How to ship goods within China: express, truck or van

1Four ways to ship goods within China

Which method suits a shipment depends mostly on its size and weight, then on how far it goes and how much handling it can take.

Express (快递)

The national express networks collect from the sender and deliver to the door. The price is a charge for the first kilogram plus a charge for each kilogram after it (首重 and 续重), and a big, light carton is charged on its volume weight instead. Express is the quickest way between cities, but every parcel passes through sorting centres, where cartons are thrown, stacked and sorted by machine. Each piece also has a weight limit; above it, the carrier sends it as freight.

Shared truck (零担, less-than-truckload)

Freight companies, some of them selling the service as express freight (快运), put many customers' goods in one truck. Heavy goods (重货) are priced by weight and light, bulky goods (泡货) by volume, whichever comes out higher. Delivery is often to the freight company's depot, where the receiver collects (自提). Delivery to the door costs more and usually stops at the ground floor. That matters when the receiver is a warehouse expecting goods at its own door, such as a forwarder's hub.

Whole truck (整车, full truckload)

You hire the whole truck. Common lengths are 4.2 m, 6.8 m, 7.6 m, 9.6 m, 13 m and 17.5 m. The size is chosen from the volume and weight of the load and from what the roads at both ends allow: a 17.5 m trailer cannot turn into every factory lane, and some city centres keep large trucks out by day. The goods are loaded once and unloaded once, which makes a whole truck the safest way to move fragile or valuable loads.

Same-city van (同城货运)

Inside one city, a van or small truck booked by the trip is usually the quickest option: collected and delivered the same day, with no depot in between. Say whether the driver should help load, and whether there are stairs.

2How to write a Chinese delivery address

Carriers and drivers in China work in Chinese, so the address they are given has to be in Chinese. Book through us and you can write it in English: we turn it into a standard Chinese address for the driver. Either way, give it from the largest place to the smallest:

1. Province (省), for example 广东省.
2. City (市), then district (区) or county (县).
3. Sub-district or town (街道 or 镇), road and number.
4. Building, unit or warehouse number, and the floor.
5. The receiver's name and a Chinese mobile number: 11 digits, starting with 1.

Our Foshan hub's address is written that way: 广东省 佛山市 南海区 桂城街道林岳大道大塘村自编1号 邮编 528000. The phone number matters more than it looks. Drivers call before they arrive, and a truck that cannot reach anyone may leave with the goods still on it.

3Getting goods from a supplier to your forwarder

For goods leaving China, the domestic leg is usually the supplier's delivery to your freight forwarder's warehouse. Many Chinese sellers include it. 包邮 means free delivery to any address in mainland China, usually apart from the remote regions, and 送到指定地址 means delivery to an address you name. Give the seller the forwarder's address in Chinese and your shipping mark, then ask three things:

• Express or freight? Freight should be delivered to the door (送货上门), not left at a depot for someone to collect.
• Who pays the delivery? 寄付 means the sender has paid; 到付 means the receiver is asked to pay on arrival. Agree it before the goods leave.
• When will it be sent, and what is the tracking number? Ask for the waybill number (运单号) the day it goes.

When the seller will not deliver, or several suppliers need collecting on the same day, book a pickup instead. Our China domestic delivery service collects from suppliers anywhere in China and delivers to your forwarder's warehouse, or to our own Foshan and Shenzhen hubs if you ship to Singapore with us. Who pays for which leg is set by the trade term you agree with the supplier: see the Incoterms guide. The rest of the supplier side is in the 1688 guide for businesses, and the Singapore journey in the complete guide to shipping from China to Singapore.

4Packing for sorting centres and trucks

• Strong cartons, filled to the top. A half-empty carton collapses under the ones stacked on it in a sorting centre.
• A wooden frame for fragile goods. Glass, stone, ceramics and machines travel in a wooden frame or crate (打木架). Without one, a carrier may refuse a breakage claim.
• Pallets for freight. On a shared truck, goods on a pallet are moved by forklift instead of by hand.
• Every carton marked. The receiver, a carton number (1/12, 2/12 and so on) and, for a forwarder, your shipping mark.

Measure the packed cartons, not the products. The CBM calculator turns carton sizes into cubic metres, which is what shared trucks are priced on and what decides the size of a whole truck.

5Goods that express carriers screen

Parcels in China are security-screened when they are collected and again in sorting centres. Lithium batteries, liquids, powders, aerosols, flammables and strong magnets are refused by some networks and accepted by others, with extra packing or paperwork. Tell the carrier before collection: a parcel stopped at screening goes back to the sender, and the days are lost.

6Cover and claims (保价)

Every carrier pays for loss or damage only up to its own standard limit, which can be far below what the goods are worth. Declared-value cover (保价) raises the limit, for a fee based on the value declared. Two habits keep a claim possible: declare the value when the shipment is booked, and check the goods before signing for them (先验货后签收). Once the receiver has signed for goods in good order, a claim is hard to make.

When we arrange a delivery, every shipment is insured by our delivery partners in China, and we photograph the goods before and after loading. 保价 for valuable goods can be added on the quote as its own line.

7Remote regions

Xinjiang, Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia and Inner Mongolia are usually outside free-delivery areas: listings say 偏远地区不包邮. Fewer trucks run there and express takes longer, so get a price for the delivery before agreeing who pays it.

8When to have someone in China arrange it

Booking a delivery in China yourself takes a Chinese phone number, a Chinese payment account and enough Chinese to talk to a driver. From outside China, that is usually the hard part. Our China domestic delivery service does it for customers anywhere in the world: pickups to your forwarder or to our hubs, and deliveries between any two addresses in mainland China. You write to us in English and get a price within a few hours, in US dollars, euros, Singapore dollars or renminbi, and you can pay by card or PayPal.

9Get a price for a delivery in China