I'm Choked! OverPaying for Duty + taxes + broker fees on Lens Shipped From Japan

gorbas said:

I just noticed that after Canada post strike, they start charging Duty, GST, PST and Handling fees for items that before strike would be delivered without any charges.
EMS from Japan used to be super fast and with out any extra fees. UPS, FedEx and DHL always used to charge me as much as possible.

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MurrayMinchin said:

Canada Post does not charge duty.

A parcel gets diverted into the hands of Canada Customs (which is who makes the duty decisions) then it gets put back into the mail stream and Postal workers get to hear all the grumblings about duty when they have to collect it on behalf of Canada Customs.

I got a metre long parcel of rolled paper from Japan to Kitimat on BC's north coast using Japanese and Canadian postal services in 5 days via Expresss mail for $39.00 in shipping.

According to the tracking number, it left the mail stream in Vancouver for a quick 1 hour romp through Canada Customs, had zero duty applied, got a $9.95 handling fee, then Provincial and federal taxes got applied for a total of $20.45 needing to be paid on top of the original $39.00 shipping fee.

Not bad in my books!

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gorbas said:

It doesn't matter where duty value was determined, now they collect $ that they did not usually collect before postal strike.

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gorbas said:

It doesn't matter where duty value was determined, now they collect $ that they did not usually collect before postal strike.

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ant! said:

Nothing has changed. I got import tax charges from Canada Post since 10 years or longer when buying abroad. Not on every package, and never in obvious private packages I got from family in Europe, but still.

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MurrayMinchin said:

It does matter when you are a Postal worker who gets barked at for something Canada customs does!

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braxus said:

Well my shipment is on hold until early next week. They kept bugging me to pay the duty, until it was on hold. My seller contacted them to correct the declaration price for it, as the paperwork was filled out incorrectly. I have to wait till they make the correction this coming week, before I can pay the duty and it will be on its way here. Its already in Canada on hold. Im expecting $30-40 for the duty charge.

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braxus said:

Well my shipment is on hold until early next week. They kept bugging me to pay the duty, until it was on hold. My seller contacted them to correct the declaration price for it, as the paperwork was filled out incorrectly. I have to wait till they make the correction this coming week, before I can pay the duty and it will be on its way here. Its already in Canada on hold. Im expecting $30-40 for the duty charge.

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braxus said:

Most shipments from Japan use Couriers. Rarely do they use mail service.

My seller is being a bit of a pain. Trying to get more info off of him to see if he actually took care of the correction on the customs info, and he dodged the question. I wouldnt be surprised if this gets sent back to him at this point, because he failed to send DHL the information. That said Ebay will be getting a call from me if that happens. He has 100 percent feedback. He is risking that with this transaction.

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braxus said:

My seller is being a bit of a pain.

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Hassasin said:

Most Japanese sellers have EMS/Japan Post stated in shipping options. The only sure way to have EMS/JP used is by asking to guarantee he'll ship that way. Some will not do that, but those are typically ones who do not show EMS/JP as option.

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braxus said:

I needed to rebuy a bunch of lenses for a system I sold off a year or so ago. I started with one this week that cost $99 US dollars, which with exchange is $143. With shipping I paid a total of $204 Canadian. So it was sent to me via DHL Express from Japan. So today I get the customs payment request and its asking me to pay a whopping $167 Canadian before they'll clear it. That is more then the lens actually cost! WTF? How the heck can duty add up to this much, and I dont believe even the tarrifs would cost that much?! Does anyone know why my duty is more then the item itself? I sent a heated letter to the seller asking him why and threatened to have it returned to sender for a full refund.

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slackercrurster said:

Poor fellow! I have ordered tons of gear in the thousands of $ from Japan over the years and no duty. Get a friend in the USA to receive it if you visit regularly.

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Marcelo Paniagua said:

Also, when the seller wont ship by EMS, I let them know why I'm not buying from them, so they are aware DHL is preventing me from buying from them.

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braxus said:

Well after a day of no communication, I asked DHL to send it back to him. They told me they can email the seller, as he needs to approve that request. Soon after I get an email from the seller explaining what has taken place so far, and he said DHL dropped the ball. His request for customs changes didnt happen. So he agrees it should be sent back to him, and then he will resend it back to me with the correct info. It just means the lens will travel a bit (hopefully without damage or loss).

I purchased a second lens from Japan 2 days ago from another seller, and he offered Fed-Ex. That shipment was also quick and the duty charges (well its really taxes) were only 29 bucks (including the fee for brokerage).

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braxus said:

Well I paid the duty this morning and they delivered it this afternoon. So I now have it in my hands. Worked out well considering what could have happened.

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