Hi guys,
just a quick question. I'll be moving to Toronto soon on 'dual intent' while waiting for my PR. I'm only taking two pieces of furniture and 4 boxes of clothes/shoes/ personal effects.
Is it better in terms of customs to have the goods shipped via sea or air?

anyone with a relevant experience?

Yeah, but, do the customs people care how the stuff comes? I don't imagine so.

Ah my bad, didn't see that bit lol.
In which case no, they don't give a stuff - no problem/difference with any of the methods.
Just keep a list of what you are bringing in.

Oh but we do care. I have lost count the amount of times I have cried or lost sleep over the way personal belongings have been shipped or treated by cargo handlers. Imagine the shock and horror when opening up a 20 or 40' container and finding that this persons extensive and expensive wine collection has frozen or bottles have broken because they decided to ship it across the Atlantic in January or February.

The collectors car not secured properly and wondering how much a new paint job and various dents in the bodywork is going to cost and finding out their insurance doesn't cover the damage.

They invented bubble wrap and a host of other types of packing material for very good reasons but unfortunately they haven't invented something to stop some bored underpaid cargo handler looking at a package with a fragile sticker on it and them testing by various means like kicking, throwing, dropping, and driving over the package to see if the item contained within is actually fragile or not.

Not "care" in terms of emotional attachment to someone else's boxes of records and old photographs, "care" in terms of assessing them different for duties and regulations according to the shipment method.

Yeah that bit we don't give a stuff about unless you are a revenue police type of officer.

Happened to a friend's container when they returned to Canada from Switzerland... don't remember the time of year, but most of the wine had frozen by the time it got to Montreal.

Thanks all for your valuable input.

We shipped our boxes by air. Just bear in mind that there are some things that cannot be shipped by air. Some sharp objects (kitchen knives are ok, but very large and sharp objects that could be mistaken for weapons - whatever those could be ?) are not allowed.

Flammable liquids are not allowed either, including items such as perfume or spirits that contain alcohol.

Items containing batteries are not allowed either, which I guess is most important to consider when shipping toys and stuff like that.

There is a list of things that are NOT allowed, which we got from the company who shipped our stuff, and they stressed the importance of complying with the requirements. Apparently they do not allow ANY of the boxes on the plane if just one of them contains something, it is not supposed to contain.