enginepaints.com

Why engine paint can't be posted

Solvent paint and aerosols are dangerous goods. What Royal Mail, Parcelforce, DPD and Evri will and won't carry, how the trade moves it instead, and what that does to the delivered price.

Updated 2026-09-20

On this page
  1. Why paint counts as dangerous goods
  2. Aerosols
  3. What each carrier says
  4. How the trade moves it
  5. What it means when you buy
  6. If you want to send paint yourself
  7. Sources
  • Solvent-based paint and paint aerosols are dangerous goods in transport law. Royal Mail and Parcelforce refuse them outright.
  • No packaging or service upgrade gets round it. The whole class of goods is refused, whatever the size of the can.
  • The trade moves paint by specialist courier service to mainland addresses only. There is no air freight, no island delivery and usually no export.
  • Carriage is close to a fixed cost per parcel, so compare delivered prices and order the whole job at once.
  • You can't post a leftover tin to a buyer or a friend either.

Why paint counts as dangerous goods

Carriers classify paint by its hazard in transit, and the first test is the flash point: the temperature at which the vapour will ignite.

Royal Mail prohibits any liquid with a flash point below 60.5°C. Its list names paint thinners and removers, solvents, varnishes and enamels, and then lists "solvent-based paints" and enamels directly, to UK and international addresses alike. That covers nearly every engine enamel and everything sold to thin it. For scale, Hycote's data sheet gives its engine enamel aerosol a flash point below minus 20°C.

There is a shortcut that saves reading the list. Royal Mail says products bearing consumer warning symbols are dangerous goods and are prohibited unless specifically permitted. If the tin carries the flame pictogram, the postal network won't take it.

Two words on these lists do different jobs. Prohibited means never. Restricted means allowed if you meet the stated conditions on packaging, volume, quantity and labelling.

Water-based paint falls into the second group. Personal customers may send 150 ml per item. Business customers may send 500 ml per item within the UK and 150 ml abroad or to the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, new and sealed.

Aerosols

Royal Mail sorts aerosols by what they are for.

Toiletry and medicinal aerosols are restricted. They can travel within the UK, capped, at no more than 500 ml each and two to a parcel, cushioned in strong packaging, with an ID8000 label and a return address showing. Personal customers must hand them over a Post Office counter. None of it goes abroad.

Aerosols for any other purpose are prohibited, and the definition names spray paints, lacquers and solvents. That applies to UK and international post, and to personal and business accounts alike.

That is why a can of engine enamel never arrives by post. Size and weight have nothing to do with it. The class is refused, so no box makes it acceptable and no premium service buys a way round it.

What each carrier says

CarrierSolvent paint in a tinPaint aerosolsOther liquids
Royal Mail and ParcelforceProhibitedProhibitedWater-based paint restricted: 150 ml personal, 500 ml business within the UK
DPDRefused as flammable goodsRefused as flammable goodsNothing over 50 ml, and no liability below that
EvriProhibited by name: paints, enamels, varnishesProhibited as pressurised containersUnder 1,000 ml within the UK, with no compensation. None abroad

Parcelforce shares Royal Mail's list, and its help pages link straight to it.

The three disagree, and a single tin shows how. Take 400 ml of water-based engine paint. Royal Mail carries it on a business account and refuses it from a personal customer, because the limits are 500 ml and 150 ml. Evri refuses it as paint at any volume. DPD's list stops at 50 ml of any liquid.

How the trade moves it

Businesses that sell paint send it on courier services set up for dangerous goods, and they pay extra for it. Their own delivery terms show what those services allow.

Rimmer Bros marks its engine and exhaust paint, the 400 ml aerosol and the 500 ml tin alike, as delivered by UPS to mainland UK addresses only. It won't send them by air or by Royal Mail, won't deliver to the islands or export them, and sets a minimum carriage charge. It takes no returns on aerosols. Frost publishes the list of countries it can send aerosols, paints and chemicals to, and the Channel Islands are not on it.

What it means when you buy

Restricted carriage narrows the choices to one carrier, one service and a mainland address, and it puts a floor under the delivery charge whatever the order is worth. One small tin and a full box cost much the same to move, because the hazard class sets the cost and the weight barely matters.

So work from the delivered price. A can that looks cheap with carriage added at checkout can cost more than a dearer can with delivery included. Some large sellers build the carriage into the price and show delivery as free. The cost is still there, which is why the delivered price is the only fair comparison. The shop shows current prices, and the UK buying guide explains how to compare cans of different sizes.

Order once. Primer, colour, thinners and a spare can in one parcel pay the carriage floor a single time.

If you live on an island, check before you order. Many sellers won't ship paint beyond the mainland at any price, and a mainland address you can collect from is the usual workaround.

Returns are harder than for ordinary goods. Halfords classes anything flammable, pressurised or harmful as a hazardous item and wants the original packaging back with a return, because that packaging carries the required labels. Rimmer won't take aerosols back at all. Check the colour and the rating before you buy, because sending it back may not be possible.

If you want to send paint yourself

You can't post it. That rules out selling a leftover tin on an auction site with postage, sending a can to a friend, and posting a sample to be matched. Royal Mail's rules apply to private senders as much as to businesses, and the sender is responsible for what is in the parcel.

The honest options are collection in person, or a courier that offers a dangerous goods service to private customers, which costs more than most leftover tins are worth. To get a colour matched, send a painted part or a sprayed test card. Dry paint is not dangerous goods.

Sources