BellaOnline Forums Travel and Culture Polish Culture Finding a long-lost Polish penpal

I'm sorry you have such bad luck with your letters. I've never had these problems, but then again... I've never written to Poland. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I can see why you would not send a registered letter to Poland every time. A regular letter costs 80 cents, but a registered letter - near 10 times that much!! Better to use email, I suppose.

My dad usually sends letters to Poland no problem. The only things that cause problems are packages or larger things sent through the U.S.P.S. Then he just takes them to a Polish store that has some service come by and pick them up and send them off.

I wonder why that happens . . . the packages I have sent to Poland have taken 3-4 weeks to arrive - I am still waiting to hear about the last one sent 3 weeks ago.

I asked UPS about their delivery service, and it would have cost $100 instead of the $20 I spent at USPS. When I was there, a woman wanted to send a baseball cap to Czech, and she was told it would cost $123. <img src="/images/graemlins/wall.gif" alt="" />

The private American mailing companies will literally charge as much as they possibly can to send a package to a foreign country - costs for airplane fuel, truck fuel, salaries of the people needed to transfer the package from point A to B to C, and so on. But they will usually send their own couriers to make sure the package gets to the destination. Once you drop the package off, it is in the company's hands exclusively until it is delivered by hand. For this, you will pay money.

The U.S. post office, however, is subsidized. International costs are even less thanks to a "cost sharing" program that all nations' postal systems have with each other. But, you have to take the risk that the post offices, in the U.S., the countries of transit, and in the destination country will actually keep track of your package and make sure it gets delivered properly. Even registered packages aren't guaranteed 100%. Probably the only way through USPS is to send an express package, since that is given the highest and only real priority.

Again, I have no experience with Poland, but I have sent letters and packages, and have received letters and packages, to/from several different former USSR, some of which are far poorer and more disorganized than Poland, and I have never had any trouble. The largest problem I ever had was a letter that was delayed by 2 months - that is all.

Just make sure the address is exact, and that all the post offices from drop-off to pick-up and in between can understand exactly where it is going. Have your paperwork (customs forms, return receipts, etc.) all in order, in English (if sending from the U.S.), and preferably in the language of the country's destination, too. If nothing else, French is still the international postal language.

If the postal system in the destination country isn't sure about something, they WILL open and examine the package for customs and security reasons. This is guaranteed to delay what you are sending by quite some time... assuming it will ever make it out of the customs office again!

Today my dad wanted to find out at the local Polish store about sending a bike we bought for my trip. He found out that now there will be some kind of tax on the bike.

Maybe the post office where these letters pass through is safe. Poznan is in the Western part of Poland which is always considered less corrupted. I have a friend in Zamosc - East part of Poland and almost no any letter, if not registered does not reach her at all!