Shipping from USA to Mumbai (Part 5)

How to pack?

I told both Maha and Nina that I will let them know when our final packing was done in about 2-3 weeks and give them the exact final count of boxes with their dimensions and weight to get their final quote. Reading the helpful posts from different websites (mentioned above) and also based on a couple of documents from Maha and Nina, I decided to ensure that each box weigh not more than eighteen kilograms (18 kgs) or forty pounds (39.6 lbs to be precise). I also decided to buy all the boxes of a uniform size from a store (instead of reusing some of the cartons of different sizes that we had). The Shippers charge extra if an additional person is required to handle the boxes when they come to collect the same. Based on advice from Shippers and others, I wanted to ensure each box can be handled individually by one person. This was a critical decision that helped a lot later on while handling / moving the boxes at all places – my home in Harrisburg, Mumbai Air Cargo, transporting from Air Cargo Complex to my home in Mumbai and then for moving the boxes within my home in Mumbai..

I had read that the Home Depot / UHaul boxes were single-ply and that it would be better to get doubly-ply-reinforced boxes for this international shipment. But Harrisburg, PA is a small town and despite checking 3-or-4 stores (Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, etc.), I still couldn’t find the heavy duty boxes locally. I had found a very nice website for the packing materials http://www.packingmaterials.com/ and they had the strong reinforced boxes I was looking for but since I needed less number of boxes (shipping charge would be involved) and since I did not have the time / flexibility, I decided to buy the boxes from my local Home Depot together with a heavy duty packing tape. I bought six boxes (dimension: 18”L x 18”W x 16”H) but assembled four boxes and we began dumping items in them. I also bought the plastic sheets that are used to protect furniture when painting a house.

Packing the boxes was the most tedious and boring task. Especially, because we had to protect fragile things and distribute the heavy objects to manage the weight as well. My wife and I, both thrifty people bordering on misers, started well with our initial boxes. But my wife then started discussing other items like her business suits, formal dresses, etc. that she wanted to take back to India together with the traditional Indian dress. Four boxes grew to six boxes as the first week went by. In the following week, she said that she wanted to take her Teddy Bears with her since I didn’t buy her a real poodle as a pet. Six boxes grew to eight boxes by the second week. In the week after that she wanted to take umbrella, track pants and empty hand bags to India. Eight boxes grew to 10 boxes in that third week. So, the final count was ten boxes of 18”L x 18”W x 16”H, each weighing 18 kgs each. No amount warnings and call-outs will help the readers avoid these type of debates and decisions with their spouses about what one wants to take back to India. I would like to believe that families come out stronger after going through these discussions, but frankly I don’t see any value additions even after a few months after those discussions.

We assembled each box with liberal use of the heavy-duty packing tape (we required two rolls for our 10 boxes) to kind of make up for using the single-ply Home Depot boxes. We lined each box with plastic sheets to protect the stuff from possible rains in Harrisburg or at JFK, New York, or at any intermediary ports in Europe or at Mumbai. We set the files / books / photo albums vertically to form an outer layer within the box to protect the boxes from collapsing and also to protect the more delicate items in the center. We put a layer of Jeans / clothes on the bottom and then started filling in other stuff in between. CDs would be packed in a shoe-box lined with bubble-wrap / packing-paper, etc. All delicate items were wrapped in clothes. Finally, I would lift each box and stand on the weighing scale figuring out the difference between my weight without the box and with the box to arrive at weight of the box. This was the most painful part. We had to do add / remove / rearrange several items before arriving at the desired 18kgs or just less for each of the boxes.

We then did the detailed inventory of the 10 boxes and this meant a bit of double work because we would have to remove the stuff and put it back into each box as-is. I typed up all items box-wise in different worksheets of an Excel file. This was then to be used as a detailed packing list for my reference in case if I ever had to file a claim for Insurance. This detailed list also helped us locate even the smallest of items in our Mumbai home later on. Everyone knows that unpacking 10 boxes and setting it all in a closet is not an easy task and it helped that we could look up an item that we wanted on this Excel file on my computer and go exactly to that box to find that item (while leaving rest of the unpacked items in that box as-is until that box came up for unpacking). This detailed inventory also helped me make a summarized packing list for the Shipper. The critical points from our above experience are –

1. Don’t do the inventory until you have weighed the box and adjusted the items for excess / shortfall.

2. Don’t seal the boxes till the very end.

Part 4 Part 6

 

 

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Tags: air cargo, international shippers, process in India, Shipping from USA to India, shipping rates