shipping nowadays is always a most interesting journey..
ex the good ol' U S of A :
DHL took me 4 days to NL ( yep ...I am a Cloggy
) for $140 USD for a small Ottoman antique 19th C dagger ( and no import duties charged....
)
value from auction was $100.. actual or real value should be $ 250-300
USPS with their local partner Post.NL again value $100 for a Bosnian dagger from 1860, actual value around 400 - 450, shipping $ 80 .... 4 monnths....with Euro 35 import duties, delivering it together wit a small yacht window ( whose owner was also waiting for 3=4 months on it from a complete different part of Holland) ....
Austrian Post uses Eurodis as intermediate to the Dutch Post.NL and ships for € 18 : 9 times all OK, one time my dagger was lost and on its way back to sender due to incorrect address. The sender made no mistake but all the intermediates put their labels over the original address. Even after contacting all callcenters of 3 involved companies it took 3 months to get my package found an delivered. Terrible... although all other 9 Austrian shipments went OK.
My recent experience :
a book on cold weapons from Bosnia: purchase price 60, DHL ( being the only option) 30....upon arrival ( 3 days !!! Very fast indeed, the same it took me by motorbike or train to Sarajevo...) I had to pay 17 import duties and....18 handling costs....the last 2 amounts did feel like a ripp off
a klewang ( purchase value $ 75, actual 150)from the US again: $ 35 by USPS: 2 weeks and no import duties....
you tell me ... what's going on?
Sometimes I think they are using the donkey express or the Kon-Tiki whilst other times they are performing excellently.
Nevertheless the scare me sh-beep-tless when it takes more than 1 month
As for description of auction houses: they are not sure anymore, so also bone or horn are lots of times described as Citesitems, whilst they come / are made from local oxes in the Balkans...and the only endangered specie is the collector who is been taken for a ride.... sadly. Thumbs up nevertheless yeh all