mkmurrays

Help!
We were advised that our shipment would take 5-8 weeks, so we booked a holiday to co-incide with this. However, we've now been told our shipment will only take three and a half weeks, so it will arrive around ten days before us. We're in Florida, our shipment has just left Montreal!
Can customs be delayed until we arrive?
Any advice/experience greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

printer

Oh shooot!
Cannot help with any advice but it does seem that these shipments can get there much quicker than expected. Our shippers quoted in writing 8 - 10 weeks to Vancouver, then when i checked they said "oh no it will be 17 - 25 days"
When they sent me the confirmation the expected arrival date was close to my arrival date and i had to phone to double check it wouldn't be there earlier. They tell me it's due in Montreal on the day we land in Vancouver so i hope this is the case.

Ben W Bell

Have you landed yet? If not then there could be a problem with import duties if you haven't landed and given in your Goods to Follow as yet.

mkmurrays

No, that's the issue. We land on 27th May, when we arrive from holiday. We anticipated our stuff would arrive a week or so later!

KRoss

If you read page 6 of this document
http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/E/pub/cm/d2-2-1/d2-2-1-e.pdf
it says that goods arriving before you will be kept for 40 days and then treated as unclaimed.
So should be ok ( I hope)

Judy in Calgary

For clarification, it states, quote:
It then goes on to say, quote:
My point is that, in a worst case scenario, one can resort to bonded storage that is provided by the removalist. I do not anticipate that that will be necessary in this case, however.

Cookie

I would call the shipping agent in Canada dealing with your goods and ask them. They will need your Florida contact details anyway to let you know when your goods have arrived. I do know that you need to get them shifted ASAP from Customs into storage if you are not collecting them within a few days of landing. If not, horrendously expensive fees will be incurred.

Our shippers organised 4 weeks storage for us. We did not have to show our goods to follow list until a couple of days before our container was delivered to us.

We were never asked to show our goods to follow list when we landed (Toronto Pearson - long story ). I think this also happened to a few other people in the forum. No worries though as the one we showed to have our shipment released to us in Halifax was accepted.

mkmurrays

Thanks for all the help and suggestions.

We finally got hold of someone, and it looks like that, because of the speedier than anticipated delivery, we should be okay - we'll only be around seven days out. We've made arrangements to meet our shipping agent the morning after we land to hand over the documents.

Major sleepless night though as a result of a couple of ill-timed 'Urgent' emails!

Thanks again!

mandi moo

glad you got it sorted.Relax now and enjoy
Lots of luck
Mandi xx

wiggs1034

No problem with this at all. Our belongings landed several weeks before us. Receiving Agent just stores it in "Bonded Storage" i.e. just one part of their warhouse if they are a big shipper, and they are treated as uncleared by customs and so therefore you are unable to access them. This can go on for months, as long as your shipper is happy to store them. Of course you pay for the service, but we found it to be only a few dollars more per week than normal storage.

After you have arrived and landed, you then get clearance from customs as normal, and the shipper removes it from bonded storage and into normal storage, and the delivers it when you want it.

Three of the UK removal companies we talked to said this was not possible. the fourth said it was (Fox's), despite them all using the same agent in Calgary, Tippet Richardson. Not surprisingly for this reason (and price) we went with Fox's. Customs were fine with us, and didn't even question it and the handing agent has been good so far - we move into new house on 4th June, so we will see what condition everything is in then.

Don't worry about it - they do it all the time.