Tomorrow, we’re going to sign a contract with the postal service so we stop delaying shipments.
 
Why we didn’t do this sooner:
Back before everything went wrong—when I had an Etsy shop—we had an official contract with Russian Post. Under the terms, all services had to be prepaid (we’d transfer funds to the account first, and only then ship the parcels). However, we kept getting hit with strange charges; Russian Post wouldn't provide any justification for them yet still demanded payment. Sometimes the amounts were huge. On one occasion, they even demanded payment for parcels that had already been paid for and shipped six months prior!

Naturally, I was dead set against losing money to unexpected charges like that again.
But since customs has started returning parcels more frequently, we’re losing money anyway—and delaying shipments to avoid sending too many at once. We can’t go on like this. It’s better to deal with the occasional random extra charge than to leave orders unshipped for weeks or have to resend them because of the whims of customs.

I just hope the losses won't be too steep. I hope we won't have to raise shipping costs because of this!