounds); no limit
of size. Postage rates: For all parcels conveyed not more than 10
geographic miles, 25 pfennig (6 cents), and 50 pfennig (13 cents) for
greater distance; if a parcel weighs more than 5 kilograms (11 pounds
av.), it is charged for each additional kilogram (2 pounds) carried 10
miles, 5 pfennig (1 cent); 20 miles, 10 pfennig (3 cents); 50 miles,
20 pfennig (5 cents); 100 miles, 30 pfennig (8 cents); 150 miles, 40
pfennig (10 cents); and more than 150 miles, 50 pfennig (13 cents).
Unwieldy parcels are charged in addition 50 per cent of the above rates.
Austria.--Greatest weight, 50 kilograms (110 pounds); except that
parcels containing gold or silver coin may weigh up to 65 kilograms
(143 pounds). Postage rates: Parcels up to 5 kilograms (11 pounds) in
weight are charged 30 heller (6 cents) for the first 10 miles, and 60
heller (12 cents) for greater distances. A parcel weighing more than
5 kilograms (11 pounds) is charged for each kilogram (2 pounds) in
addition to the above rates, for the first 10 miles, 6 heller (1 cent);
20 miles, 12 heller (2 cents); 50 miles, 24 heller (5 cents); 100
miles, 36 heller (7 cents); 150 miles, 48 heller (10 cents), and more
than 150 miles, 60 heller (12 cents).
France.--Greatest weight 10 kilograms (about 22 pounds); no limit of
size. Postage rates: Up to 3 kilograms (7 pounds), 60 centimes (12
cents) delivered at the railway station, and 85 centimes (17 cents)
delivered at a residence; from 3 to 5 kilograms (7 to 11 pounds), 80
centimes (16 cents) at a station, and 1 franc 5 centimes (21 cents)
at residence; from 5 to 10 kilograms (11 to 22 pounds), 1 franc 25
centimes (25 cents) at a station, and 1 franc 50 centimes (30 cents) at
a residence.
Belgium.--Greatest weight 60 kilograms (about 132 pounds); no limit
of size, but unwieldy parcels are charged 50 per cent in addition to
the following rates for any distance: Parcels up to 5 kilograms (11
pounds), 50 centimes (10 cents)--or if by express trains, 80 centimes
(16 cents); up to 10 kilograms (22 pounds), 60 centimes (12 cents)--or
if by express trains, 1 franc (20 cents); for each additional 10
kilograms (22 pounds), 10 centimes (2 cents)--or if sent by express
trains, 50 centimes (10 cents) additional. Fee for delivering at
residences, 30 centimes (6 cents).
Italy.--Greatest weight, 5 kilograms (11 pounds). For ordinary parcels,
greatest size in any direction, 60 centimeters (2 feet), except rolls
which may measure 1 meter (40 inches--3 feet 4 inches) in length by 20
centimeters (8 inches) in thickness. Postage rates for a parcel not
exceeding 3 kilograms (7 pounds), 60 centimes (12 cents); and 1 franc
(20 cents) for a parcel exceeding that weight. A parcel which exceeds
60 centimeters (2 feet) in any direction, but does not exceed 1½ meters
(5 feet), is admitted to the mails as an “unwieldy” parcel and is
charged, in addition to the above rates, 30 centimes (6 cents) if it
does not weigh more than 3 kilograms (7 pounds), and 50 centimes (10
cents) if it exceeds that weight.
The Netherlands.--Greatest weight, 5 kilograms (11 pounds); greatest
size, 25 cubic decimeters (1,525 cubic inches), or 1 meter (3 feet
4 inches) in any direction. Postage rates: 15 (6) cents (Dutch) up
to 1 kilogram (2 pounds); 20 (8) cents from 1 to 3 kilograms (2 to 7
pounds); 25 cents (10) from 3 to 5 kilograms (7 to 11 pounds).
Chile.--Greatest weight, 5 kilograms (11 pounds); must not measure
more than 60 centimeters (2 feet) in any direction. Postage rates: 30
centavos (10 cents) if a parcel does not weigh more than 3 kilograms (7
pounds); 50 centavos (17 cents) if it weighs more.
Cuba.--Greatest weight, 11 pounds; greatest size, 3 feet 6 inches
in length by 2 feet 6 inches in width. Postage rates: 10 centavos
(10 cents) a pound up to 5 pounds; and 6 centavos (6 cents) for each
additional pound.
