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

In order to import any shipment into Canada you'll need a Canada Customs Invoice (CCI) form. In order to avoid having your shipment delayed at the border, a properly filled form with correct and accurate information is your best tool.   Required Fields The CCI form is composed of various sections – some of which are absolutely required in order to obtain customs clearance. The below information needs to be declared at the time of rele...

Traveling abroad and thinking about bringing back a few items with you? Make your re-retry into Canada a lot easier by following the simple steps noted below. They'll help you get through customs with much more ease at mind. Coming home from a day trip across the border? If your trip was less than 24 hours, there are no personal exemptions for cross-border shoppers. Returning after 24 and 48 hours If you're returning after 24 and 48 hours, y...

More and more Canadian are flocking to online stores to buy the goods they desire. Canadians are massively looking towards merchants based outside of Canada because a majority believe that the prices are better and the variety of goods offered is much more interesting than what’s available back home. In 2015, 70% of purchases by Canadians were from merchants based outside the country. The phenomena can be explain by the fact that a vast majo...

Canada is preparing to enter a new era of unprecedented free trade involving countries from the Pacific-Asia region, the Americas and Europe. Stakeholders and various government departments are taking steps ahead of the implementation of the different agreements – those in the industry who haven't yet started analyzing how they'll be affected by the agreements should consider starting now. Steps Towards a New Trade Regime The Comprehensive Ec...

The road to the implementation of the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) has been quite a long one, but one senior European Union politician is hopeful to see it come into effect according to schedule, sometime in 2017. The hopeful EU politician in question is Bernd Lange, chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee who made his comment while visiting Ottawa and Montreal during a series of meetings...

With the Canadian dollar averaging $0.75 USD over the past year, you could be tempted to jump on the situation and increase your business south of the border. By combining a well-planned shipping strategy with the current economics, Canadian businesses and online retailers are facing an opportunity that can’t be missed. Shipping from Canada is great leverage Canadian businesses have over their U.S. competitors. It allows them to take advanta...

In a recent opinion piece on the TPP written by former RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie and published in the Globe and Mail, Balsillie shares his views on how Canada failed to set its own IP policy and continuously caved in to foreign pressures, namely from the United States. “Canada’s prosperity strategies for the past 30 years were dominated by the production principle of comparative advantage and trade liberalization. Unfortunately, this approa...

Government lawyers have been hard at work scrubbing away at details related to the Canada-European Comprehensive and Economic Trade Agreement (CETA), and Steve Verheul, Canada’s chief negotiator, has just advised the House of Commons international trade committee that the legal scrub is “virtually complete”. Verheul also mentioned to the committee members that the current timeline would allow for CETA to be implemented in early 2017. “...

Considering getting your NAFTA Certificates of Origins (NCO) updated? While setting up your review for your blanket certificates - here are some best practices you should consider: Tip 1: Be sure certificates are accurately completed Ensuring that at face value, the certificates have proper coding and are fully completed is one of the first thing companies reviewing NCOs for their North American vendors will do. It may seem like good sense but ...

In early February, the Canadian government eased restrictions on trade with Iran. The amendments to the economic sanctions were brought into force following Iran’s promise to comply with imposed restrictions regarding its nuclear proliferation activities under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action presented by the P5+1 countries. In addition, the UN Security Council also eased its sanctions and many countries including the United States and th...