Mexico - Postal Information

Mexican postal services ( correos ) are reasonably efficient. Airmail to the capital should arrive within a few days, but it may take a couple of weeks to get anywhere at all remote. Post offices (generally Mon-Fri 9am-6pm, Sat 9am-noon) usually offer a poste restante/general delivery service: letters should be addressed to Lista de Correos at the Correo Central (main post office) of any town; all mail that arrives for the Lista is put on a list updated daily and displayed in the post office, but held for two weeks only. To collect, you need your passport or some other official ID with a photograph. There is no fee.

American Express also operates an efficient mail collection service, and has a number of offices all over Mexico. They keep letters for a month and also hold faxes. If you don't carry their card or cheques, you have to pay a fee to collect your mail, although they don't always ask.

Sending letters and cards is also easy enough, if slow. Anything sent abroad by air should have an airmail (por avión) stamp on it or it is liable to go surface. Letters should take around a week to North America, two to Europe or Australasia, but can take much longer (postcards in particular are likely to be slow). Anything at all important should be taken to the post office and preferably registered rather than dropped in a mail box, although the new special airmail boxes in resorts and big cities are supposed to be more reliable than ordinary ones. 

Telegram offices (Telegrafos) are frequently in the same building as the post office. The service is super-efficient, but international ones are very expensive, even if you use the cheaper overnight service. In most cases, you can get across a short message for less by phone or fax.