Ling_Noi

It looks like a job offer in Toronto will be coming my way in the next few days and I need to prepare things as they will be expecting me within 5 weeks.

We're doing our best to trim what goods we are taking over down to only the necessary items but there are things that we won't be able to take in our standard baggage allowance:

* Clothes and shoes
* Books
* PS4, Blu-ray discs, personal computer and monitor

Most of this stuff is too heavy to get on the plane and I'd like to ship it in a partial container. Time isn't a big problem and it doesn't matter if it takes several weeks.

I live in Liverpool so ideally I'd like to drop this off at one of the ports here and collect it from a port in Toronto as we will probably be moving around within the first few months. Any suggestions on companies or how much I can roughly expect to pay on a cubic meter/kg basis?

********************

Immunisation certificates - we've done the medical already as part of the FSW. I'm British and my wife is Thai - are we going to be asked for these?

Goodbhoy

I paid just over 5K for a 20 foot container in the last month.
The price was a standard price for a container this size.
This was for professional packers who came and packed everything and will unpack in Toronto as well.

I also moved from Liverpool to Toronto and my wife and children are finally about to land at Pearson international Airport within the next 20 minutes.
I was quoted 4-6 weeks delivery and so far it still has not turned up.

Former Lancastrian

Once the shipment arrives in Canada it will have to be shipped to a bonded or sufferance warehouse for clearance. You won't be able to pick it up at a port yourself and you can clear the goods yourself at usually the nearest Customs office that clears these type of goods. Which forwarding address will you be using you can use a care of address. Don't forget to have a list of goods (duplicate) one for yourself and one for Customs when you go to clear the goods.
My suggestion is use a freight forwarder and pay for door to door service.

Juggernaut1064

you can get small crates/boxes if you dont need a full container yourself and they have different sizes.
International Removals | Overseas Moving and UK Shipping

diswell

We've just done this in our move from Silverstone to Waterloo. Thanks to the awesome advice from this website, the customs official at Kitchener (where we cleared our belongings) said we had the best paperwork she'd seen in 22 years. :-)

Chalk up another point for BE!

Ling_Noi

Minimum 2m^3 we only need 0.54m^3

Price for 2 cubic metres is reasonable though.

Siouxie

I'd suggest contacting Air Transat cargo, the items can go on the same flight as you (though that isn't necessary) and you have 48 hours from when they arrive to collect them from the Cargo department (though you have to go to the Customs office to clear them first). My son bought several boxes over that way and found it was actually cheaper than shipping them; insurance was minimal too.

http://www.leisurecargo.com/?m=1

Ling_Noi

Yeah I've got a quote from them and it's very cheap. I will go with them more than likely.

Alan2005

You speak Thai OP?

Ling_Noi

Just a bit. The Mrs is from Bangkok.

Alan2005

Though so. I used to live there (great city to spend a few years as an expat) so I picked up a little for day to day use. Enough to know what your user name means at least.

davekays

I've been using [http://www.excess-baggage.com] for years. I think about 700GBP for 83cuft (sea). You can also ship part air & sea with them. Find an alternative distributor for supplying the packaging... it may work out cheeper! As you say, somethings are too heavy/expensive for plane, but in contrast to air, underutilizing an allocated slot/sea container had cost penalties! Also, make sure you list as much as possible such as serial numbers and the like because you could get a hard time arriving at port (if moving isn't stressful enough). There is a document called 'I Declare' [http://www.cbsa.gc.ca/publications/p...5056-eng.html] that might be worth reading. You need not learn the hard way like me then! Hope this helps.