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CANADIANS: how do you avoid customs charges and brokerage fees when you buy from U.S. websites?

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Playitagainsam

Banned
Hi,

As you can see from the title, I'm trying to figure out how could I avoid being charged an insane amount of money for things I want to buy from U.S. sites. Case in point: a digital camera and a big HD... especially since the HD will be bought on the Toshiba settlement electronic coupon, not "real" money...

Is there any way to avoid duty charges (ie, saying it's a gift?)

Thanks.
 
You dont avoid them.
Unless you live near the border and have an american bring it over for you.
And when you ship across the border, you will be DAMNED lucky to receive your package in one piece, let alone receiving it at all.
 
Thanks, SammySon

BTW, check my answer to your post in the Keanu Reeves thread 🙂

After checking out some more web data, it seems that the camcorder is about the same in both countries. The HD is still more expensive north of the border, though, I wonder why...
 
Well I would move to the US, but that's just me.

Us Canadians are to intelligent to do something silly like that 😛. Beside our igloos would probably melt.

Playitagainsam yes it's a problem that all of us Canadians face.

A few ways

- If you live near the boarder have it shipped to a US address then go pick it up.

- When going on vacation down there have the package shipped to your hotel.

- When going on business have it shipped to the office down there.

- Have it shipped to a friend then have it repackaged and shipped to you as a gift.

Of course some of these methods are technically illegal 🙂.
 
Try this site.. Very nice.. You can buy anything in the USA and they will ship it to you.. You no longer have to worry about US only sites, this place will get it for you. And you don't have to worry about sponsored only shopping sites,, this place will shop for you from ANY US site. Really cool

BorderFree.com
 
Yup, I have a US mailbox that I used to get stuff shipped to, then I'd bring it across myself. Only charges this way are GST/PST.

However, I haven't bought anything from the US since last May. If you look around, you can find almost anything for the same price in Canada as you would in the US.
 

Canadian customs are *****************.

I bought a game for $50 and they charged me $50 for the duty.

Now i end up paying $100 for a game!! :|:|:|:|:|:|

I'm going to move to US after i graduate.

 
Don't use UPS ground, since they charge insanely high brokerage fees. I reported them to the Atlanta Better Business Bureau for this reason. (To their credit, I got a response from UPS that they were working on making this more clear on their website, but the practice still remains - and the references to the brokerage charges on the site are still obscure.) The faster UPS services might be an option, but I think it's more expensively than FedEx often. See if you can use USPS Standard or Global Priority, because then the brokerage charges are only $5 CAD. You will still have to pay GST, and maybe PST, depending on the province. I also find that sometimes they'll just waive the brokerage fee on small items. The problem with USPS is that there's no way to track it.

FedEx has NO brokerage charges for their air service, but unfortunately it's much more expensive. On the other hand, if it's an expensive light item, it ends up being cheaper than UPS ground, and you get it in 2 days to boot. I don't know for sure about FedEx ground (which is new), but I think they have a brokerage fee, albeit much less.

Or, just buy the damn thing in Canada. I buy most of my computer parts in Canada, because it's actually cheaper here usually, and if you get it from another province, you don't pay PST. I bought my 45 GB IBM Deskstar locally for cheaper than most US online stores.

Note that this does NOT include duty, but most electronics stuff from the US is usually duty-free.
 
Bluga: What kind of game? How was it shipped? Customs, I can almost gaurantee you, did not charge anything more that GST/PST. Any other charges would have been "brokerage fees" that the shipping company charged you.
 
Yep, if I buy something from a US website that delieves it to Australia VIA UPS or Fed Ex, as they automatically charges the customs fees & passes the duty across.

But with stuff I've bought that just gets mailed across (USPS), not once has I had to pay duty, because customs only check like about 3% of mailed parcels, so the odds are with me.

Now if things are similar in Canada, just make sure you buy from a firm that uses ordinary mail serivices & not courier companies like UPS that have a policy of charging customs fees & passing them on, regardless of whether customs have actually inspected the goods or not.
 

sandorski:

I bought Ages of Empire II about a year ago (forgot which sotre..) but when i receive the package, the box has already been opened with a sticker saying "inspected by custom"!!
 
so much for free trade

i dont mind paying GST/PST on items coming into the border but those god damn brockerage fees BURN MY ASS!!!!

for example, i ordered a tailsol heatsink/fan kit, it was 9 bucks US

BROKERAGE FEE's CAME TO 28.95 CDN!!!!
My god, i was about ready to go insane....

i couldnt believe...

brokerage fees are the current RIP off artists of our time.

:| :| :|
 


<< BROKERAGE FEE's CAME TO 28.95 CDN!!!! >>

Lemme guess. You used UPS ground. NEVER use UPS ground if you can help it. They suck.
 
Just have them mail (US Mail) it across, the odds are less than 5% or something that customs would even look at it. If its mailed across in that 3 month period before christmas the odds of customs checking it are then probably half that. If you are paranoid your parcel will be in that 2% or whatever that does end up getting checked by customs in that christmas rush; you could always ask the sender to write 'christmas present purchased by US resident' on the parcel.

Another trick is to ask the person your purchasing the product from, to write 'no cost warrantee replacement' on the package, before they mail it.

Anyway if Canadian customs is anything like Australian customs, then there'd be a threshold where customs consider any package whose contents are valued less than that threehold to not be worth bothering about. In Australia its $200 (but its at customs descretion, so if your getting multiple parcels every day with a value of $198 they probably start charging you VAT/GST/tarifs or whatever anyway).

But whatever you do, do not have any items you purchased sent over by UPS or Fed Ex, they automatically calculate &amp; charge all the customs fees &amp; VAT or whatever &amp; then charge you a fee as well as another fee for doing it. Which means you have to pay a bloody bill before they hand over your stuff.

Here in Australia I personally know of cases where UPS &amp; Fed Ex have calculated all the customs charges &amp; made people pay them, even though the products were under the $200 threshold, which would have meant they would have been up for nothing extra if their products were simply mailed over &amp; had been amongst that 5% or whatever that get inspected.
 
Dabanshee your right. However this threshold is 20.00 usd or 30.00 american.
Btw I had a package worth about 350 usd opened (640 megs of ram) that was declared at 39 and as a gift. However since there was no gift card i ended up paying about $10.00 taxes. The guys obviously have no idea about computer parts.
 
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