I sent out my sold Smith 686 PLUS to a chap's FFL in Hamburg, New York today in SW Oklahoma. I had a prepaid label from ShipMyGun.com operated under Budsgunshop.com. It was the 2nd Day Air class. It was $49 and change!! Rather steep for a 3.75 pound package. I had to go to the UPS Hub and it is only open from 3-7 PM, M-F. The guy said that he was trained not to accept a shipment for a handgun 2nd Day but only Overnight. I told him who the third party was that sold me the label. He then got on the telephone to call some dude at the "help center" and supposedly that guy OK'ed the 2nd day shipment. None of these carriers will take handguns ground rates, only long guns. The handgun market has to get punished by these high-price express air rates because of corporate policy, not federal law. The shipping biz must be scared to deal with handguns for some reason. They have to have some excuse to jack customers with these high handgun rates.
Except to pump money out of people, why else do they want want you to use the expensive speedy rates for handguns? FedEx operates the same way and only an FFL can even ship a handgun from a post office. People are all weird about handguns. FedEx and UPS both sock it to you on handguns. They really socked it to my buyer who paid the shipping, not I. I had to deal with the hassle burning up my time.
I did finally get the handgun shipped off to my GB buyer but this hassle added a 20 minute delay and I was the first customer in the door at 3 PM sharp. Do I by law even have to declare a handgun in a package to a carrier?
OK...first of all here are my qualifiers:
I'm not and expert in how UPS (or FedEx or any other shipping company) works. I've only a bare minimum experience with shipping a firearm. And, of course, my postings here aren't to be considered that of an actual "authority" on the subject.
Overnight or 2nd Day Shipping:
There may or may not be a move towards overnight, I have no idea. If I were to ask myself "What would be a practical reason for doing this", my answer wouldn't be "to charge customers higher prices". Why? Because the profit margin for the carriers is not going to be significantly higher, if at all.
First of all, there's an economic reason why overnight costs more for the customer...that's because it costs more for the shipper. If there IS a higher profit, it's not likely to be very much.
Second, I rather imagine the number of firearms shipments amounts to a tiny fraction of their total shipments, especially from us "little people". This means any profits they might realize via overnight shipments of firearms is very likely to be insignificant in comparison.
SO WHY MIGHT THEY WANT TO DO OVERNIGHT?
Practically speaking, overnight probably means two major things:
1. It's delivered faster and is therefore out of the shipper's hands sooner.
2. It goes through fewer hands to reach it's destination, therefore if there is a problem it's easier to track down and deal with.
A lost firearm during shipment is a HUGE deal. If it's an interstate shipment, the federal government gets involved and that's not something they want to deal with if they can figure a way to minimize this happening. It's such a huge deal that firearms companies really don't worry about it. If a firearm disappears, the feds get involved and things get miserable for the shipping company if it's not recovered. Firearms companies who may have to deal with a customer's lost firearm are more concerned with the customer being satisfied...if the gun they just repaired, for instance, is lost in shipment, they'll let the feds deal with it and happily provide the customer with a brand new replacement in the meantime.
(Of course, us "little people" who may be shipping a firearm from a sale don't have that kind of resources, but at least the feds will be making life miserable for others over this.)
Do I by law even have to declare a handgun in a package to a carrier?
This is from the ATF site:
May a nonlicensee ship a firearm by common or contract carrier?
A nonlicensee may ship a firearm by a common or contract carrier to a resident of his or her or her own state or to a licensee in any state. A common or contract carrier must be used to ship a handgun.
In addition, federal law requires that the carrier be notified that the shipment contains a firearm or ammunition, prohibits common or contract carriers from requiring or causing any label to be placed on any package indicating that it contains a firearm and requires obtaining written acknowledgement of receipt.
[18 U.S.C. 922(a)(2)(A), 922(a)(5), 922(e) and (f); 27 CFR 478.30 and 478.31]
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/may-nonlicensee-ship-firearm-common-or-contract-carrier
So the short answer to your question is "YES". You must notify the carrier that the shipment contains a firearm. However, federal law says the carrier is barred from requiring the placement of any label on the package which indicates a firearm is inside.
Whether or not an FFL is required depends on whether or not travel is within state or to another state.
HOWEVER...there is nothing in the laws which says that a carrier cannot require ALL shipments to be between licensed (FFL) dealers, whether in state or not. How enforceable this may be legally will likely vary from state to state.