Courier in Spain – how to get the best value – The only Discount Internet Spanish Courier Parcel, Letter, Baggage and Luggage service.

Well, wasn’t the April weather glorious in the UK? I believe that where my father lives they had 4mm of rain all month (although that has ruined the grain harvest). Here in Spain we had over 100mm in a single day (they refer to it as litres per cubic metre so 10l) let alone the other days. The weather gives us brief glimpses of Summer and then steals them away to take us back to early Spring.

As those who follow this blog can tell, I have changed the header photo a few times recently. We have had green spring, then horrid snow then beautiful sea and now these wonderful wild sweet peas.

All of these photos are shot within 100m of where we live and work. There has to be some compensation for working 12 – 15 hours a day!

I have spent some time experimenting with different types of prawns / shrimp.  I started with those peeled ones that come out of the freezer cabinet of the supermarket but (a) they are not all peeled, so some shell is left, and (b) they have that thin black line down the back which is the intestine and must be removed (it is not dangerous, just unpleasant).

So, you pay around €5 for 200g of large prawns and cook them from frozen and then have to de-vein them (take out the thin black line), which is very time consuming, before eating them.  But there is another way, go large!  In every Spanish supermarket they offer larger shell-on prawns which are raw and (although previously frozen) are sold at the fresh fish counter.  The prawns are measured by the number per kg, so 14/16 is roughly the number you will get per kg.

Although these seem to be much more expensive, maybe €10/kg, they actually offer much better value in the weight of prawn meat you get per € and they taste very much better than the ready-peeled variety.  Spend the same money as you would have before on peeled prawns (and buy just 500g for two people), if still frozen, allow to defrost in the fridge.  So now we get into recipe mode, something I have never done before.

While still raw, shell the large prawns, you will find that almost none need de-veining; the vein comes out when you tear the head off.  Put all the heads and shells in a saucepan and bring another saucepan of salted water to the boil.  Cook the bodies of the prawns for as short a time as possible, until they have gone pink, maybe only 60 seconds depending on their size, immediately remove from the heat, drain and plunge into a bowl of iced water.  You now have really fabulous top-quality prawns that can be used with a marie-rose sauce (mayonnaise, tomato ketchup, pepper, lemon juice and a little Tabasco– experiment to see what you like).  This mixture goes well with avocado or as a luxury prawn cocktail.

Now to the free lunch. 

Cover the heads and shells of the prawns with water and boil for an hour. 

Take off the heat and liquidise, I use a hand blender but any form of kitchen gadget that chops them up small is fine. 

Boil for another hour to concentrate the flavour and reduce the liquid.

Sieve into a smaller saucepan to remove the shells.

Add a little tomato puree, some cream or crème fraiche, a good dash of Tabasco, ground pepper and a teaspoon of maize flour dissolved in an eggcup of brandy.

Back on the hob, whisk until it comes to a simmer and thickens.

To be extra-delicious, you can add some raw prawns at this stage which starts the whole process again!

This may seem like a long process but the actual time needed at the cooker is less than 15 minutes (you don’t need to be present while the shells are boiling).  Result, something as good as lobster bisque and free!  The prawn meat that you have extracted from the shells is more that the defrosted ready-peeled bag of prawns (much of which is water), the taste is far better, hardly any de-veining is needed and you get a fabulous soup for free.

One of our customers bought a card access device from Anviz in China.  This is the sort of security lock that requires users to swipe a card to open a door, the picture is of a similar one but not the same.

Anyway, the lock did not work and the customer contacted Anviz and was given instructions to return the device.  We sent it by FedEx to China on their behalf.  Once it arrived Anviz refused to accept it so it sat in Customs.  FedEx let us know and we emailed Anviz twice but never got a reply.  Then we got a definitive notice from FedEx that someone called LUO (plus their telephone number and extension) had confirmed that they would never accept the faulty device and it should be returned to sender.

No one in their right mind would pay to courier a broken lock from China to Spain so the item has been destroyed by Chinese Customs at our client’s request and our client is out of pocket both for the initial cost of the lock (€450) and the cost of FedEx from Spain to China.

So, if you buy from Anviz, a global company headquartered in the USA, don’t bother to try and return the product when it doesn’t work (they will probably not answer you anyway).  Just another way to waste a few hours of your Spanish courier’s time and a sad tale of a customer losing money.

We try so hard to get international parcels from Spain through to the recipient.  If they are undeliverable, through an incorrect address or nobody being in to receive them, the courier companies, FedEx or UPS, return the packages to the sender which means a large returns bill and possible Spanish Customs import duty.

Anyway, today I fired off an email to Helena asking her to contact the recipient of luggage from Spain to Canada to beg them to contact UPS and arrange delivery as the two previous times they had tried to deliver there had been nobody home.  As it happens, we also had to exert considerable influence to get the suitcase through US Customs on its way to Canada from Spain.

Anyway, Helena calls the recipient at 9:30am which, unfortuately, was 03:30 in Canada.  The recipient was, luckily, awake and at his computer: this is roughly the conversation we had when she couldn’t cope and handed him over to me.

