Photo: Posti
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More than 3,000 international parcels have been stranded at Posti’s logistics centre in Vantaa for months, with no clear end to the backlog.
The shipments, which have arrived by air from outside the European Union, cannot be cleared through customs due to incomplete electronic security declarations. The situation stems from the EU’s Import Control System 2 (ICS2), designed to improve oversight of inbound goods.
Posti’s head of e-commerce and delivery services, Laura Inttilä, said the bottleneck is growing steadily.
“Each day, 200 to 300 parcels move forward to customs clearance, but the same number arrives to take their place,” Inttilä said.
Some shipments have already exceeded the 90-day storage limit and have been returned to the sender.
The issue originates with airlines and origin countries failing to meet EU data requirements. Posti is not authorised to process or release the parcels without approval from Finnish Customs.
“We receive shipments without complete data. Without that, customs clearance cannot happen,” Inttilä said.
One of the affected customers is Jaakko Anttonen from Espoo, whose family regularly receives packages from his mother-in-law in Japan. In February, four parcels were dispatched but never arrived.
“We’ve always received them within a week after customs clearance. This time, nothing has come,” Anttonen said.
He contacted Posti several times, only to learn that staff were trying to manually correct security messages on each individual package. He offered to help, but was told the issue lies with the airline, not Posti.
“There was no clear answer on who will fix it or when. That’s when we realised the whole system had stalled,” he said.
Eventually, Posti’s customer service advised him to stop calling and instead monitor tracking updates online.
Anttonen said the lack of transparency and guidance was frustrating. “It’s not life or death, but it’s hard to know whether it’s worth sending anything here anymore,” he said.
Dozens of similar complaints have been submitted to Yle, many highlighting dissatisfaction with Posti’s customer service.
The ICS2 system, launched in 2021 and fully implemented by 2023, requires precise security data for customs to approve parcel entry. Finland’s transition period ended in February.
“The data chains must be complete before customs will approve the shipments,” Inttilä explained.
She said the biggest issues have come from parcels originating in Japan, the US, the UK, Singapore, and South Korea.
“We didn’t expect this many countries and airlines to still be struggling with the requirements,” she said.
Posti expects the problem to ease as origin countries and carriers adjust their systems to comply. Until then, parcels will continue to queue at Vantaa, with no guaranteed timeline for resolution.
HT
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Source: www.helsinkitimes.fi
