FAQ

Deutsche Post International is your first choice for lightweight items, dialog marketing, business mail and press products. Our products encompass postal items to destinations all over the world, with straightforward processing and optional tracking. We also offer expertise in dialog marketing, with a comprehensive service portfolio to make your international marketing campaigns a success.

Our customers range from European companies in all sectors to e-commerce startups, who count on us as a reliable partner as they work towards building a successful future.

Headquartered in Bonn, we also have six sales branches in Europe and are active worldwide. Use our contact form to quickly find out the best location from which our colleagues can help you.

No, our services are suited for sending large volumes. In case you are a private customer and you want to send one parcel, we recommend you to contact your local DHL office.

You can find out about tracking here.

You can reach our sales team with our contact form.

Our local team will be happy to help, discussing our products and services with you and preparing an individualized quote on request. Talk to us, we look forward to hearing from you!

Our priority is exceptional customer focus and service quality. That also means we want to offer you the best possible combination of services and prices. This is the reason we do not have a standard price list. We want to fully understand your business and your needs so we can offer you exactly the products that will work best for you, and so we can make sure we set the pricing according to your needs.

For your personalized quote click here.

The shipments may contain goods and merchandise. Addressed written communications (letters) are excluded unless they relate to the contents of the shipment

You may seal your WARENPOST items before posting them. Deutsche Post is, however, permitted to open them for inspection purposes.

Items are to be posted at Deutsche Post retail outlets or bulk mail acceptance offices. Shipments can also be put in the letterbox in Germany, maximum 20 pieces (depending on the size of the shipment). Warenpost items may not be posted at Packstations or parcel shops or be handed over to a parcel carrier.

Larger volumes of Warenpost items are to be posted or held for collection separately from other items and separated into items <3 cm and >=3 cm thick. Mail trays or mail tray carts, if used, must always be properly labeled.

As an example, we will use a seller from Asia and explain former VAT requirements and requirements following the reform later this year.  

Before July 2021, sellers outside the EU could sell and ship goods under €22 to customers in an EU member state without having to pay value added tax. If an item above that value was shipped, either the customer or the seller had to pay the import value added tax at the import country rate. The customer-friendly seller payd the import value added tax on behalf of the end customer.

Since July 2021, sellers calculate value added tax at the point of sale and declare it in an IOSS VAT return if the value of the goods is below €150. No import value added tax is then due for those shipments at the point of import. If a shipment has a value greater than €150, import value added tax still has to be paid to customs. For sellers, this could still trigger the need for a regular value added tax registration in the import country if they intend to sell the goods locally or to buyers in the rest of the EU.

For sales to customers in the EU, sellers who are located in the United Kingdom are now considered non-EU citizens. Starting July 2021, they can use the EU IOSS as non-EU sellers. To do that, they have to register in any one of the EU nations for the quarterly filing and payment of value added tax.

To help importers and customs authorities manage escalating volumes of low value shipments, the standard customs declaration for goods under €150 will be simplified.  Sellers can use the simplified process starting July 2021 for goods imported into the EU.  The process utilizes a reduced data set for the parties who declare the import.

The existing customs exemption for most goods under €150 will remain in place.

No, there are no minimum revenue requirements for registering for the IOSS.

The IOSS does not impose any additional weight criteria. The usual postal restrictions on weight and size apply in these cases.

Yes, you can select any EU country you like. But you can register in only one country.

The standard payment schedule is monthly. Please note that customers are not charged but must submit a monthly VAT return. No invoice will be issued.

Sellers are required to account for returned items in their VAT return.

The IOSS-registered seller must keep records of all value added tax.

IOSS only functions with electronic data sent in advance. We have already integrated dedicated fields for saving and sending IOSS numbers into our customer touchpoints (portal, API). Since EADs are already required for all parcels that must pass through customs, only minimal effort should be entailed on the part of our customers to acquire and use IOSS numbers. Please note that Deutsche Post does not check whether the IOSS number matches the respective shipper. An individual shipper will frequently have to use different IOSS numbers, since the IOSS number of the online marketplace must be used for goods that are purchased through that marketplace. It is thus critically important for each shipper to make sure they enter the right IOSS number for each item. In other words, our portal cannot be configured to enter the same IOSS number automatically each time.

The IOSS identification number should be included in the data submitted for each individual shipment. It will be embedded in the data when the label data is generated and the shipment data electronically sent. The name of the field depending on the touchpoint: 

• Sender’s customs reference number (portal) 
• Sender’s tax ID (API)

The field allows a maximum of 35 characters. 

It is not printed on the label. 