Exhibit 2.
Rates recommended by the Postmaster-General in his annual report
(year ended June 30, 1907) for packages forwarded through the mails
to post-offices in the United States and its possessions, subject to
the regulations which exist at the present time, with the exception of
increasing the weight limit to 11 pounds.
Cents.
One ounce 1
Over 1 ounce and not exceeding 3 ounces 2
Over 3 ounces and not exceeding 4 ounces 3
Over 4 ounces and not exceeding 5 ounces 4
Over 5 ounces and not exceeding 6 ounces 5
Over 6 ounces and not exceeding 8 ounces 6
Over 8 ounces and not exceeding 12 ounces 9
Over 12 ounces and not exceeding 16 ounces 12
Exhibit 3.
Rates recommended by the Postmaster-General in his annual report
(fiscal year ended June 30, 1907) for packages covered by the special
local parcel post on rural delivery routes.
Cents.
For the first pound 5
For each additional pound, up to 11 pounds 2
For fractional parts of a pound:
Two ounces or less 1
Over 2 ounces and up to 4 ounces 2
Over 4 and up to 8 ounces 3
Over 8 and up to 12 ounces 4
Over 12 ounces and up to 1 pound 5
Our Postal Express.
James L. Cowles.
The United States post-office has always been an express service,
although Congress long confined the business to sealed parcels of very
small weights--not over 3 pounds--and at very high rates graduated
according to distance, with no insurance whatever against loss or
damage in the mails. In 1874, however, the business was extended over
all kinds of merchandise in unsealed parcels at a common rate of
one cent each two ounces, regardless at once of distance and of the
volume of a patron’s business. This placed the humblest citizen in the
most out of the way postal district of the country on a par with the
biggest corporation in our greatest metropolis as to the cost of the
transportation of his produce and of his supplies in parcels up to four
pounds, and, though still with no insurance against loss or damage,
the new postal express immediately became a dangerous competitor to
the private express company with its distance rates based on what the
subject will bear and always discriminating in favor of the big town
against the little town, the big corporation against the ordinary
citizen.
The private express interests got quickly to work, therefore, and
Congress soon checked up the growing postal express business by
increasing the postal rate one hundred per cent--from eight to sixteen
cents a pound. Later Congress bowed to the powerful book and seed
interests of the country and reduced the rate on their merchandise
to the old rate of 1874, and now, for many years, the post-office
and the public have been subjected to two sets of rates on matter
indistinguishable both in character and as to the cost of their
transportation.
The evil of this absurd postal classification, continued these twenty
years by Congress, becomes decidedly evident when our domestic service
is compared with the foreign parcels post services established by
President Taft and Postmaster-General Hitchcock, with their common 11
pound weight limit at 12 cents a pound, on all merchandise posted from
the United States to foreign countries and from those countries to the
United States:
From Austria:
4½ pounds .35
11 pounds .86
From Italy:
7 pounds .39
11 pounds .79
From Norway:
2½ pounds .16
11 pounds .96
From Germany:
4½ pounds .33
11 pounds .81
From Belgium:
4½ pounds .35
11 pounds 1.10
U. S. Foreign Rates:
2¼ pounds .36
7 pounds .84
11 pounds 1.32
U. S. Domestic Service:
2¼ pounds .36
4½ pounds (2 parcels) .72
7 pounds (2 parcels) 1.12
11 pounds (3 parcels) 1.76
Under the English post-American express arrangement English postal
parcels now come to New York three pounds for sixty cents; seven pounds
for 84c; eleven pounds for $1.08, and these parcels are forwarded by
the American express company throughout the country at a common rate
of twenty-four cents a parcel, eight cents a pound on a three-pound
parcel; about three and a half cents a pound on a seven-pound parcel,
and less than two and a half cents a pound on an eleven-pound parcel.
Meantime the express company taxes domestic merchandise of the same
weights from 25 cents to $3.20, according to the distance traversed,
while Congress taxes the public for a similar domestic postal service,
three pounds, forty-eight cents; seven pounds, 2 parcels, $1.12; eleven
pounds, 3 parcels, $1.76.
Data Relative to Proposed Extension of Parcel Post. pp. 8-14.
From The Boston Herald.
Ernest G. Walker.
