By Aneela Mirchandani
(Update: This story has been updated at 1 pm ET Sept 5, 2025 with new information from the United Nation’s Universal Postal Union)
The Takeaways
📦 Global shipping disruption: Over 60 countries suspended mail to the U.S. after a key tariff exemption—known as “de minimis”—was abruptly revoked by executive order.
💸 Tariffs hit small packages: Even low-value goods now face customs enforcement, with tariffs ranging from 10% to 50%, leaving consumers and ecommerce sellers scrambling.
🌍 Confusion across borders: Consulates, postal authorities, and online sellers were caught off guard, triggering widespread frustration and temporary chaos in international commerce.
The Details
A little-known loophole that allowed shippers overseas to skirt President Donald Trump’s tariffs closed at the end of last month, throwing consumers, ecommerce sellers, and even some consulates into confusion.
Postal authorities of over 60 countries suspended mail deliveries to the US, either wholly or only for packages. The Universal Postal Union (UPU), a United Nations agency tasked with oversight of international mail, is now stepping in to facilitate communication between member nations and the United States so that shipments can resume.
In an email to AsAmNews, the UPU press office intimated that change was disruptive because for the first time, the mail carriers were being called upon to collect customs duty.
As postal authorities suspended shipments to the US, local mail consumers were thrown into confusion, spreading news of the change on social media. A US expat in the Philippines worried about their social security forms not reaching the authorities. Other consumers blamed the postal authorities in Singapore and Malaysia for the cessation of shipment.
“Shame on you, to simply suspend the service at last minute without proper notification to everyone,” one consumer in Malaysia said.
Neither the Consulate General of the Republic of Singapore in San Francisco, nor the Consulate General of Malaysia in Los Angeles responded to requests for comment from AsAmNews.
Consulates of a few other affected countries did not seem to be prepared about the disruption in mail service.
An official at the Philippine Consulate General in San Francisco said in a phone interview with AsAmNews that she had not yet heard of the suspension of all outgoing US mail from the Philippines. Nor, she said, had they received questions from Philippine nationals living in the US.
An official at the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea intimated that goods from South Korea would be subject to a 15% tariff, but was not aware that the country’s national postal service had stopped accepting US-bound parcels. The official looked it up on the internet while on the phone with the AsAmNews reporter, and suggested using private mail delivery such as DHS or Fedex.
The commerce department at the Consulate General of India in San Francisco, the economic department at the Consulate General of Japan in San Francisco, and the director of the economic division at the Consulate General of Taiwan in San Francisco did not respond to requests for comment from AsAmNews.
Ecommerce sellers were already reeling from the shock of losing access to the US market, at least temporarily. Artisanal makers on Etsy, a 3-d print artwork shop in Mexico, and sellers of action figurines and toys in Taiwan warned customers in public posts that their shipments to the US would cease. Industry outlet Beauty Matters reported that beauty brands situated in Korea, the UK, and elsewhere who depend on the US market were facing a “gut punch.”
For decades, an exemption known as “de minimis” has allowed small packages shipped from overseas to be exempt from customs inspections, allowing goods sold to US consumers that fall beneath a certain economic value to avoid tariffs. In July, Trump announced via an executive order that the exemption would be ended for all countries starting Aug. 29 at midnight, after having ended it for China and Hong Kong on May 2.
With this change, even small packages will be required to go through customs enforcement. This means consumers will be required to pay tariffs according to the applicable rate per country as set by the White House. For instance, packages from Australia are required to pay 10% of their value, while packages from India will be charged 50% of their value.
However, documents and gifts of up to $100 would remain exempt, Customs and Border Protection announced.
“The issue for postal operators is not the end of the de minimis,” said UPU press secretary Yana Brugier in an email to AsAmNews, “but rather the change on the burden of duty collections and the short delays left for adaptation.”
She added, “Transportation carriers have signaled that they are unwilling or unable to bear this responsibility. Furthermore, neither party has direct contact with senders nor recipients.”
Consumers were already being hit by demands for fees by shipment companies before they could receive their packages. In one such case an AliExpress customer was hit by a $50 fee. According to their post on Reddit, neither the customer service at AliExpress nor the shipping company were able to help sort out the confusion.
Postal authorities across several countries reacted to the end of the de minimis exemption in the US with a patchwork of schemes. Some countries, such as the Philippines, suspended all outbound mail going to the US, while others, such as Malaysia, had only blocked packages and not documents. The United Kingdom had already lifted their temporary suspension of US mail.
An up-to-the-minute list of each country’s postal authority rules was being collated by the Global Trade Alert bulletin board. At last look, more than 60 countries had imposed some sort of mail suspension to the US.
With the global mail disruption, the UPU announced on Aug. 26 that it was working with member nations on their concerns, and had communicated those concerns in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. They also announced that they were working on a scalable duty collection solution across the entire network.
Chad Carleton, the CEO of Good Company, an ecommerce and fulfillment firm, said in an email to AsAmNews that these postal suspensions likely won’t last.
“These suspensions are temporary reactions to a sudden rule change,” Carleton said. “They’ll ease once customs systems catch up.”
But, he added, the old model where shippers could send goods to US consumers skirting customs inspection was likely gone forever.
(We used AI to assist in writing The Takeaways, but only after factchecking and editing by editors)
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