When shipping from a warehouse outside the EU, you as the customer must import the items into the EU and pay customs duty before handing them over to Deutsche Post. 

When importing, you are free to use IOSS. The individual items are therefore already cleared through customs when they are handed over to Deutsche Post.

The shipments must therefore not bear any customs declarations and you do not transfer any electronic customs content data to Deutsche Post. 

The situation is only different if you are sending from the UK. In the UK, we can also accept consignments of goods from you, which are then cleared through customs by post. 

You can use IOSS for this customs clearance process if you transfer the IOSS number to Deutsche Post in the electronic advance data.

None! The usage of our API is free for all of our customers.

Single calls should be answered in milliseconds. In case you are sending parallel requests or batched requests in high volume this could sum up, nonetheless there will not be real waiting times. In case you experience delays, please contact your local customer support.

You can find the latest information here.

No, all that is necessary for using our Deutsche Post International web service is a connection to the internet and developer resources on your side to code against it – this also works without any internet presence.

You have to be a registered user to get credentials for our Deutsche Post International API. In case you are not registered yet or a Deutsche Post customer, please contact your local customer support.

Only registered customers can log in the Deutsche Post Customer Portal.

In case you are not registered yet or a Deutsche Post customer, please contact your local customer support.

Yes, you can pass a unique customer ID by entering a “customer reference”.

From single shipment preparation to bulk/batch uploading of data and pulling your orders out of marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay, our portal offers you a simple and centralized way to manage all your lightweight shipments up to 2 kg. You can generate labels as well as track and report your shipments.

Please find these information within our Service and Handling Brochure under: https://www.deutschepost.com/en/business-customers/tac.html

You do not need a label certification when using the Deutsche Post International API.  Labels generated by the API meet all requirements, including sufficiently high resolution to ensure good printing quality and requirements towards size and orientation.

Yes, if you are sending goods, gifts or commercial samples to a country outside the EU. There are two types of form, depending on the value of the items sent. Please make sure you use the correct one. CN22 is valid for items with a value up to 300 SDR. For items with a value over 300 SDR you have to  enclose a complete CN 23 customs declaration inside the shipment in addition. CN23 is not provided via API and Portal.

Yes! For all shipments containing goods which will be send to a non-EU destination customs data are required. These customs data will be shown on the CN22 which is an standard part of the harmonized label.  If you have to provide a CN23 customs declaration you can complete the form and enclose it into the shipment additionally. You can find the template here.

Yes, it does! All packet labels carry a unique S10 barcode, and the content of the customs form is forwarded electronically to customs authorities via the postal operators in destination countries.

This feature will be available in a later release of our API.

For mail and packet products, the single items are bundled into shipments. So a shipment contains multiple items of one product, usually all items shipped on a specific day (up to a maximum of 2500). For each shipment, an Airwaybill (AWB) is required as a transport document. It contains information such as customer account number (EKP), product, total weight and item count.

An item label is what you need to label a single letter or packet. It is a product-specific printable document containing the recipient address as well as Printed Postage Impressions (PPI) and if necessary a customs declaration form.

Yes, both need to be printed. Even if you would only ship a single item, you would still need an AWB in addition to the item label.

As Deutsche Post International Customer you will have access to our Customer Portal which enables you among other features to track your shipments with a tracking number. Please be aware that different products include different levels of tracking detail. For detailed tracking status updates, please visit our tracking portal.

Not pushed, but pulled back. The Customer system has to request new tracking information for shipments in transit.

Yes!

Tracking events are updated every hour.

