Shipping Prices and Procedures
We have a very efficient shipping operation and we process 90% of orders and have them picked up by USPS and UPS Ground the next business day. If an order is difficult to "kit" or has questions or issues with lack of stock, the order may be delayed a day. 99% of all orders that do not have a payment or stock issue are sent within 2 business days.
In the last year, particularly with the creation of Regional rate boxes, the Post Office has become much less expensive for shipping the lighter packages than UPS Ground, and Priority Mail is also faster going coast-to-coast. We ship from Boston, MA, so whenever possible we try to ship West Coast orders by Priority Mail so that they take only 2-3 days. We offer an optional Upgrade to ensure that your shipment will go by Priority Mail, but this is not needed on light, simple orders.
In fact, over 90% of all our orders now are cheaper to ship by Priority Mail, due to many price increases by UPS Ground. So, we generally only ship by UPS Ground when orders are particularly heavy or too bulky for the standard Post Office boxes.
In the last 2 years we have seen over 8 major and several minor rate increases in USPS Priority Mail and UPS Ground, raising rates in total over 40%. We had to suspend our previous Free Shipping over $75 program because the only way to continue with that was to increase all our product prices, like many web sites do to compensate for "free" shipping. We chose to keep our prices as low as possible.
We have continued to offer $5 off shipping on any order over $50. This reflects the lower cost of handling and more efficient rates of shipping larger orders.
We also keep up-to-date on the latest Regional Rate boxes and other ways to save customers money. We are also bringing back some Flat Rate Free Shipping Specials on select products in optimal quantities to fit the economical Flat Rate and Regional Rate boxes offered by the Post Office.
If you need an order by a particular date, please tell us in the Comments/Message Field at Checkout. If we see any problem, we will contact you with suggestions for Express upgrade.
For more shipping information please call us at 781-391-2255.
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