Question on shipping fabric from the US to Escape

[Jill]

I have my fabric order ready to go and I'm finding a significant upcharge plus a tax and duty charge for shipping directly from the online store to Canada. Adds up to about $110 more than shipping it to myself. I'm wondering if I can avoid the tax and duty by shipping to myself then forwarding it to Escape. Anyone else run into this?

[P&L]

I shipped fabric to Escape. I purchased it at a local store and it cost me $45 through the postal service. That said it was a lightweight outdoor fabric weighing less than 6 lbs.

[tractors1]

Originally Posted by Jill

I have my fabric order ready to go and I'm finding a significant upcharge plus a tax and duty charge for shipping directly from the online store to Canada. Adds up to about $110 more than shipping it to myself. I'm wondering if I can avoid the tax and duty by shipping to myself then forwarding it to Escape. Anyone else run into this?

Had the same issue, Escape paid the tax/duty on their end, added those charges to the price, then sent me copies of the Canadian customs paperwork. You can apply for reimbursement of those charges after you have proof the trailer was exported from Canada (which you will get when it clears customs at the border.)

[GRINGOandTICA]

I used Sailrite for fabric. Around $60 to drop ship 18yds at ETI via USPS. If any duty fees, it will be tacked onto my invoice.

I tried buying fabric online via a Canadian company or two, but had no luck.

[Art M.]

We found quite a variation in shipping costs, so we sometimes selected a vendor more by shipping costs than item costs, and not all vendors will ship outside the US. We went for the convenience of having the vendors ship to ETI, rather than us receiving, maybe packaging things together, and then reshipping to ETI. No idea if we could have saved money doing that. We looked for vendors in Canada, but only found one for a grab bar in the bathroom. (We haven't ordered Umbra hooks yet.)
Our custom fabric came from Sailrite, who charged us almost $55 US to ship 13 yds of fabric, plus ETI was charged nearly $30 Canadian for Custom's fees when it arrived there, which of course went on our bill.

The exchange rate is still very good, but not quite as good as a few have gotten recently: Our bank wire transfer took two days from California to Canada and was converted at a rate of 1.1947 on 4/23/15. From the Bank of Canada rate on that day, it looks like fees ate about 2%. We also paid a fee of $45 to our bank, which I thought wasn't too bad compared with a Cashier's check for $7.50 plus whatever UPS or Fedex would charge for one to a couple day delivery.

[tractors1]

Link to the Canadian rebate forms:

GST189 - General Application for Rebate of GST/HST

[Jill]

Wow a lot of good info and so quickly!!! I think I will ship it myself so I can save some $$ and get a peek at the fabric. Now that I think of it, my son will be driving to Vancouver this summer. Maybe I can convince him to take a trip out to Chilliwack for me.

[Rossue]

Cost us $68 USPS to ETI after we paid Sailrite $20 to ship to us first. No other charges for shipping it as "gift" incurred from CAN Customs.

[T&R]

We bought our fabric from Sailrite last month. The shipping from Sailrite to ETI was $73.27 for 12 yards of fabric. Then I got an email that ETI had to pay and additional $28.33 for shipping and handling. That fee was added to our build sheet. Hope this helps.

Randie

[GRINGOandTICA]

I also had Sailrite send me a sample. Using it to match up my Formica.