To the Canadian members

[billk]

For what's is worth, here's a repost of a thread on the Trains.com forum with a heads up for mail orders from the US to Canada:

I've been buying stuff mail order from the USA from years, all sorts of stuff. But today I ran into a nasty snag. I had some DCC hardware shipped express mail back on March or April. Some strange deal the US Post office now has instead of the express mail switching to Canada Post at the border as it did in the past and Canada Post collecting the duty, the US Post Office now turns express mail over to Purolator Courier! Not the I have anything against Purolator, but the custom taxes are now collected by a private company called PBB.

So 4 months or so later this PBB mails be an invoice for $21 duty and broker fees, I didn't respond for a few days until I could figure out/remember what it was for. So I mailed a check. A almost two weeks later I get a letter from PBB threatening me that if I did pay they'd send a collection agency after me and make back reports to the credit bureau to wreck my credit rating.

I confirmed with the back that they have in fact cashed the check. And called them, got voice mail, jerks like that love to hide behind voice mail, and left and somewhat hostile message, and told them to call me back if they had the nerve to.

ok, the end point I want to make is if you want to buy from the US and get fast shipping, have it sent UPS, or FedEx. But stay away from the US Postal Service and Purolator. From my past experience with UPS and Fedex that handle duty themselves. NOTE: the does not effect mail sent by "regular" US Postal Mail, just fast/express service like Global Mail Express.

I've posted this on the train forums I'm active on, if you see other places this info may save somebody problems, feel free to repost it or link to it.

 

[Ben H]

The brokerage fee aspect of a item shipped as stated can get real painful. Early in the year I had a $50.00 item that ended up having a a $25.00 brokerage fee added. This charge coved the administration by Purolator Courier to clear the item through customs and collect the Canada GST Tax at the border.

It seems so short sighted for a company to instigate such a unbalance charge. Because once you get hit your start looking for another courier source.

Purolator Courier must be happy not to have these small items on their activity list so we should be happy using another courier system.

 

[GNRail]

It seems that most of the couriers have outragous fees. If I remember the last time I used UPS it was around $50.00 USD for them to broker a package that was duty free (amateur radio equipment)

Does anyone know if the USPS does the same thing with standard mail or is it just express post?

 

[Lighthorseman]

The Poop On Brokerage...

Okay, here's the deal.

The brokerage fees are essentially the Government of Canada saying, "Don't want to use a Crown corporation? Fine. It's going to COST you."

Canada Post, a crown corporation, has specific import rules that the competition does not have. They charge only a flat $5.00 fee for any item over a $30.00 CAD value. This charge comes into effect only if the value of the item exceeds $30.00 Canadian. Everyone else must broker these items across, resulting in the exorbitant fees.

Fedex and UPS offer the brokerage fees included with anything shipped air, as there is enough markup in this system to afford eating that cost.

As a result, when the Purolator or UPS guy show up at the door, you can expect to have to fork out $40.00 or more in charges for something that you got from Ebay for $20.00 USD...whereas the Post Office would want about six or seven bucks.


Here is the truly EVIL part. UPS, the great steamrolling monolith, has decided that they've had enough of this stupid competition nonsense up here in Canada, and have taken Canada Post to court over the difference in import charges, claiming that it's an unfair government subsidy. (Okay, so maybe it is. I don't mind.) Instead of asking that they not be obliged to charge so much more, they're demanding that the Post Office ALSO charge these extortionate fees, handily holding onto the ludicrously profitable brokerage fees, and hooping all the hapless peons (us) in the process.

A happy bonus for them is that with an "even playing field", now they'll just crush all the competition.

Egad. The humanity.

 

[Paul Davis]

Here's my experience for what it's worth. If you ship UPS ground you will get charged brokerage fees. I haven't yet been charged brikerage by anyone else but I'll watch purolator for sure now. I've shipped FedEx (international economy) several times and always payed $7 + gst.