Shut up.  I want your full name.  Shut up, are you going to listen to me or shall I hang up?  Shut up, where do you live?  Shut up, my brother made an emergency trip to Spain to collect my mother who is seriously ill and managed to get her out in time, this parcel is her clothes.  Shut up, I am a personal friend of the CEO of UPS Canada.  Shut up, do you know where Almuñecar is?  Shut up, if I offered you and your wife $5m a year would you come to Toronto to work for me?  Shut up, I want you to send me your resumés (CVs) right now.  Shut up, where do you live?  Shut up, I am about to start a multi-million dollar lawsuit against UPS, do you want to join in?  Shut up, why are you laughing?

Well, at least the job has some compensations, you get the occasional laugh on top of all the effort of getting the international parcels from Spain through the problems provided by both government agencies and customers.  After 30 minutes on this international call, the recipient told me that delivery was scheduled for this morning (the only bit of information I wanted to know) and then: Shut up, are you going to take up my offer of employment or do you want me to hang up?  I opted for the latter option which, luckily he did!

Last week, we had a few problems clearing through Spanish Customs two suitcases a lady was sending by FedEx from outside the EU.  I have written before about how Customs all over the World are getting tougher and trying to collect more money.  Anyway, the lady decided to get her lawyer involved.

Although Sr. Babiano’s office contacted me a number of times, I explained to them (in English and in Spanish) that we had everything under control and it was far better that they did not interfere with Customs which could only delay the release of the baggage from Monaco.  Customs released the goods on Thursday at 5.00pm and the suitcases were delivered to our Elviria office at 11.00am on Friday.  As an aside, the lady refused to pay the full courier fee which, indeed, does make me stupid.

Anyway, Sr. Luís Babiano sent me a long email (over 400 words) in which he called me a “stupid man” five times in five paragraphs.  Here is why he called me stupid:

1)      I am stupid because I haven’t learned Spanish – I spent 11 weeks in language school in Nerja (6 hours a day) and most people think my Spanish pretty good.

2)      I am stupid because he had the cases released from Customs (not us and FedEx), even though he claims the time he talked to Customs was after the baggage had already been delivered to our office, and that Customs told him they would be delivered to his client’s house on Saturday when the delivery address was our office and FedEx don’t make Saturday deliveries so someone somewhere was not telling the truth.

3)      I am stupid because he told me that I didn’t realise quite what an important lawyer he was.

4)      I am stupid because ignorant and stupid foreign delinquent people (normally English) have settled in the Costa del Sol due to which it is known as the Costa del Crime.

5)      Look, Mr Stupid, come to my office with a couple of lawyers, or better, go to England.

Actually, I haven’t had such a funny email for ages and couldn’t stop laughing.  But anyone thinking of engaging a lawyer who specialises in Sotogrande, Campo de Gibraltar, Marbella and Fuengirola may wish to consider that this man obviously loses his temper very quickly and, in contrast to most Spanish lawyers I have met, who are learned and courteous, is foul-mouthed and rude.  Clearly, I would not want to use him and I suggest that you might think twice before doing so!

I write this at 03:18 having been woken over an hour ago by the most terrible shrieking.  It is the second time within a week; last time my wife confronted it and tonight I did, on both occasions, all we could see was an eerie pair of shining yellow eyes.  Please forgive me if your courier in Spain is not so alert today.

This animal is not in the distance, it has come within 3m of the house, situated on the border of Granada and Almeria, to plunder the garden.  I have spent the last 90 minutes identifying it and here is what it sounds like: Shrieking of the Golden Jackal and this is what it looks like:

With this terrible noise you can imagine that we were frightened and when I looked it up in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_jackal it says “Although it is known to kill animals up to three times its own weight, the golden jackal overall targets mammalian prey much less frequently than the black-backed jackal.^[36] Upon capturing large prey, the golden jackal makes no attempt to kill its prey, but rips open its belly and eats the entrails. ” Which is very comforting.  It also says that it is more a wolf than a jackal, even more comforting.

Referring to my wildlife guide this beast is meant to only be in the Eastern Mediterranean whereas we are decidedly Western.  It says that Canis Aureus (its Latin name) is wary but this one shows no fear, it stays near if I shout “go away” and only does go away when caught in the beam of a powerful torch.

Altogether not a welcome sight in an International Andalusian Courier business!

I have a friend who went to a flamenco bar in Nerja (Málaga) Spain (a proper one, not a tourist one) and a young man was teaching her the different forms of clapping that accompany this famous Andaluz (Andalusian) Gypsy music.  There was a single man playing the flamenco guitar and singing.

She really enjoyed her time and on Saturday my wife heard the song being played in a bar that we were in and the waiter kindly wrote down for us the name of the band and the song.  I went onto eBay and put in a bid for an album that contained this song and, luckily, I was outbid.  The 2nd hand CDs sold for £13.50 and I went this morning to Amazon and bought exactly the same for £1.94 (and the postage was fractionally cheaper, too).  So the eBay one was 700% more expensive.

In the words of Alan Greenspan “Irrational exuberance”, great for sellers but Caveat Emptor (buyer beware) of overbidding at auction and not checking prices thoroughly.  www.amazon.co.uk is really coming up with more and more bargains and many of our customers are chosing to list their products through Amazon UK using Citibox to send the products from Spain to the UK from where Amazon distribute them.

The moral of the story is to search carefully on the internet before making a purchase and, in Spain, you will not find a cheaper international courier service than Citibox however hard you try.