• 3PV / 3PS: Third party vendor or Third party solutions.
• Access Token: An access token contains the security credentials for a login session and identifies the user, the user's groups, the user's privileges, and, in some cases, a particular application.
• Ad Valorem: A term from Latin meaning, "according to value." Often refers to customs brokerage, where a third party is used for the clearance of inbound or outbound shipments.
• Airway Bill: Transport document for airfreight issued by a carrier or a forwarder towards the business customer.
• API: Application Programming Interface - A server-side web API is a programmatic interface consisting of one or more publicly exposed endpoints to a defined request–response message system, typically expressed in JSON or XML, which is exposed via the web—most commonly by means of an HTTP-based web server.
• API GW: API Gateway enables organizations to manage, deliver and secure APIs. It provides all the required infrastructure services for the management, delivery, and security of APIs.
• Brokerage: Refers to customs brokerage. Here a third party is used for customs clearance of inbound and/or outbound shipments.
• Close-out Manifest: A Close-out Manifest lists the goods carried in a means of transport or in a transport-unit. The manifest gives the commercial details of the goods, such as: transport document numbers / consignors and consignees / marks and numbers / number and kind of packages / descriptions and quantities of goods. It may be used in place of the Cargo declaration.
• CMR: "Convention relative au contract de transport international de merchandises par route". This international convention regulates liability and competencies in respect of the international carriage of goods by road. It is used in cross-border road transport and comes under the provisions of the CMR Agreement, which most European countries have adopted.
• Commercial Invoice: In each parcel it is necessary to provide a commercial invoice which can be also used by customs authorities. The invoice should contain all legally required information in order to ensure successful customs clearance: e.g. number of items, commodity value, total purchase value of order, exact commodity description, name and address of sender, name and address of recipient, number and date of invoice, VAT number of shipper.
• Commercial Summary Invoice: In some cases (e.g. for Trade lane DE-CN) the merchant is requested to also attach a commercial summary invoice in a pouch to the first pallet of the shipment. In general" this document is required for purpose of export declaration. Commercial summary invoice needs to contain: Total number of each article sold, total purchase value of each article sold, total purchase value as sum of purchase value from all parcels.
• Consignee: A person who pays for the delivery of a package. This person is usually the buyer of goods and services. This term means the same as recipient.
• Consignment: One or more items that a carrier has accepted for shipment at a given time.
• Customs brokers: A firm that represents importers/exporters in dealings with customs. Normally responsible for obtaining and submitting all documents for clearing merchandise through customs, arranging inland transport, and paying all charges related to these functions.
• Customs Declaration: Any statement or action, in any form prescribed or accepted by customs, giving information or particulars required by customs.
• Cut-off time: The cut-off time is the latest time where Deutsche Post guarantees same day processing.
• Dangerous Goods: Goods/parcels with the activated attribute "dangerous good". As dangerous goods are considered solids, liquids, or gases that can harm people, other living organisms, property, or the environment.
• DC: Abbreviation for delivery confirmation
• DCM: Data Capture Method - indicates which process is used to capture customer address information during processing.
• Denied Parties: Any Person who is identified in any applicable Denied Party Regulations as being a person or entity with whom entering into a contract for the supply of goods or services would be unlawful.
• Destination Country: The country where the consignee is located.
• Dimension Range: A range of dimensions (min & max of length, width & height) of a shipment item that can be shipped as a Deutsche Post International Product.
• Drop-off: The process when the customer delivers the consignments at an injection point directly into the Deutsche Post International network.
• EAN: European Article Code
• eFile: Electronic File as used to integrate customers via FTP / sftp file transfers using electronic data interchange instead of RESTful web services.
• Encoding: Process in Deutsche Post International mail terminals that consists of weighing individual packages, capturing address information, zip code validation & correction.
• Extraterritorial Office of Exchange (ETOE): A facility belonging to a postal operator outside its national territory on the territory of another country. There are ETOE’s in the United Kingdom and Denmark operated by Deutsche Post International and in Switzerland operated by Quickmail.
• FLC or Fully Landed Costs: Final costs including shipping costs, local taxes and duties, which the recipient has to pay to receive an import shipment.
• FTP or sFTP: File Transfer Protocol - Web-based site for storage of data files and a foundation for the EDI /eFILE integration option. Similar to SFTP, where the "s" stands for secured, meaning encripted file transfer protocol.
• HS-Code: Harmonized Code - The Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS) is a classification system for goods entering an importing country through Customs. Used to classify every commodity traded among countries. International 6-digit, 8-digit or even 10 digit code for product classification purposes to regulate import and export procedures - Required to calculate taxes and duties.
• Hub: Hub is a sorting facility where shipments are sorted and distributed for other Hubs or depot locations. In the postal service, hubs are frequently parcel centers. Hub building can be sometimes combined with depot for its closest delivery area under the same roof.
• Identcode: Code consisting of numbers, that marking clear and individual each single item.
• Inbound: Inbound logistics refers to the transport, storage and delivery of goods coming into a business.
• Indicia: Only applicable for postal products (letter or package) and has to fulfill the UPU requirements (ordered service payment postal operator for return) Part of a label as required and specified by the DSP. Usually contains no identification of the shipment item.
