Note: this information is now out of date — please see our current delivery information for up to date charges and details.

Click here to see the details of our delivery charges and areas

We sometimes get emails from customers saying they think our delivery charges are too high. This is something we are always concerned about and we try to keep our charges as low as possible while also charging enough to cover our actual costs and stay in business so we will still be here next time you want some left-handed items.

Some companies offer free delivery and increase their product prices to cover the costs. We prefer to keep it separate as a fixed amount otherwise people making large orders pay too much and subsidise those making very small orders.

Here is some of the thinking behind why we do it the way we do and why it costs what it does...

The thinking behind our delivery charges

Our delivery charge is an averaged amount to cover the cost of our packing the order, the padded envelope or other packing materials and the postage cost. It may seem like a lot if you only order a single ruler, but it is very good value if you order heavy products like books, knives or folders!

Our charges compare favourably with other web businesses and avoid lots of complications:

• We could charge a fixed price and then so much extra per item, like Amazon, but often people order a number of small items like pens and sharpeners and this would give an unfairly high charge.
• If we charged by weight, we would be undercharging for items like writing mats that are light but very large
• The UK post office now charge not just by weight but by size and packet thickness as well which adds more complexity

Overall, we hope we have got the balance right and that the simplicity of a fixed charge is better than the other option of calculating individual order delivery charges based on weight of products and geographical location.

We are not able to calculate special reduced postage charges for individual orders that happen to be for lightweight items and we will not try to charge you extra if you only order heavy things!

If you need any more information, please contact us

Click here to see a full alphabetic list of countries with their delivery zones

If you think our delivery charges are too high...

Customers sometimes ask if our delivery charge is too high, particularly when only ordering a single low priced item, but there is a good reason for it...

The actual postage cost to send a single peeler may be between £1.50 and £3.00 depending where it is going but we also have to pay for the fulfilment of the order (warehousing, pick, pack, despatch), which costs us a minimum £2.50 plus the cost of a padded bag, document printing, document envelope to stick on the outside.

For larger orders, the packing cost and postage goes up but we keep the charge to our customers at the same fixed rate for all orders up to £40.00 then a little more above that as the weight of the items means the postage cost goes up rapidly. That fixed charge doesn't seem as big for people ordering £30 or more of products, which is around the average for our orders.

If we are going to stay in business and continue to search out and supply left-handed products and also provide all the free information, newsletters and personal advice for our site visitors, we have to make sure we are at least covering our costs.

We do have a lot of fixed cost in processing an order and it is just not viable if we charge less, even though it can seem like a lot if you are only ordering a single low value item like a peeler. Best to add a few more items you really want to your order at no extra delivery charge to make it worthwhile.

We hope that makes sense.

Why do you have to pay for a courier to some countries?

We have sent thousands of parcels all round the world over the last 40 years and in our experience airmail parcels to some countries just don't seem to reach the customer. If your parcel gets "lost" it involves a big delay for you and your time spent chasing it around and, usually, the cost of sending the whole thing again, often more than once!

That does not give the high standard of customer service that we always aim for, so where we think there could be delivery problems with standard airmail we will still deliver your order, but only using a tracked service from UPS so we know it will definitely get to you.

Unfortunately, there is a much higher cost for that as we have to pay for the UPS service, but we hope you will agree it is worth it to make sure you actually get the left-handed items you are ordering.

There is also an option to pay the extra charge for a courier for any country if you want to make sure your order gets to you quickly and safely with signed-for delivery.