iscoverAustralian small businesses are set to continue to be directly impacted by the ongoing postal freeze to the US, COSBOA has warned.
Small business set to feel the squeeze as AusPost US freeze drags on
16 September 2025
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8 minute read
With postal services to the US set to not lift until later this month, it is expected that Australian small businesses will bear the brunt of the storm and experience significant impacts to profit.
Postal services around the world ceased sending mail to the US ahead of President Donald Trump’s expected expanded tariffs following the removed exemption on packages worth under US$800.
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The Council of Small Business Organisations Australia predicted the postal freeze to end on 25 September, with businesses from around 26 countries having faced the same impacts to profit.
Matthew Addison, COSBOA chair, said the disruption was based on the new tariff and administrative requirements on small parcels entering the US, which have temporarily affected the ability of postal operators worldwide to continue processing the shipments.
In Australia specifically, small businesses in sectors such as fashion, gifts, food and wine, specifically in retail, have been hit the hardest, with many relying on exports to the US market.
In addition to the US, Australia Post revealed in a statement that the postal freeze also included services to the United States’ overseas territories such as Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands and the U.S. Minor Outlying Islands.
“Small businesses have been unable to fulfil customer orders to the US for almost a month, resulting in lost income, delayed deliveries and the need to rebuild customer confidence,” Addison said.
“For many micro and small businesses, these export markets are critical. Unlike larger companies, they don’t have the flexibility to switch couriers or absorb higher freight costs, so any disruption can have a very real impact on their operations.”
In an Information Age report, it was highlighted that given Australia Post has reported 2.3 billion articles during fiscal 2023–24, an average of 6.3 million articles per day, extrapolation suggested that Australian businesses and individuals could be sending 289,000 packages to the US per day.
“That means by the time Australia Post resumes US shipments, Australian exporters could conceivably have a backlog of 7.8 million packages waiting to be shipped there – overloading airlines that have been scaling back package delivery capacity,” the report said.
According to COSBOA, despite Australia Post having indicated shipments should be resumed at the end of the month after the introduction of a new duty collection system through a third-party provider, there was already a significant backlog of orders and “ongoing uncertainty” for smaller operators.
To resolve the issue and backlog, COSBOA pledged to work with members, government and industry stakeholders to ensure the “voices of small businesses were heard” and that safeguards were in place to prevent similar distributions in the future.
Addison said the industry body would call on the government to act quickly to resolve the underlying tariff and administrative barriers affecting small-value shipments to the US, to ensure small businesses could regain certainty and continue trading smoothly.
“With 2.5 million small businesses employing almost 5 million Australians and contributing around one-third of our GDP, it’s vital that the government acts swiftly to remove these barriers and support small exporters.”
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