The U.S. Postal Service said it would temporarily suspend parcels from China and Hong Kong, after President Donald Trump ended a trade provision this week used by retailers including Temu and Shein to ship low-value packages duty-free to the U.S.
The Trump administration imposed an additional 10% tariff on Chinese goods that came into effect on Tuesday and moved to close the “de minimis” exemption that allows U.S. shoppers to avoid paying tariffs for shipments below $800.
“This is huge… People waiting for orders from Amazon, Shein and Temu have no way of knowing when they can receive those orders,” said Ram Ben Tzion, founder of Ultra Information Solution, the firm behind digital shipment vetting platform Publican.
“I do expect this to be a short-term measure replaced by a longer-term measure that will be more measured,” he said.
USPS said the change will not impact the flow of letters and ‘flats’ – mail that can be up to 15 inches (38 cm) long or 3/4 inches (1.9 cm) thick – from China and Hong Kong. It did not immediately comment on whether this was tied to Trump’s change to ending de minimis shipments from China and other countries.
“The USPS would require some time to sort out how to execute the new taxes before allowing Chinese packages to arrive in the U.S. again,” said Chelsey Tam, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar.
