DDP Shipping from China, The Hassle Free Shipping Term

What is your preferred shipping term when you are importing from China? EXW, FOB, CIF or DDP. There are so many terms. But these 4 terms are the easiest one. With understanding of them, you shouldn’t have any problems in shipping from China. In this article, we will discuss about how does DDP shipping from China works. If you are starting out a mini importation business, consider DDP shipping, it would save you a lot of time and energy.

When you are buying from China, how many parties do you need to work with? Let’s assume that you are buying from a factory directly, probably the factory can help arrange shipping, but you still need a freight forwarder to double confirm the shipping cost. then a customs broker to help you handle the importation work in your local port. So, you have to deal with minimum 3 parties. If you are working with a factory or a sourcing agent which can help you arrange DDP shipping, there is no need to deal with multiple parties. So, what is DDP shipping? How can it benefit your business? And how can you arrange your shipment under DDP term?

What is DDP shipping?

DDP is the short term of Delivered Duty Paid. It is a delivery/shipping agreement whereby the seller assumes all of the responsibility, risk, and costs associated with transporting goods until the buyer receives or transfers them at the destination port. This agreement includes paying for shipping costs, export and import duties, insurance, and any other expenses incurred during shipping to an agreed-upon location in the buyer’s country. (Quoted from Investopedia.)

Simply speaking, DDP shipping is a door to door shipping covering all the related shipping cost and import duty, as well as handle all the necessary procedures in the customs. If your supplier, either a factory or a sourcing agent could arrange DDP shipping from China to the Amazon FBA warehouse or any private locations, perfect, you won’t need to run all the legs.

How does DDP shipping work?

DDP shipping only started getting popular from 2017. It is usually carried by air and sea. Express shipping also has duty prepaid service as well. But it’s not commonly used. And from 2014, Yiwu-Xinjiang-Europe cargo train started to be operated. The Yiwu-Xinjiang-Europe cargo line runs from the city in Zhejiang province through the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region to Europe. Now it works as a great channel to ship “Made-in-China” products to European countries and regions along the way.

So, DDP shipping usually carried by air, sea, and train first. When it’s reached to the port, the shipper would arrange customs clearance. After that they will send the shipments to their cooperated third-parties, such as UPS or truck service. Or the third-parties would go to the port and pick up the shipments, then dispatching all individually to the final destination.

From our experience, DDP shipping to the US by air takes 7-10 days, by sea takes 22-25 days; DDP shipping to European countries by air takes 7-10 days, by train takes 25-30 days. The time frame is not always right. At the moment of COVID-19, any type of shipping faces certain delay. So, make sure to plan the shipping as early as you can.

One more important thing, how do you track DDP shipments? Normally, shipping agents offer the DDP shipping tracking by express for the last mile delivery. So, before the shipments picked up by the third-party express service, it’s not easy to track it. But not easy doesn’t mean impossible. If it’s shipping by air or sea, you can ask for the airway bill or container information. They may not be willing to share as in the document it contains information of several clients. So, most of the shippers would track it and update the cargo location for you.

How can DDP benefit your business?

As mentioned earlier, DDP shipping is more like one-stop shipping solution. You would save a lot of time in talking with many parties. At the same time, it somehow saves the time in delivering as it’s air+express, sea+express, sea+truck combined shipping.

DDP shipping service supports your business if you are a start-up business. You don’t have to learn so many things. If you are a large business, then you won’t need to hire any logistics employees.

From another aspect, DDP shipping allows you to calculate the total landed cost at a second. Generally, sum up the product cost and the DDP shipping cost, it would be the total landed cost. In all, DDP shipping is fast, convenient and hassle free.

How can you arrange your shipment under DDP term?

Not all the factories can arrange DDP shipping. Most of them likes to offer EXW or FOB cost. As we know that the earlier they transfer the shipments to your hands, the earlier they are free from any responsibility. So, how can you arrange your shipment under DDP term?

First, if you are working with a sourcing agent, they probably have many shipping channels. They would be very familiar with DDP shipping term. If not, they are not as professional as you believe. MindenSourcing offers DDP shipping service to the US, Canada, Mexico, and most of the European countries. And the shipping price from MindenSourcing is very competitive as we are working with the first level agent directly.

Second, if you do have a shipping forwarder, good for you. They are the experts. Send your shipment details to them and ask for a solution. You can even compare the price and delivery time.

Third, you must know Alibaba.com and probably you are buying frequently there. Alibaba.com completes its logistics service in the recent years. It builds great connections with top shipping carriers. It’s very convenient for sellers on Alibaba to give you a DDP shipping solution if your country is reachable. In 2020, MindenSourcing also started listing products on Alibaba.com. We are a paid member and verified supplier on Alibaba.com. If you want us to arrange the sourcing and dealing on Alibaba.com, we would support you.

Hey, that’s all for DDP shipping from China. Hope this article could be helpful