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Why is fuel surcharge for shipping services unchanged?

It is the festive season and many Singaporeans are shopping online for gifts. Many would be using shipping services such as vPost and Borderlinx to ship their purchases home.

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Huang Wenshan

It is the festive season and many Singaporeans are shopping online for gifts. Many would be using shipping services such as vPost and Borderlinx to ship their purchases home.

Besides these shipping charges, these services have a fuel surcharge, which was introduced on the back of surging oil prices.

For example, I paid vPost a 95-cent surcharge for shipping a 0.5kg package last December. The cost is not insignificant; at a shipping charge of S$3.60 for the same package, the fuel surcharge adds 26 per cent to shipping costs.

However, even though oil prices have plunged, the surcharge for these services remains unchanged.

Petrol stations have repeatedly lowered their prices in response to falling oil prices, so how do shipping services such as vPost justify the same fuel surcharge? (“95-octane grade petrol dips below S$2 as oil prices slide”; Dec 13)

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