Postmaster-General Wanamaker first actively urged the establishment
of a parcels post on a large scale. He summed up the situation
epigrammatically in his 100 reasons for it and only 4 reasons against
it--those 4 being the express companies. Others after him, especially
the late Postmaster-General Bissell, made like recommendations. But
Mr. Meyer now has an advantage in his campaign which none of his
predecessors had in the rural delivery routes. Every one of the many
thousands of routes would be a little parcels service in itself, aside
from being a line of communication, by which small packages could be
conveyed from all parts of the country or to any part of the country.
Mr. Meyer is building much upon that fact. The local service at cheaper
rates will also protect the local store-keepers, to which the big
department stores and mail-order establishments are bogeys.
Ever since he announced his intention of urging a better parcels post
service for the United States, the Postmaster-General has been the
recipient of many letters. These come from various classes of people.
Most of them commend his plan, but the retail associations, such as the
associations of hardware men and grocers, come out in bold opposition.
It is such people as these that the Postmaster-General hopes to convert
when they are brought to understand the details of what he wants to
do. Some of these critics, besides claiming that the legislation would
favor the catalogue houses, argue that the government should not go
into a general freight business and that if the express companies are
charging exorbitant rates, the Interstate Commerce Commission, which
now has authority over them, should step in and require that the rates
be lowered.
The operations of parcels post in other countries make a very
interesting transportation chapter. They are conducted on a gigantic
scale and, apart from what J. Henniker Heaton, long an English member
of Parliament from Canterbury, and a great advocate of postal reforms,
calls “grandmotherly regulations,” have worked with practically
world-wide success. Shopping by mail is made easy, whether one in the
country would trade with the local draper or the big metropolitan
merchant.
Great Britain’s conservative enactments will likely be a model for
any extension of the parcels post service by Congress. The service is
almost twenty-five years old over there. It has become one of the most
important and highly appreciated postal features. Its growth has been
continuous and phenomenal. The scope has frequently been broadened.
There was an early clamor for an agricultural parcels post. The owners
of small farms in remote localities wanted it. The growers of spring
flowers in Kerry said it would enable them to compete with the south
of France and the Scilly Isles. Eventually the agricultural parcels
post was authorized and also spacious dimensions for packages. Flower
growers can now send full length orchid spikes and long-stemmed roses
by post, where formerly only simple blooms were admissable.
_Send Fish, Eggs and Fruit_
The produce of the culturists goes forward to London and other big
English cities in tremendous volume. Fresh fish, dispatched from
seaport towns to the large hotels, are delivered with celerity. Meats,
cheese, fruits, vegetables, and freshly laid eggs in mail packages
under the 11-pound limit form a very considerable factor in the
commerce of the Kingdom.
The general rates are low. A 1-pound parcel takes a three-penny stamp.
That is 6 cents in our money. For 2 pounds an 8-cent stamp is required;
for three pounds, a 10-cent stamp; for 5 pounds, 12 cents; for 7
pounds, 14 cents; 8 pounds, 16 cents; 9 pounds, 18 cents; 10 pounds,
20 cents, and 11 pounds, 22 cents. Four-pound parcels cost as much as
five pounds, and 6 pounds cost as much as 7 pounds. For inland parcels
3 feet 6 inches is the maximum length; 6 feet the maximum measurement
for length and girth. These have been adopted as standard dimensions
in the services of numerous other countries. Parcels should not be
posted at a letter box, but presented at the counter of a postoffice.
The government virtually guarantees the sender against loss up to
$10. Payment of a registry fee of 4 cents, in addition to the regular
postage, insures the parcel for $25; a 25-cent registry stamp carries
an insurance of $1,000. There have been demands, not yet conceded,
for the cash on delivery system that several European countries have
adopted.
The big retail stores of London avail themselves extensively of the
parcels service for delivery of goods. The rates, ranging from 6 to
22 cents, are not prohibitive. In many cases the government service
is cheaper and quicker. Laundries return washing by parcels post. In
Germany, where the rates are even cheaper, lads away at school send
their soiled linen home by mail to be washed and it is returned to them
by the same conveyance.
Sidney Buxton, the postmaster-general of Great Britain, in his
last report, statistically demonstrates the continuous growth, and
consequently the popularity, of the parcels post in the United Kingdom.