• Injection point: Location where shipments are handed over into the logistics network by the customer OR Location where shipments are handed over to the DSP after mail terminal processing or line haul.
• Intended Returns: Shipments which the recipient has received and wants to return to sender.
  International Mail Processing Center: Mail terminal that handles cross-border postal products.
• IOR: Importer of Record is a term used in customs law, referring to an importer (entities and/or individuals), who is responsible to ensure that legal goods are imported in accordance with local laws. This IOR is also responsible for filing all legally required documents.
• Item: Every piece of an order picked and packed is called an item.
• JSON: JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is a lightweight data-interchange format. It is easy for humans to read and write. It is easy for machines to parse and generate. It is based on a subset of the JavaScript Programming Language. Heavily used as web API data format.
• Label: A label in general describes the information on a shipment address label (minimum requirement: address of sender and recipient). The label must be visible "legible understandable by the handling parties" and must be attached to the item(s).
• labeling: Process of attaching a unique product identifier (such as a SKU) with its barcode onto the product.
• Landed Cost: The cost of the imported goods at the port or point of entry into a country, including the cost of freight, insurance and port and dock charges. All charges occurring after the goods leave the import point are not included.
• LIBA: Lithium Battery in context of classifying them as dangerous good components.
• Linehaul: A Linehaul is a direct transport connection between two different points.
• Manifest: A manifest is a document containing shipment data that is exchanged between business partners. For example the eFile sent by the customer is a customer's manifest or the manifests provided by us to business partners like DSP, customs broker/agency or airlines.
• Merchant: Person or company involved in wholesale trade, especially supplying merchandise to a particular trade and acting as sender of mail items and/or parcel shipments.
• OAuth: OAuth (Open Authorization) is an open standard for token-based authentication and authorization on the Internet.
• OMS: Order Management System - IT System for the administration and management of customer orders.
• Order item: Item/s belonging to an order
• Outbound: Outbound logistics refers to logistic processes for goods going out of a business.
• Pickup: Pickup is a process of collecting consignments from a merchant into the Deutsche Post International Network.
• Piece: Pieces are defined as a uniquely identified part of a shipment that is packaged and handled separately. Piece is the lowest level of handling.
• POD: Proof of Delivery which can be done in multiple ways, e.g. signature by recipient.
• PPO: Public Postal Operator
• Receiving: Process in mail terminal acknowledging that certain piece has been received by carrier and will go into processing.
• Receptacle: A consolidation is usually put into a receptacle, e.g. pallet, container, mail bag.
• Recipient: Represents a final person to whom the shipment item is addressed. Can be an individual person or a legal entity.
• Remuneration for the Exchange of International Mails: Agreement between 21 European postal providers on intercompany pricing and terminal dues. Currently in version 5 and governed by the IPC.
  Remuneration protection: Separate process for proving the success rate of the accounting process and for avoiding any loss of salary.
• REST (RESTful): Representational state transfer (REST) or RESTful Web services are one way of providing interoperability between computer systems on the Internet. REST-compliant Web services allow requesting systems to access and manipulate textual representations of Web resources using a uniform and predefined set of stateless operations.
• Return: Is a shipment which is sent back to the consignor for several reasons (e.g. Recipient cannot be determined).
• Shipment: A shipment is a user-defined unit containing goods (single or multiple units) and requires transportation from one location to another. A shipment becomes a shipment when it leaves the consignor's location. A shipment is complete when it arrives at the consignee's destination.
• Shipper: person who sends the packages. He can be a seller/merchant who may or may not operate on an online platform concurrently.
• Shipping Profile: Share and distribution of specific shipping details as they relate to products, weights, destinations, pickup frequencies, etc.
• SLA: Service Level Agreement
• Swagger Specification (or just Swagger): The Swagger specification is a powerful definition format to describe RESTful APIs. The Swagger specification creates a RESTful interface for easily developing and consuming an API by effectively mapping all the resources and operations associated with it. It’s easy-to-learn, language agnostic, and both human and machine readable.
• Tariff-Code: (also see HS Code) - Destination Country Customs Code where duty and tax rates are applied to. Varies from 8 to 11 digits depending on country of destination, first six digits are always the HS-Code.
• TMS: Transport Management System - An IT system for the administration, orcestration and overall management of logistic transports.
• Track Event: A track event represents an event or state in the life of a shipment item along the supply chain. A tracking event is defined by - date/time - location - object - activity type (= status) Possible activity types" please refer to topic "Shipment Item Status".
• Undeliverables: Items, which cannot be delivered to the recipient
• UPU: Universal Postal Union - Specialized agency of the United Nations for the postal sector
• VAS - Value Added Service: A VAS is a service applied to an order or a shipment item that can be additionally charged to the customer
• Webshop: A website offering goods and services online to its buyers.
• White Label: A shipment item label which contains consignee information and at times customs declaration information incl. barcode with packet identifier (e.g. CCN = Customer Confirmation Number). The label of shipment items is attached by customers. The content of the White Label can vary between CCN only and more complex information. The White Label is always replaced by the DSP Label during operation.
• XML: Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language that defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. Heavily used as a Web Service data format.
  Zip Code: Code consists of numbers and letters which define the city or a part of the city for delivery.