Clearit.ca's Blog on Customs Brokerage and News Updates

There’s no feeling quite like the holiday rush. For some, it’s all about the exhilaration of sprinting from shopping mall to shopping mall, trying to buy up the season’s quickest disappearing items for your loved ones. For others, it’s the stress of sprinting from shopping mall to shopping mall, trying to buy up the season’s quickest disappearing items for your loved ones. Not to mention cooking meals, entertaining dozens of famil...

There aren’t many passion projects more fun or satisfying than putting entirely new spins on the various rooms in your home. But whether you’re a professional interior designer or just someone with a keen eye for design, a worthwhile remodelling requires more than just a fresh coat of paint. Anyone who regularly scours Pinterest for inspiration or spends their weekends perusing furniture and knick-knack stores will surely consider replacin...

While we often discuss the importance of meeting the necessary requirements to get your shipment cleared at the border into Canada once it reaches that point, there is still an entire voyage that your imported goods will go on — and each step in that journey — to consider. Oftentimes, customs brokers will team up with another group of experts called freight forwarders to get your shipment from point A to point B. There are two keys to d...

Are you a resident of Canada coming home from abroad? Maybe you were doing a little shopping online? Or perhaps you’re moving to Canada? You have duty exemptions available to you in all these cases -- but what those exemptions are change for each context. To save you the most money in duty fees at the Canadian border in any situation, we’ve put together this guide! Personal Duty Exemptions as a Resident Importing by mail Let’s start...

Some of the trickiest items for importers to get across the Canadian border are food products — after all, they’re ripe with opportunities to imperil human health! Improper packaging or supply chain delays can spoil items en route. Food advisories could fly under one’s radar. Lax suppliers might even forget to address potential hazards before your shipment ever gets out. Aside from the sheer number of food commodity categories with th...

It’s fair to say that nobody enjoys filling out and keeping track of multiple sets of paperwork, but when it comes to importation, it’s necessary to keep track and be aware of your paperwork at every stage in the process. There’s nothing more frustrating than having your shipment come to a screeching halt because of a missing document, or worse, a simple unchecked box or a blank space. That’s why having the mandatory forms in order, as...

Last time, in our continuing series on agricultural importing, we looked at the requirements needed to bring livestock across the Canada - USA border. Today, we’re going to focus on goods that are a wee bit smaller in stature — two things, in fact, that are vital to the livelihoods of Canadian farmers and ranchers, and which carry their own set of regulations. We’re, of course, talking about livestock feed and seeds (more specifically, t...

Every year, thousands of cattle are moved over the Canada - USA border. Whether they’re flowing into Canada or the United States changes based on a number of factors, but no matter what, importing cattle is a vital part of cattle ranching for farms in both countries. 2018, in particular, has proven to be a strong year for cattle importing -- nearly 15,000 head of feeder cattle were imported into Canada in May, which is close to double the numbe...

Last week, we discussed how Canadian IP holders can benefit from anti-counterfeiting measures in international trade. Protecting your own IP, however, is just one part of staying on the right side of international copyright law! While Canada has gained a reputation as a weak link in fight for stopping the trade of counterfeit goods, increasing pressure from trading allies means that Canadian importers should start brushing up on copyright comp...

The Canadian Border Services Agency has adopted new regulations in order to combat the growing counterfeit market. Prior to 2015, the CBSA had little power when it came to withholding or detaining these types of products, and no formal system for recording IP rights or information was in place, making it difficult to keep counterfeit products from entering the country. But while there were always steps that a CBSA officer could take if they we...