Any Canadians buying Senn from US?

[sionghchan]

Hi all,

I am eager to expand my headphone collection and am looking at the refurbished HD-600 from www.amazon.com or the refurbished HD-650 from www.ecost.com. Both of these are from retailers in the States. Anyone in Canada has bought from them before? How much duties did you get dinged?

Unfortunately, www.amazon.ca does not carry many other merchandise besides books, music, movies and software. So, I'm stuck with sites in US for these refurbished items..

Help any Canadians out there?

Thanks!

 

[warpdriver]

Amazon won't ship electronics to Canadians. You need a friend in the US, or have it shipped to a drop-location and drive across to pick it up, or have it forwarded.

I bought my Etymotics ER-6i and had Amazon ship to a US address, and picked it up later. Since I was down there for 2 days, there no duty either. It was $90 on sale, no taxes due to $200 exception for 48 hours stay. So I paid $126 total, a far cry from the $200+tax they charge here.

ecost will ship to Canada using the BorderFree service, and all costs of duties and taxes are prepaid by you when you check out. However, their shipping and handling is outrageous (but often, can still be cheaper than buying in Canada). I bought my E3C's and a couple of other things there with no problems and very quick service.

 

[sionghchan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by warpdriver Amazon won't ship electronics to Canadians. You need a friend in the US, or have it shipped to a drop-location and drive across to pick it up, or have it forwarded. I bought my Etymotics ER-6i and had Amazon ship to a US address, and picked it up later. Since I was down there for 2 days, there no duty either. It was $90 on sale, no taxes due to $200 exception for 48 hours stay. So I paid $126 total, a far cry from the $200+tax they charge here. ecost will ship to Canada using the BorderFree service, and all costs of duties and taxes are prepaid by you when you check out. However, their shipping and handling is outrageous (but often, can still be cheaper than buying in Canada). I bought my E3C's and a couple of other things there with no problems and very quick service.

Thanks for all your info warpdriver. Great help! So, my only real choice are the refurbished HD650s from ecost then. Unfortunately, I have gone through the checkout process except paying for them and found that they are going to cost CDN$384 after including shipping, border handling fees and duties. A pretty hefty sum...

Oh well, cie la vie..

 

[warpdriver]

Sometimes, if I know that I will be crossing the border, I have them send package to the nearest American UPS Store/Mailbox Etc which holds it for me for $5. Then I cross back declaring it, paying GST/PST. Of course, it's only worth it if you have some other reason to go. It's one way to get stuff that would be otherwise impossible to get into Canada without incurring massive UPS brokerage fees (UPS is truly evil) and expensive shipping to Canada. For example, this way you can take advantage of free shipping offers which don't apply when shipping to Canada. On more expensive items, it's worth the cost of gas.

Lastly, if you ever plan a vacation in the US, often you can have items shipped to your hotel before you get there. Most hotels will hold the item for you (maybe charging you a small handling fee).