Hi. I landed on July 1st, as scheduled. We went through the Queenston-Lewiston Bridge. Immigration was quick and easy... customs on both sides of the border has been a different story. We hired a moving company (great one by the way, contact me if you need the name) and our goods arrived in Canada 3 days before I landed. We had things in our possession, including both our 2013 model cars, in both our names so since I was landing I put them on my B4. One of our cars was paid off, the other one is still financed but our bank gave permission to export it to Canada. The US side of customs was a nightmare. Florida, where we were moving from, does not issue car titles until they are paid off, so we had to contact US customs way ahead of time to figure out how to deal with that. A US customs agent told us that a certified copy of the certificate of origin will suffice and so we obtained it from the dealer from which we bought the car. With those documents in hand we showed up at US customs to export the vehicles. As luck will have it, the agent we had dealt with was on vacation so we were denied exportation of the car right away because we did not have a copy of the title; the agents were so uncooperative! Our bank got involved and after 1hr of talking back and forth we were off to Canada not without leaving a very unhappy and unapologetic customs agent - this is a huge disconnection between US state and US federal government. Once in Canada customs was a long process. The agent took our 14 pages of B4 and B4A and totaled them (so, I recommend you have a separate total for goods in possession and goods to follow available so you save some time if you have a lot of itemizations, plus an additional copy of your B4 and B4A forms to leave to them). Then the agent was confused on how to deal with both cars. We had to pay no taxes or duties and we were given a Form 1 for each car and told to pay the RIV fee online before taking the cars to inspection. So, after another hour we were off to Toronto. Yesterday I went to have my goods-to-follow cleared by CBSA near Pearson airport so the moving company would be allowed to deliver them to us. The agent that helped me asked me about my goods and cars. He became very upset because customs at the port of entry did not charge the RIV fee - he even consulted with his superintendent and coworkers on the situation and they all agreed - he even told me that I had to pay taxes and duties which in the end I didn't have to. He told me that I would have to go back to the port of entry to have another set of Form 1 done and that I needed to bring the cars in for them to see; he, however, cleared my goods to follow. I called CBSA today and they told me that the port of entry not always facilitates the payment of RIV and that I should pay my RIV fees online and then take the cars for inspection and then for registration. In any case, I will still have to deal with the agent from yesterday because he wrote on my B4 form that I need to bring in the cars. I would recommend paying your RIV fees at the port of entry! Other than that, we are happy to be in Canada.
