Fuel cost ups shipping bill (U.S.)
Carriers once again are responding to higher oil and gasoline prices by passing along the costs. Rather than raise base rates, they impose fuel surcharges.
– DHL raises the Air Express and International surcharge from 18.5 percent of the total shipping bill, to 19.5 percent. The surcharge for Ground Delivery service rises from 5 percent to 5.3 percent.
-UPS raises the Ground Delivery fuel surcharge from 5 percent to 5.25 percent. The surcharge for air and international deliveries goes from 16.50 percent to 17.50 percent.
FedEx fuel surcharges go up the same as UPS, for the same categories.
In catalogs and on Web sites, most of the tables on shipping costs don’t include a fuel surcharge.
The U.S. Postal Service, whose rates are governed by a federal commission, can’t impose fuel surcharges.
That doesn’t stop the postal service from taking other steps to realign pricing with the actual costs of processing the mail. First class stamp rates rose from 39 to 41 cents in May, Since then, the postal service also takes more consideration of the size and shape of a piece of mail, when calculating prices.
