Comments on: Brokerage Fee

By: John R

John R — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 22:30:51 +0000

HST based on $500

By: Will

Will — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 04:10:19 +0000

Hi,

I purchased something for $400 from an individual in the states. it’s a collectable poster. he put the value at $500 on the customs form and shipped it USPS to me in Canada. what kind of duty/tax would I expect to pay when it gets here?

By: Rick

Rick — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 15:31:42 +0000

I forgot to mention: On our website, http://www.jtv.com, we DO ship to Canada, but get almost no Canadian customers. I **think** I figured out why. Though we list Canadian provinces in our address options, we DO NOT specify anywhere what shipping method we actually use. My guess is that we don’t get Canadian orders because Canadians fear we’re going to ship UPS. We actually do ship USPS to Canada, from what I was told. If anyone wanted to check out our site, and evaluate it for “Canadian Friendliness”, I’d be ever grateful (there might be a discount code thrown your way!!).

By: Rick

Rick — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 15:27:50 +0000

Hey all – I’m glad to see this is an unemotional topic that no one cares much about!! I work for a company in Tennessee, and we do almost no shipping to Canada – we don’t market there, so there’s not much demand. I’d like to see us do that, and learn more about doing business in a customer-friendly way with Canadians. After a lot of reading, so far what I’ve figured out is that Canadians hate UPS because of brokerage fees. What I haven’t figured out, despite a lot of anecdotal evidence, is what these fees actually are, and what Canada Post’s fees actually are. I work for a jewelry & gemstone retailer (www.jtv.com), so I really need to know, for example, what would a Canadian customer pay, in all the various expenses, for a $100 gemstone ring sent to, say, Toronto? We’re new at this, so if anyone else has tangible and specific advice, I am all ears. I’m very numbers-oriented, so I’m very interested in data, data, data….Thanks everyone.

By: John R

John R — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 14:38:46 +0000

While I agree for brokerers charging fees to do work, UPS for far too long made it near impossible to do self clearance. CBSA stepped in and made things easier with multiiport clearance. If someone choses to use UPS to clear their packages, then they agree to the rates that they charge.

There are regulations for brokers, but not for the fees. Thats why you always have the option to shop around, or clear it yourself (much the same way you have 100 different pizza shops, or lawyers around – there is nothing forcing you to use UPS to clear your goods). The issue was that UPS didn’t make it easy for consignees to clear their own goods.

DHL charges a flat $7 for clearance, (and no I don’t work for UPS, nor do I work for DHL). As carriers go, the cheapest is Canada Post, then DHL, then fedex, then UPS.

I will defend that companies are in the business, to be in business and have to answer to their shareholders. If they weren’t a business they wouldn’t be trying to make money. Where I do have an issue is where they made it difficult to pass the paperwork over for self clearance. That has been why I have always told people how to clear goods on their own.

Rates will be as high as people are willing to pay. Its simple if you don’t like UPS rates, use a broker, clear it yourself, or use another carrier. If you’re going to pay UPS to clear your goods, then don’t complain about it. There are options.

By: John R

John R — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 14:31:16 +0000

Actually, John has given the proper advice here, listing out why UPS charges, and there are posts on alternate ways. Your comments do little to help the community. Having brokerage staff costs money.

By: Ron

Ron — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 21:59:20 +0000

Screw the UPS and the companies in the US that use them I will only shop in China from now on, tired of being ripped off by loser companies, no wonder the US is in a sad state of affairs, when I do order from China it is free shipping, labelled as a gift I pay $0 brokerage fees, geez only makes sense to go where you need to go and cut out the middleman. Suck it up UPS you lost any and all future business from me and cost others it as well, idiots. Too bad these companies that middleman it from China are gonna suffer and drive you further into recession, have fun with that.

By: Ron

Ron — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 21:47:30 +0000

And he has every right to rant, perhaps both of you work for UPS, I move a lot of product and what you guys say makes me laugh, when a company acts as the broker there are no regulations in place to keep them on a leash and costs go higher and because we live in Canada we get ripped off on everything. We will see how this ongoing lawsuit against UPS’S extravagant rates goes and I am sure they will pay out the @ss once it all hits the fan. When you crunch the numbers, when i pay 55 bucks in the end for a 20 dollar component somthing is not right, if you want to defend these loser companies and think rates need to be this high then you are not a businessman nor should ever own one, all the companies that I use for UPS are now dropped, support a company that rips off hard working people ur done like fried rice.

By: Ron

Ron — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 21:39:04 +0000

Too bad John you are an idiot and have no clue what you are talking about, you probably work for UPS with your lil rant there. I deal a lot with this and yes they make money off it so untill you get your grade 8 education STFU!

By: Jon

Jon — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:42:50 +0000

No argument there, Jay.