cbrock450 said:
My friend should be chiming in on this one soon. He just bought a frame out of canada and he has to cough up $60 to get the bike even though everything was supposedly taken care of. He did a TON of research and will be able to answer your questions
That's me. I didn't do a ton of research, but I did some...and it's enough for me to just say "F it, all my orders are from the US from now on"
I just took delivery of a misfit dissent (fe). I wasn't there to pick it up at first, but my neighbor was. When I got back he was like "dude, they asked for $60 bucks, so I didn't take it" That fee was on top of the $65 shipping fee. I made all the calls the next day to Misfit, then to UPS, and even got the NAFTA (North American Free Trade Association) number...but stopped short of calling them after reading up on some stuff. NAFTA probably won't have anything to do with items coming from overseas...but maybe I'm wrong...
Anyway...Brokerage fees are all UPS fees for acting as your customs agent to get your sh!t over the border. They actually have a table on their webpage that sets out their fees. So other than us not knowing about them, they are not hiding the fees either(
http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/resources/select/receiving/customs/fees.html - this only states canadian fees though...can't find europe). Anyway...the $6 you were probably charged was the "disbursement fee" which goes on top of the Brokerage fee. So in my case, I got charged $24.75 + $6 by UPS for brokerage + disbursement (
http://www.ups.com/content/in/en/shipping/cost/additional.html#Disbursement+Fee) Who the F knows what that means. Anyway, brokerage fees have to do with the value of the contents...if it's insured...they know the value and probably will charge the brokerage fee. I have read that brokerage fees from Canada to the US are nullified if you go air mail...if you go Standard ground...that's when the brokerage fees come into play. Makes no sense to me at all.
Duty fees are....I still don't understand them at all. It's just a fee imposed by the government to try to keep more production domestic...or something along those lines. Peter at Misfit did all the NAFTA forms to remove the duties...but he didn't really understand all the processes perfectly I guess. Product price, where the item was made, where its parts were sourced from, etc. all takes part in the duty cost. Sometimes it's $0, sometimes it's a lowered duty, and sometimes it's full price. Mine was established to be a lowered duty cost based on the insured value of ~$1000. So, Misfit definitely did their job...it still sucks though. The Duty cost for me was $25.70
http://www.usitc.gov/publications/docs/tata/hts/bychapter/0702gn.pdf#page=3
Page 27 explains NAFTA...in a confusing way. I'm still not sure if it applies to your duty fees, but I'm sure it's similar.
Either way...I had no idea about this and it took me by surprise. I thought shipping from canada was already expensive enough, and now this was just a slap in the face. I really feel companies shipping over the border should do better at explaining that these charges could occur.
Oh yeah...there was also a $2 "governement" fee. They just keep tacking on fees that have almost no explanation whatsoever.
My total was $65 (shipping) + $25.70 (duty) + $2 (government) + $24.75 (brokerage) + $6 (disbursement)
Grand total for UPS ground shipping from Ontario, Canada to Denver, CO....
$123.45. It's as easy as counting...get it???? God damn...another slap in the face.
So, I've rambled on too long. It's just frustrating and felt I had to state what I have figured out...or at least what I think I've figured out.
-Nick
