I sold my Swarovski Spotter to a Ram hunter in B.C. I have always used U.S. postal service priority mail in the past but last year I sent my moose guide in Alberta a nice gift and it took 2 weeks to get there. Do I have any other options? Also, anyone know what the tax is in BC? He wants me to check "gift" on the customs form even though he refused to send me a Paypal gift which cost me over $100 in Paypal fees. Wondering how much it will cost him if I am truthful on the custom form.

Anytime I mail US to Canada, it is slow getting there.
I would be shy about fudging on duty. You could phone Revenue Canada,customs, and ask about the issue.

1-2 weeks is pretty normal for USPS to Canada. You could send it UPS or FedEx, if you wanted, but brokerage fees will be terrible on his end (up to 50% of the value of the package). There are no brokerage fees with the postal service. I believe sales tax in BC is still 12%. I would only check gift if he sent the payment as a gift. Otherwise, I would mark it as goods sold. He will have to pay federal and provincial sales tax if you are truthful about the value, and that's par for the course when we buy something from outside of Canada and import it.

Jordan's got it.

He will be charged 12% of whatever value you assign it. That's not "duty", it's standard sales tax.

USPS is the easy way to go.

Up to 2 weeks is pretty much the norm. Mail service on both sides of the line is pretty good, but it can sit at customs for a few days while it is processed.

I buy LOT of gear and so forth from the US, am about to order another Thermarest later today or tomorrow, as my Exped 9Dlx. has been appropriated by my wife for her sore back and my Big Agnes IAC seems a tad "cool", even last week in the Kootenays where it was hot.

I NEVER use Fedex or UPS, have been burned by them in the past, but, my dealings with USPS-CanadaPost, have been uniformly excellent and I tell US dealers that they ship by mail or, I buy elsewhere.

Trying to "fudge" customs or taxes is simply foolish, why get into trouble for a few bucks and risk confiscation?

The only way to minimize brokerage fees from UPS or FedEx is to ship by air. I deal with cross-border shipping constantly with my business, so I see a lot of these issues. UPS or FedEx Ground, and you may get charged up to 50% of the value of the package in brokerage fees. So the package would have to be fairly small and valuable to make UPS or FedEx air worth using. Either that, or you need it to arrive quicker than 1-2 weeks.

Definitely ship via USPS.

He may be charged 12% sales tax on declared value plus a handling fee, $15 or so, Also, there's a chance there could be duty on it as Swarovski is made in Austria which doesn't qualify for the duty free exemption under NAFTA.

He may also get charged nothing, about 50% of the items seem to slip through Customs without being assessed. However, this is a high priced item, so chances are slim if you declare actual value.

If the shipping options are UPS and Fedex, I don't buy. It's got to be USPS/Canada Post. I don't mind the wait, but I hate the outrageous brokerage fees.

To be honest, the USPS/Canada Post service is not all that shabby. I have very few complaints and I can't remember the last time I even paid sales tax on a shipment.

Thanks all. Just got a nasty phone call from the guy - scope got there in about 5 days via USPS priority mail from Oregon to BC. He's pissed that I declared the actual value of the scope ($2495) as he had to pay $300 in tax. I told him that if he'd have trusted me on the paypal gift (we talked on the phone twice, he knew I was trustworthy from my perfect feedback) then I might have checked "gift" for him, but otherwise I wasn't willing to take the risk for a guy who wasn't willing to do the same for me. He said he's going to get me "kicked off eBay". I wished him the best of luck.

$300 is kind of steep - I feel for the guy, but feel like I did the right thing.

So he's mad at you because you're honest and he had to pay sales tax on goods that he purchased and brought into the country.

Quite a stand-up guy from the sounds of it.

Paypal can suspend your account if you receive "gift money" when it was in fact for a service/purchase the sender made, so careful with that. If you declared the amount you received from him for the spotter, you did the right thing.

Whenever I do paypal "gift" I do it very discreetly - no messages via paypal, no mailing address, etc. If you keep it discreet, I think you are fine. I've even bought and sold several guns and exchanged the funds discreetly by paypal without issue.

Another thing you can tell the digruntled buyer is that you couldn't have insured the spotter if it's declared as "gift" and having no value. Even if you'd marked "gift" and put the value at $2500, customs would assess taxes,etc. as the limit is $60 for a duty/tax free gift exemption.
Also, I've had it happen where I was sent an actual gift with a pretty high value, but marked as "$0 value", and customs opened the package and assessed their own value on which I was charged taxes.