U S Postal Mail And Package Forwarding Services

[earthdome]

I will soon be going to the Philippines for my first extended visit lasting from 2-6 months. So I am having to deal with some of the issues related to being outside of my home country for an extended time.

One issue I have to deal with now is what to do about my postal mail. I have already gone through and switched to online billing and payment for everything that I can. Banks, credit cards, etc. But I am sure that I will still receive some things through postal mail that I will need to at least see.

There are very few things I would need to physically forward, I expect just new or replacement debit/credit cards. So the ability to scan the contents of my mail so I can view the contents online was an important feature for me. Also the ability to discard mail and have it shredded.

I want the option to have packages forwarded just in case there is something I just have to purchase in the US and have shipped to me in the Philippines.

Another consideration was having a street address in a US state with no income taxes so I can make that state my official US residence for tax purposes. There are 7 states with no income taxes. From the list below and my research it looks like my address will end up in Florida or Texas.

• Alaska
  
• Florida
  
• Nevada
  
• South Dakota
  
• Texas
  
• Washington
  
• Wyoming
  

Since I don't expect to actually ship much mail or packages I didn't research the shipping costs much.

I did some research and compiled a list of mail/package forwarding services and created a spreadsheet. I have turned that into a PDF and attached it here.

I haven't decided yet which service I will use. At this point I can try one out for this first extended stay since I will only be forwarding my mail to it not doing a permanent change of address. I will need to be pretty sure which service I want to use when I need to make my permanent change of address prior to my final move sometime next summer.

Ohh, if anyone wants to expand on this I would be happy to send you the original spreadsheet so you can update it.

MailForwardingServices.pdf

[OnMyWay]

When I was shopping for a service, I decided USA Box $10 plan was the best value and best for me, at the time. My needs are just about identical to yours. I opened a free account, but I have not used it yet. Several members speak highly of it.

I got lucky. I am using my sister's address in California as a mailing address for some things like credit cards, and my bro-in-law is retired Fedex so he can forward mail to me once in a while, very cheap. My sister uses her iPad to snap pictures of the mail and e-mail them! Like you I have tried to reduce physical mailings as much as possible.

After discussing the tax consequences with my attorney (my brother in law! :no: ) I decided the state tax was not going to be an issue for me. My main income is with Fidelity, and they allow you to have a legal address (Phils) and a mailing address (Sister in Calif.). My federal income tax will be filed with a Phils address.

[Call me bubba]

Your plan on having your sisters address in good, this way it can be sent ASAP if needed.

Off topic but related to the US MAIL.

since you (and others of the forum ) are not in the US, make sure you watch your "Credit " as in the past some times

ID theft has occurred .

either put a BLOCK on your credit file so the access is limited, and

2 . before you leave, get a FREE copy to make sure it is "PROBLEM FREE",

last . DONT CLOSE ALL OF YOUR CREDIT CARDS,

once you close them it may be hard to reestablish credit

who knows what may happen next month or next year, and only depending on "SS" or investment income may not be enough $$ to help.

[Mike S]

Well I use the first one on you list and have for about 6 years ..... I do not nave a lot of mail as I only forwarded my new address to those I wanted to keep getting mail from .... the rest like adds and mags I just let float around in mail kingdom somewhere .... I get maybe 2-3 shipments a year from USA BOX and can tell from the envelope scan they send me if it is important or not and just have them discard what I don't want .... like you just about everything I do is paperless ..... one other feature about USA BOX which is good for me is that you can pay yearly instead of each month but they will deduct the cost of shipments from the yearly amount ....... I choose this so I don't have to keep approving a monthly credit-card purchase ..... :thumbsup:

[OnMyWay]

Your plan on having your sisters address in good, this way it can be sent ASAP if needed.

Off topic but related to the US MAIL.

since you (and others of the forum ) are not in the US, make sure you watch your "Credit " as in the past some times

ID theft has occurred .

either put a BLOCK on your credit file so the access is limited, and

2 . before you leave, get a FREE copy to make sure it is "PROBLEM FREE",

last . DONT CLOSE ALL OF YOUR CREDIT CARDS,

once you close them it may be hard to reestablish credit

who knows what may happen next month or next year, and only depending on "SS" or investment income may not be enough $$ to help.

Yes, I think I will put a block on my credit sometime soon. I already looked into it.

[MikeB]

Nice spreadsheet. I would set up this up and finalize (as much as possible) before you leave because they all require a notarized US Postal Consent Form to be mailed (not emailed) to them. Not easy or cheap from overseas. I'm not recommending any of them but I selected Earth Class ($19.95) because I felt their customer support was good.The post office will forward mail for a year so you can hold off on the street address fee. Eventually you will need it but more then a year and a half later the PO is still forwarding from my old address. I have had 1 letter forwarded from the US to me in the Philippines and it cost about $42 (Fedex).

For sending packages from Amazon, etc I use this service (recommended by a past member here).

http://www.my-shoppingbox.com/

[SubicSteve]

If you use Florida for your mailing address but leave your drivers license and or credit card address as NY or California, those states can legally ask you for STATE taxes so be careful.

[earthdome]

If you use Florida for your mailing address but leave your drivers license and or credit card address as NY or California, those states can legally ask you for STATE taxes so be careful.

Correct. That is why I plan on making a trip to either FL or TX, wherever my street address is to establish residency by getting DL, voter registration, etc.

I still may have to pay some small income tax in my current state since I will own a home their which will be generating rental income.

[Tukaram (Tim)]

That is some great info! I have been looking at different services but had not seen a couple of these. I set up a free account with USAbox already but I think I will give USA2me a try. I kind of like the idea of keeping my Texas address.

Thanks for gathering all this and sharing! :tiphat:

[earthdome]

That is some great info! I have been looking at different services but had not seen a couple of these. I set up a free account with USAbox already but I think I will give USA2me a try. I kind of like the idea of keeping my Texas address.

Thanks for gathering all this and sharing! :tiphat:

Thanks.