Dangerous Goods and Air/Sea/Ground Shipment

Be sure you order "smart" and place orders that result in the lowest shipping costs!

Important notice:
The information given on this page is meant for those who are either present or prospective customers of SPI Supplies products and are wanting to learn more about how the shipping regulations will affect their shipment and the associated shipping costs of SPI Supplies products to their laboratories. Under no circumstances are we able to accept shipments of goods from others. We are not a public shipping service. Please don't ask us to do this because the answer is always going to be "no". If you have personal items to be shipped, we would suggest visiting your local post office or UPS or FedEx offices. I am sure they will be happy to be of assistance.

For all shipments of SPI Supplies products, IATA and/or U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) regulations will be followed exactly, wherever dangerous goods are involved, and will always take precedence over any other customer specified shipping requests. We take very seriously our obligations and legal responsibilities to make certain that all applicable regulations are followed. Please do not ask us to deviate even the slightest.

All UN numbers will be clearly marked and other associated regulations followed exactly. Appropriate MSDS information accompanies all shipments containing dangerous and potentially dangerous items whether required by law or not.

Domestic USA Customers:
Items designated as dangerous goods will be shipped, unless otherwise specified, via FedEx or UPS ground or by air in special packaging. Anything too heavy for FedEx or UPS will be shipped by truck or by air freight depending upon customer instructions. All US DOT regulations will be followed exactly including those relating to the shipment of dangerous items. Some items because of their dangerous nature can only be shipped by FedEx or UPS ground. Note: We will ship only to institutional addresses and under no circumstances will shipments be made to residential, or to post office box numbers. Shipments to hotel addresses can be made only by prior approval and provided the shipment contains no items classified as dangerous goods.

International Customers:
Items designated as dangerous goods must be shipped exactly according to IATA (International Air Transportation Association) regulations if by air, or other applicable regulations if by sea or ground.

Many of the products for electron and light microscopy offered by SPI Supplies are considered dangerous goods materials for purposes of transportation. SPI Supplies will ship these "Hazmats" (to use terminology used in North America) or "Dangerous Goods" (to use the accepted international designation) in strict conformity with United States Department of Transportation (DOT) regulations, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Technical Instructions, International Air Transport Association (IATA) Dangerous Goods Regulations, and other international conventions. These rules will be followed exactly and will always take precedence over any other customer specified shipping requests. We take very seriously our obligations and legal responsibilities to make certain that all applicable regulations are followed. Please do not ask us to deviate from the legal requirements.

Where required, all UN numbers will be clearly marked and other associated regulations followed exactly. Appropriate Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) information accompanies all shipments containing dangerous or potentially dangerous goods whether required by law or not.

Since so many of the products for electron and light microscopy offered by SPI Supplies are considered "dangerous goods" for the purposes of air transportation, we have identified such items by their appropriate hazardous item "sign" or "symbol". In the SPI Supplies electronic catalog, you should note that some items have more than one hazardous designation.

Hazardous Labels

Flammable Gas Class 2 Division 2.1	Non-Flammable Gas Class 2 Division 2.2	Flammable Liquid Class 3
Spontaneously Combustible Class 4 Division 4.2	Flammable Solid Class 4 Division 4.1	Dangerous when wet Class 4 Division 4.3
Oxidizer Class 5 Division 5.1	Organic Peroxide Class 5 Division 5.2	Toxic Substance Class 6 Division 6.1
Radioactive Class 7	Corrosive Class 8	Miscellaneous Dangerous Goods Class 9

Saving Money on Shipping Costs

SPI Supplies believes in the concept that customers should be trained to order "smart". We can offer our customers, both domestic and international, two approaches to saving money, but both involve ordering "smart", especially in these days of tighter and tighter research budgets.

1. - Avoid small orders of standard size "put ups" of items classified as dangerous goods.
Usually, the addition of a single item classified as dangerous goods in a shipment increases the shipping cost, a lesser amount domestically, but a potentially enormous amount internationally.

2. - Small quantity packaging.
SPI has reformulated and repackaged some items to comply with special small quantity shipping rules.

In order to make it easy to identify those products that can be ordered "smart", and shipped at more attractive shipping rates, we have created our own SPI symbol system to highlight such items:

There are exceptions to every rule, and the

shipping approach is no exception: Some countries can not accept

shipments, and therefore, to those destinations, air freight is the only option.

