At Overland Express, We have been shipping network appliances and associated equipment for over 30 years, from legacy 33Kbps modems to the latest, state of the art 100Gb switches.
Needless to say, modern network equipment can cost as much as a decent second-hand car, which is why we have negotiated shipping insurance for your network devices to ensure that they are fully insured whilst in transit.
A cardboard box must be used for the outer packaging due to COVID-19 handling restrictions.
Insurance costs just 2.00% of the declared value of the item, subject to a £10.00 minimum charge to cover the policy administration fee. We can insure your network switches, routers and firewalls up to a maximum of £20,000.00, which broadly speaking, will cover the vast majority of these network devices whilst being shipped.
Routers
Whether you are shipping an old router back to your ISP, or sending a new Netgear Nighthawk router to a customer, it should ideally be packaged prior to shipping in its original box - ensuring that it is secure and cannot freely move around, this box should then be wrapped in bubble wrap (or similar material) before being placed into a larger double walled cardboard box for extra protection.
When fully packaged, if the box is shaken, there should be no movement from within.
If taking out our enhanced router shipping insurance, our insurer has stipulated that there should be no markings on the outer box that indicate what may be inside, the box should be plain and any logos etc. should be covered up.
The parcel label should be applied to the outer box, ensuring that any addresses or barcodes are not covered up. We also suggest placing a second copy of the parcel label within the outer box as this will allow the sender and receiver to be identified, should the outer label become detached.
Switches
Before shipping your network switch, remove, and place any SFP modules into an anti-static bag.
The switch should be placed into the original manufactures box, or a similar box that is sufficient to provide adequate protection to the device. Any accessories should also be securely placed within this box ensuring that they are not loose, and will cause scratches or collision damage whilst in transit.
The boxed switch should be wrapped in a few layers of bubble wrap, foam or polystyrene chips and subsequently placed into a larger double walled box. If shaken, there should be no movement of the contents of either box.
Before sealing this outer box, we suggest that a copy of the parcel label is placed in to this box for the circumstances where the original parcel label may become defaced or detached.
Finally attach the parcel label to outer box of the switch that you are shipping.
If you intend to insure your switch, nothing should appear on the outer box that may indicate the contents of the package - cover up any brand names or logos that appear on this box.
Firewalls
Essentially, the same packaging guidelines apply to shipping firewalls by courier as for shipping switches.
However, if the firewall device that you intend to ship resembles a server, you should use our server shipping page instead.
Security
Before shipping any network devices, if used, don't forget to factory reset these devices to purge any sensitive data or settings that may be present on them.
International Shipping of Network Devices
As with all of these examples, if you are shipping your network appliance overseas, please ensure that an export licence is not required. You should contact the manufacturer of the equipment to obtain this information.
Overland Express will provide you with a document that you must print out, and sign all three pages. This document must then be placed into an unsealed envelope and affixed to one of the boxes that you are sending overseas
We purposely try to keep our overheads down which enables us to offer you the lowest prices on international parcel delivery and domestic courier services. We avoid using advertising as someone has to pay for this, that someone is you!
No waiting or the need to enter your email address to obtain a quote, just provide source and destination postcodes along with the dimensions of the parcel that you wish to send, and you will immediately be presented with the price.
DHL, UPS, Parcel Force etc. - Enough said, we do not use budget courier service providers full stop. Having been in the parcel delivery industry for almost 30 years, we've seen the problems caused by these 'budget' provider's first hand.
Our DHL options utilise the Short Messaging Service (SMS) alerts to notify you (and the recipient if chosen) when your parcel is due to be delivered, yes, a bit old school now, however, very convenient as no apps are required to receive the notification.
Have you ever tried to ship perfume and cosmetics? We can provide bespoke shipping services specifically for these difficult to send products, see our specialist pages above for more information and how to package and post these niche items.
You will not find a better customer services team in the courier industry that are contactable via telephone, if you don't believe us, read our reviews on Trustpilot, most comment on how professional and helpful our UK based team are.