By popular demand* and because I happened to have been studying the issue right before we headed out of the marina, here's a discussion about a couple of different ways to handle mail while cruising long term.
* Yo! Patrick!
First, an explanation of mail forwarding and a description of our particular mail-forwarding strategy as it has been up to now.
When we first moved aboard The Fox at Shilshole Marina waaay back in March 2003, like everybody else in the marina we moved our mail to Ballard Mailbox on Market Street. These nice folks act as your agent for receiving your mail and packages, and signing for certified mail and such on your behalf. At your telephone or email request they will forward your mail to any destination – within the US or internationally. They have done an excellent job sending our mail to us during the past 6 years. The basic service we signed up for costs about $145 per year. Like other mail forwarders, Ballard Mailbox asks for an extra deposit (about $50) to cover the shipping expenses for the mail they forward to you. When your deposit is depleted, you replenish it. It is all quite rational and the Ballard Mailbox gang is professional and efficient. For folks who live aboard a boat but don't intend to travel far and/or are still closely connected to a job onshore, this is all they need.
When forwarding mail to a location outside the US, Ballard Mailbox and places like them generally ship your flat mail via a DHL envelope. DHL is desirable because you pay for a tracking number that comes in handy if your precious mail goes walkabout. When cruising, you periodically plan a stop at a marina ($$$) so that you can use their address to get your mail forwarded there as soon as possible. It's been our experience that a typical DHL envelope gets from Ballard Mailbox to almost any reasonable cruising destination on Vancouver Island, BC, or Baja or mainland Mexico, within about 4 or 5 days. (Packages are another kettle of fish – much more complicated. We'll just continue discussing flat mail shipped by good ol' reliable DHL in this here post.)
Difficulty: in 2008 DHL doubled their shipping fees because, they said, that big run-up in gasoline prices significantly increased their overhead. Of course, when the fuel prices dropped back down, DHL kept those higher fees in place. Bastards. The bottom line to you, though, for getting your mail shipped to you outside the US? Is that if your experience is like ours has been, you'll be paying about $110 per flat DHL envelope. Yes, you read that right. One hundred-ten US dollars. Now, the folks at Ballard Mailbox will help you keep your DHL costs as low as possible by reviewing and sorting your mail with you over the telephone, getting rid of the junk mail and nonessential bulky items
that have accumulated in your mailbox. But even with that help, assuming you can afford to get your mail shipped to you only once every four months, and further assuming that your average DHL envelope is like ours and contains less than 2 dozen separate pieces of mail — you're looking at an extra $300 or more for shipping your mail to you, on top of your $145 annual base fee.
$445 per year for mail. Zowie.
Some people who cruise only part-time, or who often return to the US, can avoid costs like these by picking up their accumulated mail themselves directly from their mailbox; or by getting it forwarded to some cheaper destination within the US (like, a friend's or relative's house they plan to visit), where they pick up the mail and personally carry it back to their boat. But for full-time cruisers like us who are spending most of our time away from the US, mail forwarding is unavoidable - and at certain times, essential. Some documents come to us via email (for example, our insurance carriers email their policies and other documents to us, so that we can print them out wherever we happen to be). Unfortunately, other important papers come only via hard-copy snail mail. Like, the annual US Coast Guard registration; all our health insurance info; GB's pension documents; and checks. So we need to pay for a mail forwarder.
Needless to say, one of my tasks while having enjoyed Marina Costa Baja during December-January was to investigate more economical mail-forwarding alternatives. Luckily for cruisers, technology has developed over the past few years that enables mail forwarders to receive and forward your mail the old-fashioned way; but also to electronically scan it as it comes in. You get to view your scanned mail online, and direct your mail forwarder to hold it, throw it away as junk mail, shred it, or forward it to you – whatever you desire. I've looked at two such mail forwarders on opposite sides of the US (Earth Class Mail and St. Brendan's Isle), and they seem to charge a similar amount of annual fees ($240-$270 or so) for roughly the same kinds of services. I'm sure there are more places like these two out there; and I'll wager they charge roughly the same. But they're interesting in that the goal with each of them is to give you the long-distance control over your mail to reduce its volume (and presumably, its cost for shipping to you) by about 70%. Sweet.
I've liked the work Ballard Mailbox has done for us during the past 6 years, and I'm not sure the online scannig services xan do much better than they do -but the idea of an electronic scanning mail service still intrigues me. There's just one problem setting up any mail forwarding service like these when you're outside the US like we are: The US Postal Service requires you to sign a federal form authorizing the mail forwarder of your choice to act as your agent before they can receive and act upon your mail as you instruct. And, your signature on this US federal form needs to be notarized. Which outside the US can only be done at a US Consulate. And, for the next several months we will be very far away from the nearest US Consulate. Ergo our clever plan to switch mail services is on hold until I find a notary in the same town as myself, either in the US next time I visit; or at a US Consulate in Mexico.
In conclusion: whichever type of mail service you choose – electronic or otherwise – there are some pretty spiffy options for you. It's best to study those options well, and when you make a choice get it in place when you're still in the States.
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