Mailing a letter or a parcel in Thailand, particularly in Bangkok, is easy — and cheap. Just follow these quick tips and you will spend just minutes at a Thai post office, with your mail soon winging its way onward.
Post Office Opening Hours – Post offices are all over Bangkok, as well as easy to find in most Thai towns and cities. The main post office in Bangkok is on Thanon Charoen Krun. It is open from 8am to 8pm, Monday through Friday, and on Saturdays from 8am to 1pm.
Other post offices in the city are open from 8am to 4:30pm, and most are also open on Saturday mornings from 8am to 12pm or 1pm.
The post office at Saphan Kwai is also excellent, as it is right next to Saphan Kwai sky train station and the staff is helpful and friendly.
Opening hours vary in other parts of Thailand, but your hotel or apartment building should be able to give you information.
You Can Package Your Items at the Post Office in Thailand – If you are not sure where to buy mailing supplies in Thailand, don’t worry about it, just buy them at the post office. At all Thai post offices, you can buy envelopes (both padded and normal), tubes and boxes and prices are cheap.
At an average of 75 cents to $1 for a box (much cheaper than at US post offices, where they are $3 to $6) and 30-60 cents for a brown envelope, there really isn’t much point buying them anywhere else.
You can also do all your packing at the post office, as boxes come with tape and string and the envelopes are self-sealing, so no other supplies are necessary. The post office clerk will help you if you have any problems packing your items.
Thailand’s Express Mail Service (EMS) – If you want to send a parcel domestically or overseas in Thailand, you can send it by Express Mail Service. This means the person who receives it has to sign for it or the post office won’t deliver it.
EMS is slightly more expensive than regular mail and, although several Westerners recommend only sending by EMS, I have never used the service yet all my parcels arrive in their destination just fine.
At about 10 to 20% more expensive than regular mail services, to me EMS is not worth the extra money. But, if you are nervous about using regular mail, EMS is a good alternative.
Sending Parcels and Letters By Registered Mail in Thailand – I mail all my parcels and letters domestically and internationally by regular Thai mail. In the last five years, I have mailed more than 5,000 packages from Thailand to the U.S., the UK, Europe, Australia and South America, as I ran my own business.
In all that time, only one of them ever went missing, and that was in the United States.
Regular registered mail is cheaper than EMS in Thailand, yet just as reliable, as you can also send it by registered mail (called ‘long tabien‘ in Thai), so the recipient has to sign for it, just like with EMS.
You will pay an extra charge (less than $2 usually), but it is well worth it if the item you are sending is expensive.
Don’t Seal the Package – One way to save a lot of money mailing things in Thailand is to send a box or a package without sealing it with tape.
With an envelope, all you do is place your items inside and then seal it by placing a few staples across the envelope flap. With a box, you just tie string around it instead of using the tape. With both, you will also complete a green customs slip to stick on the package.
Doing this will save you up to 50% in mailing costs as, because the packages are not sealed, the customs officials in the receiving country can open them to check the contents are the same as listed on the customs slip.
In my experience, they never do, but doing so still saves you money.
So, if you need to mail a package or a letter from Thailand, don’t stress about it. Just head to the local post office.
For more information, as well as postal rate quotes and information on the closest post office to your location – check out Thailand’s General Post Office website.