The number of parcels delivered in the country districts of England
and Wales in 1896-97 was 41,512,000, and increased annually by from 3
to 6 per cent, till in 1905-6 the number was 66,277,000. In the London
district for the same ten-year period the increase was from 11,229,000
parcels to 18,167,000. A similar increase was shown for Scotland from
6,802,000 to 10,725,000 parcels, and for Ireland, where the increase
was from 4,172,000 in 1896-97 to 6,513,000 in 1905-6.
The gross amount of revenue the government collected increased from
£1,445,126 for 63,715,000 parcels in the United Kingdom for the first
year of the decade to £2,138,673 for 101,682,000 parcels in the last
year of the decade. The post-office’s share of these collections
increased from £763,307 to £1,142,224. The average postage per parcel
decreased during the period from about 11 cents to 10 cents. The
postmaster-general undertakes to deliver both letters and parcels at
every house in the Kingdom. They are delivered by the same postman,
except in the large towns, where there is a special staff for parcel
work.
_Call Swiss Service Best_
Because of competition from private agencies, that have charges
graduated on a basis of distance, there is a tendency for an unduly
high proportion of long distance parcels and parcels for delivery in
rural districts, which are the least remunerative. The post-office
has met this competition by establishing, for comparatively short
distances, a large number of horse and motor parcel van services,
as road conveyance for these distances makes possible an economy as
compared with conveyance by railway at the charge of 55 per cent of the
receipts.
The Swiss is cited much as one of the most efficient and satisfactory
in Europe. The mountain villages and resorts of that industrious
little country receive a large portion of their supplies by post, as a
maximum weight of 110 pounds is carried within a radius of 62 miles.
The conditions there are somewhat the same as with the dwellers in the
Appalachian and Blue Ridge mountains, to whom it has been declared that
a parcels post would be a great boon because there is no prospect that
either the railroads or the express companies will ever approach their
hamlets and villages.
This Swiss law includes an agricultural parcels post and likewise a
passenger post, agitation for both of which has generally followed the
establishment of parcels post in most countries. The passenger post of
Switzerland is something like the mail coaches in the United States
before the coming of railroads, except that the coaches are owned by
the state and the fees are prescribed by the same authority. A very
large business is done in sending parcels through the mails. A treasury
official, who was traveling in Switzerland during the past summer, saw
at one railroad station several enormous baskets filled with hams and
provisions. They were samples of mail parcels under the 110-pound limit.
_Cash on Delivery Plan_
The general rates are more liberal than in any other country. A parcel
weighing 1 pound is carried anywhere within the boundaries of the
Federation for 3 cents, a 5-pound parcel for 5 cents, a 11-pound
parcel for 8 cents, a 22-pound parcel for 17 cents, a 33-pound parcel
for 23 cents, and a 44-pound parcel for 33 cents. Parcels weighing
as much as 110 pounds are carried within a radius of 62 miles for 60
cents, which enables many of the peasants to market much of their light
produce by mail. The rates are so adjustable that housewives can secure
anything by post from a paper of pins to a bag of flour. The V. P.,
or value payable, system is a part of the Swiss postal arrangements,
so that purchaser can pay for his goods on delivery, and there is but
one financial transaction connected with the purchase as far as he is
concerned. A provision for delivery makes the service all the more
attractive.
Belgium’s parcels post has even a higher weight limit than Switzerland,
for it accepts articles of 62 kilograms, or about 132 pounds, in
one package, and puts no limit upon the size, except that unwieldy
packages are subject to an extra charge of 50 per cent. But up to 5
kilograms, which is the conventional 11-pound limit of a majority of
the parcels post countries, the charge is 50 centimes, or 10 cents;
for 10 kilograms 12 cents, and two cents extra for every additional
10 kilograms (22 pounds). A higher charge is made in Belgium, as in
several other European countries, if the parcel is to be carried on an
express train. It amounts to six cents for five kilograms. The fee for
delivering at residence is six cents additional.
Germany and Austria maintain the 50-kilogram limit. The first named
country enforces the 50 per cent extra charge for unwieldy articles. It
also has what is called the zone system. For conveyance 10 geographic
miles the charge is six cents (25 pfennigs), and 13 cents (50 pfennigs)
for greater distances. If the parcel weighs more than 11 pounds there
is a charge of one cent (five pfennigs) for each additional kilogram
carried 10 miles, 10 pfennigs for 20 miles, 20 pfennigs for 50 miles,
30 pfennigs for 100 miles, 40 pfennigs for 150 miles, and 50 pfennigs,
approximately 13 cents, for more than 150 miles. The same rate of
charges applies in Austria.
