Shipper'S Letter Of Instructions: Fill & Download for Free

Hello and welcome to the fast and crazy life of e commerce. YES, PLEASE DO JOIN! But a word of caution... We need NATIVE ENGLISH PROGRAMMERS, NOT DROP SHIPPERS!!! The only way we are going to last against Chinese based start ups is to take advantage of having a strong command of English. All the important business how to material is in English. I DO NOT think it's a good idea to spend your first thousand in savings on starting a drop ship business.To everyone that is reading this, all the classes and hype around drop shipping..... The actual successful shops that can stay live in business have far more money and resources in their operations than a thousand bucks...I've been in international multi channel e commerce for over 14 years now. I started with 60 dollars back in the day when Ebay and amazon trust and safety measures weren't so strict.I could write a long and drawn out explanation as to why not, but I will keep this short and sweet for you. If you have a thousand dollars and some time to burn on starting something that actually consistently delivers value;If I had to start all over again today from zero, here are some of the things I would do:Pick up the basics of at LEAST and definitely not limited to:Operations Managementproject managementrapid solutions architecture Via something like PHP and MYSQL in conjunction with either MAGENTO/WOO COMMERCE, then also Acces or FileMakerbuy a book or two how to model in BPMN and practice dailyspend serious time in learning the ins and outs of PLA and analytics like Google shopping and AdwordsAll with the intent to build a resilient foundation that can weather the ever changing environment of e-commerce.Again, please do not jump right into trying to be a drop shipper.Most of the hype is from people who just want to exploit your excitement for monetary gain... Yes even the big sites.I know literally hundreds of tech heads across China and Taiwan who could run circles around you and everyone else all excited about getting their feet wet in dropshipping. Seriously, there are too many code savvy people who are waiting to snoop on your good idea, and under cut you just as soon as you think things go smoothly. YES its really that easy. All your hard efforts in putting together titles, data feeds, etc., anyone with rudimentary PHP skills could copycat you and kick you out of business in no time simply because they only need 400 a month to cover their business overhead. It's that crazy. If you aren't kicked out of the game by Chinese competition teams, Amazon themselves will undercut you by buying directly from the supplier to go head to head against you.Get in it to win it. Start right so you can stay long.LEAN/SIX SIGMA/Value added BPM/KAIZEN and other constant improvement methodologies are a great resource to help prepare you to build a sustainable strategy.Please be safe, think carefully, get lots of advice, and keep learning.Good Luck to you

Technically, only the USPS is a "postal carrier;" UPS and FedEx are private parcel services and have no connection with the federal government other than having the government for a client and having certain portions of their business regulated by it.As Joel Wishkovsky pointed out that they have several methods of detecting contraband and all of them work with some degree of effectiveness. However, the sheer volume of parcels precludes them from checking more than a tiny minority of packages. From talking with people that work in the industries, they usually look for:Suspicious looking/acting people.People that don't know the address of where they are sending the packagePeople who ship an "excessive" number of packages but don't have a business.People who ship from (or to) known "drug areas" (e.g. border towns, cities in Florida,etc)People who pay cash to ship packages.Basically, the majority of illicit shipments get through to their destination. However, if a single package is flagged or detected, it's likely that the sender and receiver will garner far more attention than they ever wanted.