Shipping diapers from USA

[npl]

Has anyone bought diapers from a US store and had them shipped to Canada?
Did you have to pay tax/duty on the package?

[KistheMum]

I have not shipped diapers. I go there fairly regularly, so I have amazon.com ship them to one of my States addresses and then bring them up in the car. Amazon.com won't ship them to Canada, anyhow.

I use the 7th Generation chlorine free diapers, and they are about $40 (free shipping & no tax) for a pack of 4 packages versus $18 +13% tax here for 1 package.

I also get cases (12 packages) of wipes refills for about $45.

I do believe they would charge you duties unless you can get someone to ship them to you as a gift. If they are shipped as a gift, and have a value of less than $60 there will be no duties or taxes.

[npl]

oops - I guess I should have specified CLOTH diapers!
If I understand it correctly, until the HST comes into effect, there is no PST on cloth diapers, so that's why I thought that they might be exempt.
Also, going on the info I got from the Lands End catalog, anything made in the USA would be exempt, and the diapers I'm considering are US made. But, whilst that might be the theory, in practice I'm not sure that a customs agent would take that into account. I once ordered cloth diapers from the US, and the seller thought she was doing me a favour by labelling the package as "fabric" and I got dinged for the duties and a $5 handling charge. By the time it got delivered and I needed to pay the charges on the spot, it was too late.

[Piglet68]

It's been about 3 years since I bought cloth diapers but when I ordered from the US it seemed random as to whether I'd be charged duty (I think they just randomly sampled packages). I will say that FedEx was the absolute worst as they charged a custom fee at your door, so I avoided that. Don't know if it has changed since then but I always crossed my fingers that the package would come through without duty added. ;-)

Originally Posted by npl

oops - I guess I should have specified CLOTH diapers!
If I understand it correctly, until the HST comes into effect, there is no PST on cloth diapers, so that's why I thought that they might be exempt.
Also, going on the info I got from the Lands End catalog, anything made in the USA would be exempt, and the diapers I'm considering are US made. But, whilst that might be the theory, in practice I'm not sure that a customs agent would take that into account. I once ordered cloth diapers from the US, and the seller thought she was doing me a favour by labelling the package as "fabric" and I got dinged for the duties and a $5 handling charge. By the time it got delivered and I needed to pay the charges on the spot, it was too late.

[kdtmom2be]

I think there is a $25 or $50 limit when shipped by regular mail, but you're really better off getting a US shipping address and driving them across if at all possible. (for those of us close to the border it's certainly the easiest way to do it!) I always declare my purchases at the border and haven't been asked to pay anything in many years; we've been searched twice; we go across approx bi-weekly. If you have them shipped and they do charge you GST etc, you may end up not being ahead in terms of dollars spent.

ETA: and while your down there you can pick up organic chicken for $4/lb and cheese is approx half price (get Tillamook to avoid the hormones that aren't as tightly regulated in the US).