This is a continuation of a long topic, addressed by post number rather than by page. Start at post 1 · go to the accepted answer.
On post #29 — agreed on the reasoning, with one qualification.
Document outcomes rather than forecasting them. A forecast in this category reads as reassurance and is not one.
Worth reading the earlier posts in this thread before acting on mine.
Before the thread moves on from insurance and replacement policies — what is the sample size behind the claim? I am not being difficult; I have seen the same figure quoted from an n of four and from an n of four hundred.
Post #33 is right about the mechanism and I think understates the practical bit.
Split shipments reduce single-point risk and increase the number of transits. Which trade is right depends on what you are protecting against.
Post #33 describes the usual case. This is about the unusual one.
I disagree with the framing of insurance and replacement policies above, and I think it is a substantive disagreement rather than a terminological one. Setting out why, so it can be checked.
The reasoning depends on an assumption that is doing a lot of work and is never stated. If the assumption holds, the conclusion follows. I do not think it holds generally.
Insurance and replacement policies is one of those subjects where the general answer and the answer for a specific case diverge, and the thread will go in circles until someone says which one is being asked for.
The question underneath insurance and replacement policies is usually "how would I tell?" rather than "what is true?", and that one has a method attached to it.
Write down what you would expect to see under each hypothesis before you collect anything. If they predict the same observation, collecting it will not help.
Taking post #37 at face value and following it one step further.
Small correction to my own earlier position on insurance and replacement policies. I had the units the wrong way round, which changes the conclusion by an order of magnitude and therefore changes it entirely.
This follows post #38 rather than contradicting it.
Anyone deciding whether a delay is a problem should ask what would change if they waited another week. Usually the answer is nothing.
Two sources, same conclusion, and I could not rule out that one copied the other.
Worth separating two things that post #40 runs together.
Import restrictions by jurisdiction: what is legal to import for personal use varies enormously by country. Some jurisdictions are quite permissive; others are not. Checking your own country's rules before ordering is prudent.
It cost nothing to check and would have cost something not to.
Insurance and replacement policies: I have looked for the primary source twice and failed twice. Either it does not exist or it is somewhere I do not know to look, and I would like to know which.
Insurance and carrier liability: most parcel carriers limit liability. Understanding the limits before choosing a carrier matters if you are shipping expensive material.
On insurance and replacement policies the community has more anecdote than the confidence in this thread implies, and I include my own contribution in that.
The practical version of insurance and replacement policies is three sentences long. The rigorous version is three pages and reaches the same conclusion with the conditions attached.
No notes. Posting so the count is not one.
Insurance and replacement policies looks different depending on whether you are reading the primary literature or the summaries of it, and the difference is not in our favour.
Post #49 put the caveat in the right place and I want to underline it.
Speaking only to insurance and replacement policies as I have actually seen it, rather than as it is usually described: the effect is real, it is smaller than the thread suggests, and the variance between people is larger than the effect.
Building on post #51 rather than restating it.
Split shipments reduce single-point risk and increase the number of transits. Which trade is right depends on what you are protecting against.
Written from notes rather than memory, which is why the numbers are specific.
What would change my mind on insurance and replacement policies is a second dataset collected by someone with no stake in the first. Until then I hold it loosely and I would rather say so than pretend to more.
I changed my mind about insurance and replacement policies after someone here asked me for the source and I could not produce one. That is worth saying out loud because it is the ordinary way it happens.
Peak periods and public holidays affect this more than any other factor and are entirely predictable in advance.
That matches what I was told, which is not the same as knowing it.
Answering the question post #55 raises rather than the one it answers.
Import restrictions by jurisdiction: what is legal to import for personal use varies enormously by country. Some jurisdictions are quite permissive; others are not. Checking your own country's rules before ordering is prudent.
Speaking for myself and not for anyone else who has posted here.
A request rather than an answer: could whoever has the primary source for insurance and replacement policies post it? I have seen the claim three times this month and each version had lost a qualifier.
Two things can be true about insurance and replacement policies at once: the mechanism is plausible and the evidence for the size of the effect is thin. Most of the argument here is people defending the first against attacks on the second.