The competence of different courier companies varies from region to region. By this I mean the global couriers each have one area in which they excel, and they tend to do pretty poorly outside of that area.
My own experience in over 15 years of working in the 3rd world goes like this:
1) UPS is great within the USA, in particular they offer quite inexpensive shipping of large boxes in the USA, they are hopeless for international shipments.
2) FedEx is pretty good if you are shipping to and from countries that meet the following developmental benchmarks:
a) Lots of ATM's everywhere,
b) Low levels of corruption at the airport
c) Reliable phone systems in the country.
3) DHL is by far the best when shipping to a corrupt, screwed-up or war-torn country. It seems that DHL has the best 'local employees' who always know the ropes (to get your package out of customs) and know the neighborhood (to get the package to where you are). It also helps greatly if you establish contact and a rapport with the DHL destination office beforehand.
PanEuropean
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