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amcdc79 · ‎06-21-2017

If you are buying from China and you're finding that it's taking forever there are two reasons.

1-everything now goes to Winnipeg first, then sent out. I have been told that there are ~40 trailer loads waiting to be gone through. A friend of mine just received today(June 21) his order from the beginning of March.

2-Drugs (fentenal among others ), so much is sent from China, that CBSA is now checking every package more thoroughly, which naturally takes more time.

Of course ymmv.

zee-chan · ‎06-21-2017

The past few Chinese items I bought were all shipped from Turkey, taking roughly 4-6 weeks to arrive. I think that's the workaround that the Chinese sellers have figured out.

femmefan1946 · ‎06-21-2017

1-everything now goes to Winnipeg first, then sent out.

Gee.

I didn't know there was a containership dock in Winnipeg.

The lake must be deeper than I thought.

amcdc79 · ‎06-23-2017

@femmefan1946 wrote:
1-everything now goes to Winnipeg first, then sent out.

Gee.
I didn't know there was a containership dock in Winnipeg.
The lake must be deeper than I thought.

Hehe, thank you for the laugh, and for pointing out the error with my statement.

Until recently, the mail from China was sorted in Vancouver, then sent across Canada to it's final destination. Now it gets sorted in Winnipeg, then sent on it's way.

Another error, was my misspelling of fentanyl, sorry about that. Sadly the drug seems to be such a huge problem, CBSA is checking everything coming from China and other known drug producing countries.

I truly hope they are successful, but in the meantime it is slowing down the mail from those countries.

hlmacdon · ‎06-23-2017

@amcdc79 wrote:
Hehe, thank you for the laugh, and for pointing out the error with my statement.

Until recently, the mail from China was sorted in Vancouver, then sent across Canada to it's final destination. Now it gets sorted in Winnipeg, then sent on it's way.

Another error, was my misspelling of fentanyl, sorry about that. Sadly the drug seems to be such a huge problem, CBSA is checking everything coming from China and other known drug producing countries.

I truly hope they are successful, but in the meantime it is slowing down the mail from those countries.

They are likely splitting the sorting as the Richmond facility is completely overrun. At one point they had over 100 trailers waiting to be cleared and huge numbers of cleared packages warehoused separately as low priority delivery. Anything that is your typical bubble mailer shipment is going to get the lowest priority as it is a manual sort. Anything boxed and sent by e-packet or ems services with proper printed labelling is getting delivered before bubble mailer packets.

Fentanyl is only one of the issues with screening, certainly the one that is getting the most media coverage, but there are ongoing issues with every other unlabeled derivative chemical coming in that are a focus of attention as well. Probably a great time to be in the business of selling test kits to the government.

If you look at the direction the UPU is heading issues like these are why they are trying to restructure how physical goods are being shipped and the rates that countries like China are paying.

dinomitesales · ‎06-23-2017

As someone who works as a Canada Post clerk, yes, the times for anything coming from China are extremely long these days. Not unheard of for items to be taking 3+ months to arrive.

I'm also in Winnipeg - the routing of mail through Winnipeg is news to me. Hadn't heard that one before. But I do know they are extremely backed up.

One other thing we've noticed is the large spike in parcels arriving at the post office with customs due. Is this possibly due to the CBSA agents scrutinizing the parcels more as they enter the country? Perhaps. But there's definitely a lot more customs fees being paid now than there was at this time last year. And a lot of relatively low-value items too - items declared at about $40 CDN getting assessed when these would have just slipped through previously. Leads to a lot of unhappy customers who have no idea how customs works in Canada and believe that since they've never been charged before they shouldn't have to pay now. I tell them they got lucky with their previous shipments.

zee-chan · ‎06-23-2017

Since so many parcels slip through without customs dues anyway, I don't get why CBSA wouldn't just change the limit to something like $50 or $100 and then charge every single one of them so that people don't get confused over getting charged on a $40 parcel now.

And I'm one of the lucky ones that haven't been charged anything for quite a few years... the last time I was charged was something $300 that I was prepared to pay for.

ypdc_dennis · ‎06-23-2017

@zee-chan wrote:
Since so many parcels slip through without customs dues anyway, I don't get why CBSA wouldn't just change the limit to something like $50 or $100 and then charge every single one of them so that people don't get confused over getting charged on a $40 parcel now.

Because the CBSA does not set the limit. Parliament has to make the change.

hlmacdon · ‎06-24-2017

@zee-chan wrote:
Since so many parcels slip through without customs dues anyway, I don't get why CBSA wouldn't just change the limit to something like $50 or $100 and then charge every single one of them so that people don't get confused over getting charged on a $40 parcel now.

Any politician/party looking to put forth such an idea would get slammed by lobbyists and the domestic retail industry. Raising the limit would only further exacerbate the current postal issues as well, so there is that.

hlmacdon · ‎06-24-2017

@dinomitesales wrote:

One other thing we've noticed is the large spike in parcels arriving at the post office with customs due. Is this possibly due to the CBSA agents scrutinizing the parcels more as they enter the country? Perhaps. But there's definitely a lot more customs fees being paid now than there was at this time last year. And a lot of relatively low-value items too - items declared at about $40 CDN getting assessed when these would have just slipped through previously. Leads to a lot of unhappy customers who have no idea how customs works in Canada and believe that since they've never been charged before they shouldn't have to pay now. I tell them they got lucky with their previous shipments.

Processing is very weird at the moment, my last several commercial shipments needed adjustments filing as they were processed incorrectly despite paperwork plainly visible. All undercharged or not charged at all and classified incorrectly. I can only assume the expedited shipments are given less attention with the focus being on getting them out the door quickly so they focus on the retail airmail volume. As for consumers complaining it is unfortunate they don't take the time to educate themselves, getting mad at the postal clerks is pointless but then again there is a surprising number of people who think that anything from the internet should magically not have taxes.

cumos55 · ‎06-24-2017

Beam me over Scotty... ...A new postal service .... a most unique way to deliver mail

Or... How about ... drones......

How many times will we have to... duck..... each day.... look out here comes the mail... Ouch!

hlmacdon · ‎06-24-2017

@cumos55 wrote:
Beam me over Scotty... ...A new postal service .... a most unique way to deliver mail

Or... How about ... drones......

How many times will we have to... duck..... each day.... look out here comes the mail... Ouch!

With my luck the drone would run out of battery power and my shipment would end up in the river or stuck on someone's roof.