USPS office didn't want to ship live fish

[Mahi27]

Has anyone had this happen before? I was trying to ship two separate boxes of fish, some G. metallicus and platies. The postal worker didn't want to take the box. I showed him on the USPS website that they do indeed allow shipment of live, harmless fish (this page: https://pe.usps.com/text/pub52/pub52c5_008.htm). He ended up sending me to a different counter for that employee to deal with me. By this time I was really late to work so I'm ashamed to say it but I lied to the second guy and said there was nothing perishable in the box. Now I feel guilty but also confused and irritated bc why wouldn't they just take the fish??

Any tips or feedback?

[beastie]

In czech republic all but one courier has it explicitly forbidden to ship live animal (including shrimp and snail ) and it happened gradually, one by one shipper and now there is only one, fairly expensive.

Noone wants to be responsible for the loses 

Edited November 14, 2023 by beastie

[nabokovfan87]

On 11/14/2023 at 12:42 PM, Mahi27 said:

Any tips or feedback?

Unfortunately, it's normal for this to happen. I take mine to the UPS shipment warehouse because the local UPS store claims they "don't ship" them. Despite that they do.

It's not worth the argument and I would recommend getting on the phone and speaking to the person at the sorting facility/shipment warehouse for UPS or the postmaster for USPS and verify that they will ship the package. Take the name down of said person for the sake of any issues.

FedEx won't ship live animals anymore from my research.

[Guppysnail]

I have run into this. I even had them tell me they won’t ship live plants once. I have also found packages labeled live fish often get delay. More often than other packages. 
I now use perishable and fragile stickers and do not indicate live fish on the package  

 
 

[Mahi27]

Sighhh, the boxes ended up back on my porch today. With a nonsensical note: "Live fish, need to properly package". So annoying. 

I won't get into politics but it is such a shame that I feel penalized for being honest. Anyway...pics of the colonies I sold from for tax 🙂

[nabokovfan87]

I'm sorry about that @Mahi27 If you want, post pictures about how they were packaged and maybe we can advise?

As far as shipment, the main thing is to follow the guidelines and then to ship them from the facility itself that is the main hub for the area.  For USPS this is often just the actual post office, for UPS it's going to be the sorting facility (whatever the term is these days).

Edited November 16, 2023 by nabokovfan87

[JettsPapa]

I'm surprised to hear that.  I've shipped dozens of packages of live shrimp and/or fish, all labeled as such, with the US postal service, and never had any issues.

[Mahi27]

On 11/16/2023 at 1:42 PM, Pepere said:

I have received plenty of live fish from various venders by usps and none of them met those requirements…

Exactly lol. It's pretty clear to me that they just didn't want to deal with it. I was able to reship them in the exact same packaging the next day from a different USPS office. 

[Fish and Chip]

I have shipped a few dozen orders and one employee asks me "What fish have we got today?" I will tell him the breed and show him a pic if I can. The older guy always gives me a "Did the last one make it?" with a bit of side-eye. 

Neither has denied a shipment tho. 

[jwcarlson]

I have never shipped fish, but have shipped live queen bees quite a bit.  I think the hesitation comes from a good place typically.  Usually it takes some hand holding and it helps to find then right person that knows how to do it.  There's one lady at our PO that knew what to do without a lot of fanfare.

Stinks they took it and just left it on your porch.  There was some discussion on another forum talking about higher rates of fish theft in boxes labeled as fish.

[Guppysnail]

On 11/17/2023 at 5:36 AM, jwcarlson said:

There was some discussion on another forum talking about higher rates of fish theft in boxes labeled as fish.

This should not be surprising but it is.  My mind has a hard time wrapping itself around people stealing other people pets.

 

[JettsPapa]

On 11/17/2023 at 12:23 AM, Fish and Chip said:

I have shipped a few dozen orders and one employee asks me "What fish have we got today?" I will tell him the breed and show him a pic if I can. The older guy always gives me a "Did the last one make it?" with a bit of side-eye. 

I dropped off a package with a "Live Shrimp" sticker on top and all four sides at my little local post office Tuesday.  The guy behind the counter jokingly asked "When are you going to start shipping dead shrimp?"  I replied "Hopefully never.  People tend to want their money back if the shrimp are dead."

On 11/17/2023 at 4:36 AM, jwcarlson said:

I have never shipped fish, but have shipped live queen bees quite a bit.  I think the hesitation comes from a good place typically.  Usually it takes some hand holding and it helps to find then right person that knows how to do it.  There's one lady at our PO that knew what to do without a lot of fanfare.

Stinks they took it and just left it on your porch.  There was some discussion on another forum talking about higher rates of fish theft in boxes labeled as fish.

I worked for probably one of the best known beekeepers in the world in the mid to late '90's.  Try showing up at the post office with a 2-pound package of bees.

Edited November 17, 2023 by JettsPapa