pommywagon

My last post got nixed cuz I was a little hard on a fellow who thinks it's a cat and mouse game, and Sarah, it's not.

As a farmer, Customs has a responsibility to prohibit things that can damage my livelyhood, and livehood of farmers. Whether or not they ENFORCE Queen's rules is not up to me, but I guess we forgot how some selfisly smuggled Pork resulted in foot and mouth disease. Unlike back home, the Yanks will NOT help us if we get some virus here. Look at the panic, (unessessary) over Pork and Swine Flu. Imagine what would happen if it was transmitted. Food is a nessesity of life, and last year Canada had enough problems with listeria and salmonella. All this can be brought in too if someone is travelling form a place that has it. It's selfish to bring in something you think is OK because you want it. Think of the rest of us. If the folks in blue don't want to do it, you should have enough respect for folks like us who provide your food here, the people who don't want a virus and keep from paying a ransom for a hamburger or banger when we run short of pigs or cattle.
The FMD crisis was caused by discarded pork that may have been picked up by soem other animal. It was suspected a steer or bovine ate it. The cattle got sick, and it contaminates everything, so lorries taking other cattle to farm brought the mud on the tyres and hence, it spead to other farms...
THINK. THINK. THINK.

pommywagon

[QUOTE=CaptainHook;7370759



Perhaps you've never asked a CBSA officer to say please.


.[/QUOTE]

Why should they say please?

Jingsamichty

There's no reason why common courtesy and good manners should be forgotten just because you're wearing a uniform. Very few uniformed jobs are so critical that a 'please', 'thank you', 'you're welcome' or whatever won't make the whole exchange a little more pleasant for all involved.

pommywagon

I guess. Try telling that to someone in retail!!!

dannyg1001

A word of warning to those who plan on stuffing their cases and keeping their gobs shut.

Basically Ive done this a few times, i didnt declare anything and walked through customs with no questions asked... that was until a few months ago in Calgary.

They asked if I had anything to declare and I said no... she looked at me and asked if I am sure and I said I was. She put an X on my declaration form and was sent into a room for a bag search.

Upon opening my case's the (miserable) customs officer found 8 bottles magners, 4 tins beans, 4 tins heinz mulligatawny soup, 2 bags jellie babies, 2 packs carmel digestives, 12 pot noodles, 12 pack of monster much, 10 pack of skips and lots more that i cant remember. I had over 100 quids worth.

They confiscated the lot, and told me if I'd have declared it they would have probably let me keep it.

They also confiscated the christmas present my brother bought me, and 2 womens england football shirts that still had the labels on.

Basically, just declare it... cos i was absolutely gutted when I lost all my stuff, and i have no place to moan about it as I know the laws and it my my fault for being stupid.

G77

I should think that the game was given away somewhat by your bulging case - that's a lot of stuff!

How long had you been away? If you'd been gone 7 days you could quite rightly have kept it and paid nothing on it!

dannyg1001

I know... it was jammed into every spare space of my luggage, i had to pay for it being over the weight limit too.

i had been gone for 3 and a half weeks, over Christmas.

G77

Doh - you could have most definitely declared it and would have been no problem

dannyg1001

Thats what the lady said

it was my own fault... i have no complaints. I just thought I'd add it because some people on this thread are advising others to pack their cases with stuff and not declare it and it will be fine... I can personally say its most definitely not a good idea!!!!

scrubbedexpat091

If it wasn't with you when you left Canada, declare it. Better to declare then to have them find something and seize it.

jericho

Yeah, but what you tried to get away with was a little excessive. There's someone on here claiming they were damn near strip searched for having the scent of an apple in their bag. It's scaremongering at it's worst.

mandymoochops

Unless you're bringing back gold plated venision - we live in deer capital of the world - why on earth would you want to do that????? Canadian venison is lovely (as is Elk - more so probably)

(For the record used to work for Holkham Estate in Norfolk - very good friends with the guy who looked after ((and shot)) the deer - which was then cooked by our head chef ((who used to cook for the Queen when she was up at the hall)) so do know what well reared and cooked venison should taste like)

G77

That's because it's fruit - they don't like fruit (particularly citrus, not sure why) crossing borders. Pretty much ok with processed and sealed foods I'd say....