We now consider two different cases:

1. - For domestic USA shipments containing no dangerous goods items except those designated by:

For U.S. domestic shipments only, SPI can ship many items under the provisions of 49 CFR 173.4 and additional items under a special permit granted by the U.S. Department of Transportation, exemption DOT-E 6971. Using either of these methods, small quantities of materials classified as dangerous goods may be shipped, in essence, as if they were not dangerous goods, provided SPI's uses its specially devised and approved packaging system. There is a nominal charge for the special packaging materials, such cost is much less than the shipping costs being saved. It is difficult to obtain the DOT-E 6971 permit and SPI Supplies is one of only a small number of companies in the United States which enjoy this privilege.

In order to be in compliance with both DOT-E 6971 and 49 CFR 173.4, extensive package design and testing was necessary before shipment could be made using this exemption. To be candid about it, SPI spent what to us was a large amount of money to set up the procedures so that these materials for EM laboratories could be shipped to SPI customers on much a much more favorable shipping rate basis.

Still, there are some products that cannot be shipped under these exemptions and have to be shipped as they have always been shipped, and several examples would include the SPI Two-In-One™ Dusters, SPI Bell Bright™ and Metal Bright™, VacSeal™ in aerosol form, and some of the embedding resin kits. Also, in a few instances we have denoted products with

as applying only to international shipments, not for domestic shipments. But in those cases, the cost to ship domestically in the USA is only marginally higher because of the dangerous goods nature of the material. We therefore did not bother to reformulate product sizes smaller than indicated.

Special SPI-imposed Dangerous Goods Packaging Charges will apply for all shipments going out under one of the exemptions permitting the lower cost shipping methods. Since all involve a higher level and more stringent packaging system, these charges are passed on to our customers. Note that in general, the charge is levied once for the shipment, which can cover a number of different individual Dangerous Goods and it is not a levy on each dangerous goods. For larger shipments involving quite a quantity of different dangerous goods, it is possible that more than one special packaging system would be required and in that case, a second Dangerous Goods Packaging Charge could apply. Also, in some cases, we cannot ship two dangerous goods in the same package, because they can react with each other in the event of breakage. By US Department of Transportation regulations such products must be shipped segregated. And in such a case, an additional Dangerous Goods Packaging Charge would be applied

2. - For international shipments containing no dangerous goods items except those designated as:

For all international shipments, ICAO/IATA regulations prevail, and the just described exemptions from the U.S. DOT, both DOT-E 6971 and also under 49 CFR 173.4 do not apply.

Working in cooperation with FedEx, SPI Supplies is authorized to make "excepted quantity shipments" to foreign destinations, provided the shipment contains absolutely no dangerous goods items except for those also designated by

in the SPI Supplies on-line electronic catalog. Some of our big selling items, such as silver paint thinner, and osmium tetroxide (crystals and aqueous) can be shipped this way, as an SPI "Excepted Quantity Shipment". However, examples of items that could not be shipped this way would include most embedding resin kits, SPI's family of "Dusters", and Bell Bright™ and Metal Bright™. But to make things even more confusing, some shipping destinations (e.g. countries) do not permit

shipments. Also not all shipping services permit

shipments either.

It has been our experience that for many shipments as described above, using FedEx for "excepted quantity shipments", the shipping costs can be a mere fraction of what they might otherwise have been if the shipment was made via regular air freight. And with FedEx, the service is "door to door" including customs clearance (but not taxes), and the SPI customer receiving goods this way (in general) does not even have to pay a separate charge from a customs broker.

Special SPI-imposed Dangerous Goods Packaging Charges will apply for all shipments going out under one of the exemptions permitting the lower cost shipping methods but since all involve a higher level and more stringent packaging system, these charges are passed on to our customers. Note that in general, the charge is levied once for the shipment, which can cover a number of different individual Dangerous Goods and it is not a levy on each and every item classified as Dangerous Goods. For larger shipments involving quite a quantity of different Dangerous Goods, it is possible that more than one special packaging system would be required and in that case, a second Dangerous Goods Packaging Charge could apply.

If you have any questions about our recommendations for "ordering smart" or about domestic "small quantity" or international "excepted quantity" Charges shipments, or about our Dangerous Goods Packaging Charges just e-mail us at spi3spi@2spi.com.

We value your business and have tried very hard to help keep shipping costs associated with SPI customer purchases to a minimum. If you are in a country where presently OK-SPI Supplies shipments are not permitted, and if you would like to help SPI Supplies gain permission to make OK-SPI shipments to your country, let us know, we need all the help we can get to keep the shipping charges to the bare bones minimum. And by all means, give us any suggestions you might have on your own by which we might reduce even further the shipping costs associated with getting SPI Supplies products into your hands".

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