_A Table of Charges_
The French parcels post law requires presentation at the railroad
station. Some other European countries, like Great Britain, require
it to be delivered at the postoffice. The French maximum weight is 10
kilograms (22 pounds) without any restriction as to size. The postage
rates are 12 cents up to 3 kilograms; 16 cents up to 5 kilograms,
and 30 cents up to 10 kilograms. These rates are for delivery at a
railroad station. An extra fee of 25 centimes (5 cents) is charged for
delivering the parcel at the residence of the addressee.
Certain elementary items of cost enter into the service of European
countries that would not be identical with the maintenance of a similar
service in the United States. In Germany a considerable mileage of
the railroads is state owned. They carry certain parcels in the mails
without compensation. In large sections of Europe there has never been
anything like adequate service by express companies, and in the absence
of business enterprises in establishing such transportation the people
have been compelled to look to their governments for relief. The cheap
rates for parcels post there were originally, in some part, intended as
an accommodation for the poorer classes.
The distances for transportation are less and the population is denser.
The United States is 225 times larger than Switzerland, 60 times larger
than England, 17 times larger than Germany, 12 times larger than the
three countries combined. In England the average distance a letter or
mail package travels is 40 miles; in Germany it is 42 miles; in the
United States it is said to be 542 miles.
_Difficult to Estimate Cost_
No accurate information is available as to whether the European parcels
posts are in reality self-supporting. They certainly are nearly so,
and in some instances are regarded as profitable government ventures.
Everywhere the service is characterized by prompt transmission and
prompt delivery. The percentages of loss are very small. The several
national constituencies that have a parcels post system would no more
relinquish such privileges than American cities would relinquish
electric lights or automobiles. One European enthusiast pronounced
the establishment of the parcels post “a service to mankind only less
splendid than that of the transmission of thought.”
In England it is claimed that the parcels post service would be
a source of profit but for the amounts paid to the railroads for
transportation, the share of 55 per cent of the receipts being regarded
as exorbitant. Generally the parcels post is so joined with the rest of
the mail service that its entire cost can not be counted.
The international business has grown to enormous proportions. The
figures collected at Berne for 1904, in connection with the Postal
Union, show that the parcels mailed across the frontiers of 36 nations
and colonies that year numbered something like 38,000,000. The small
percentage of that total, where the value was declared, showed an
aggregate of about $162,000,000 worth of property. In that list the
United States would have stood about eleventh on the showing for the
fiscal year of 1906, when 264,438 parcels of an average weight of 2⅔
pounds were sent from this country abroad. Tunis sent more according
to the figures than the United States. Germany, leading all other
nations both in the dispatch and receipt of parcels in international
mails, sent a total of 11,675,385, of which 11,343,516 were classed as
“ordinary,” and 331,869 were “with a declared value” of $23,352,378.
Austria, enjoying close postal relations with Germany, dispatched
10,659,300 parcels to other countries, of which 1,082,430 had a
declared value of $68,396,578.
_Has Become Great Factor_
The totals of “receipts” and “dispatches” of course balance for the
36 countries in question, but are not the same for each country
represented. The rank in parcels dispatched runs: Germany, Austria,
France, Hungary, Great Britain, Switzerland, Italy, Belgium,
Netherlands, Tunis, British India, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Russia, Denmark,
Luxemburg, Japan, and Egypt; in parcels received the order is: Germany,
Hungary, Austria, Switzerland, France, Italy, Great Britain, Belgium,
Russia, Netherlands, Denmark, Roumania, Spain, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Sweden, Norway, Luxemburg, Tunis, and so on. Switzerland in 1904
received across her borders 2,788,406 parcels by post, of which
2,635,090 were “ordinary” and 133,316 were declared of a value of
$9,863,886. Of 6,352,360 parcels that came over the Austrian frontier,
778,380 had a declared value of $64,788,927. Germany received 7,337,404
parcels in international mails, of which 482,472 had a declared value
of $35,901,435. The parcels received by post in the United States
during the fiscal year 1906 from abroad were recorded as 131,064, of
an average weight of 2.73 pounds. Probably the actual number was much
larger, perhaps twice as large.
Sufficient figures have been given to indicate what a great factor the
parcels post has become in the trade of the world. The value of the
merchandise thus transported can only be roughly estimated, but it will
probably exceed half a billion dollars annually.