Postal services in Europe will stop sending parcels to the United States as new tariffs on the import of goods worth less than $800 kick in at the end of the month.
U.S. President Donald Trump last month scrapped a long-standing tax exemption on the import of low value goods known as “de minimis” from Aug. 29 onwards via an executive order.
National post services in France, Spain, Germany and the U.K. have all said they would temporarily suspend their shipment services to the U.S. as of next week to prepare for the new measures. Belgian postal service Bpost already stopped shipping parcels to the U.S. on Friday, the company announced in a statement.
The suspensions — which will not affect letters or small parcels worth less than $100 in many countries — will start on Monday and last until the postal services find practical solutions.
“The suspension will be maintained for the time strictly necessary to adopt the necessary operational measures to meet the new obligations of the United States,” the Spanish national postal service Correos said on Friday.
The U.K.’s Royal Mail said it hoped the interruption would only last a couple of days after which it would have “a new system up and running,” the BBC reported.
Some services blamed the U.S. for not giving them enough time to prepare for the new rules.
“Despite discussions with the U.S. customs services, no time was granted to postal operators to organize themselves and ensure the necessary IT developments for compliance with the new established rules,” France’s La Post said, according to reports in Le Monde.
The tariffs on small parcels come just as the U.S. and the European Union shook hands on a new trade deal to end months of escalating tensions over tariffs between the two blocs.
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