Havana/To verify that number 526 Goicuría Street, between O’Farril and Patrocinio, in the Havana municipality of Diez de Octubre, is one of the Cubamax delivery points, you have to get close. The name of the parcel company, an essential service for Cubans on the Island who are lucky enough to have a family member in the United States, appears in red, on a precarious piece of paper twisted between the blind and the fence, all in green.
The place is far from resembling the impeccable Cubamax stores found in Florida, some of them even with parking lots, where they serve in a purely professional manner. Here, garbage proliferates in the vicinity – like in any corner of Havana – and the only difference is that among the waste you can see some corporate box from the company.
Still, it works. Like this small point, managed by individuals, there are spread throughout the island, says the company, which on February 11 announced that, due to the fuel crisis worsened by the United States oil blockade, suspended home deliveries and warned of restrictions on its service.
/ 14ymedio
The website clearly warns before browsing it: “Due to fuel shortages in Cuba, shipments may be delayed. Food: 7-10 additional days. Appliances: 30-60 days. Frozen shipments have been temporarily removed from our website.”
However, the person in charge of this Goicuría point boasts that “now deliveries are faster, because even though there is no oil, they removed the door-to-door deliveries.” By plane, packages to Havana are taking only four or five days, and the ship, he says, “is coming quite quickly, it takes between 15 and 21 days.”
The key to this “office” is, he explains, M11, and it serves the residents of Cerro, Casino Deportivo, Sevillano, Santos Suárez and Mantilla. The man has been working with the agency for three years, and claims to be happy. In addition, it offers an extra service. “Cubamax leaves the packages here,” he continues, but “if you want me to take it to your house, I will charge you something.” How does it take less, if the agency itself has stated that delays are occurring? “They put another plane, now there are two,” he says.
How does it take less, if the agency itself has stated that delays are occurring?
He does not know how long it takes for the package to reach other provinces, but in a call to a Cubamax office in Miami they respond to 14ymedio To the eastern region, for example, by air transport, the delay is between 15 and 30 days. The same employee insists that they have not suspended the service, and that each agency informs them of the closest point to the address to which they want to send the shipment.
Last Monday, in a post on your social networksthe company reported having established a “super special rapid collection center”, where it ensures that the merchandise arrives in 48 hours, if sent by plane, and 72 by ship. The Miami employee points out: “two business days or three business days, depending on the transport, once the customs inspection has passed.”
This location, however, is not very accessible, given the difficulties in transportation. It is located in Siboney, in the municipality of Playa, about 15 kilometers from the center of Havana.
