Saggy Dang DAP

[Willa]

They just made some changes to NAFTA and in that they seem to be changing the minimum import tax..
"Duty-free purchases through e-commerce jump to $150 from the current $20."

Maybe thins will make it easier to buy Sarco and to do other online purchases from Canada. The issue has always been with brokerage. What happens is shipping companies and USPS/ Canada post do the customs clearance and in doing so the parcels often get seriously delayed.

The issue is not with the dollar amount of the item but the carrier.

CanadaPost charges a $ 5.00 brokerage charge, plus the receiver pays duty and taxes on top of that.

UPS charges a $ 50.00 brokerage charge, plus the receiver pays duty and taxes.

Fed Ex is more complicated and expensive.

Ebay has a very wretched scam going on with many sellers being locked into using their "international" carrier, plus the Canadian buyer gets walloped with some arbitrary import fees - even on a low value small item like a used book, antique latches, etc. that are far below the $ 50.00 threshold for import fees to be collected. I avoid buying from any Ebay sellers who ship this way, if I can. I forget who the culprit is - Pitney Bowes I think ? - but they have raked in millions charging fees for which no duty or taxation even apply !

Many small businesses like UPS, because they can create an account and UPS will pick the item up v.s. standing in line at the post office. UPS will handle larger and heavier shipments, too. No way is Sarco going to be hauling multiple 1 or 5 gallon buckets of putty to the post office.

Now if Sarco had a reliable Canadian distributor...which it does not...that would make it possible to buy this product at a reasonable cost. Paradigm Shift Window Restoration in ?Guelph? briefly claimed to sell Sarco, but that is now long gone from their site.

[phil]

Thanks for the clarity Willa, it has always been a bit of a mystery to me, and a bit of a crap shoot when ordering online. Also a lot of businesses have websites but try not to put money into things like having actual people answering the phones. a lot of the machine parts that I buy do have service and shipping departments but these huge online companies tend to be difficult to communicate with. UPS seems the worst, but I think Americans use it a lot and within the US it works better. I spent 40 minutes on hold trying to call my internet provider Shaw, so frustrating.
on the news last night they seemed to say the increase from $20 to 150 before taxes need to be added will reduce shipping delays but I guess we will see what effect it has in time.
hope the hot water tank issue got sorted. I guess you had an excuse to have a break from scraping anyway

[Willa]

See, UPS is fine within the borders. Like if a Canadian company shipped an order within Canada it works really well.

Their brokerage charges when an order crosses into Canada are the problem. Apparently you can clear the shipment yourself - I remember reading online how this was done. In my city this would have involved going to the office at the airport and filling out some paperwork. This was a different kind of hassle (the time and distance of getting to and from the airport, waiting around at the office for an agent who knows what you are talking about, etc.). I was sure mad at the fabric company I ordered from who said they would ship via USPS - and I double checked this with them - then they shipped my order via UPS. Grrrr !

[phil]

I had one experience where I had UPS shipped pars delivered to my workplace. they dropped the parcel at work , I wasn't there. then they tried to charge me some rediculous brokerage charge and I called UPS and said I didnt' authorize them to broker it, they let it go.

another time I got a bit smarter and I did go to their UPS depot at the airport. It wasnt' too bad actually as it wasn't in the airport, they have a building near the airport. It might depend on how far to the airport but it saved the cost, maybe $40 ..

more recently Ive ordered parts for my job.. UPS had these automated machines phoning me, leaving messages threatening to return the part. In this case I didn't' really care about the cost I just wanted the part, they made it really awkward. they needed some form signed. something like power of attorney? its probably to give them blanket authority to broiker anything against my name. the issue was they said they would send it to me , and then didn't. I phoned back a few times and asked for the manager. not sure how thye expected me to sign an electronic form. Oh they wanted a fax.. I told them no one uses fax anymore... since they couldn't get the form to my email due to their complete incompetence I asked them to email me to confirm they have the right email , or offered to email them so they could just hit "reply" but the manager at UPS said they don't have authorization to do email.. The manager isn't authorized to use email ? what kind of an organization is this ? the flunkys that look after the phones hit a button and it automatically sends the form but they as employees cant' access that part of their system. Its probably all plugged into an integrated system like SAP

I got frustrated enough I got one of the purchasers to look after it once It got to the manager that can't email or even verify where they were sending their own permission form.

[Corsetière]

I'm just here to swoon over that color of green you painted the woodwork! It's killer.

[Willa]

I'm just here to swoon over that color of green you painted the woodwork! It's killer.

Benjamin Moore, Essex Green - HC- 188

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Previously you had liked a door I painted BM Black Forest Green - HC - 187, right next to on the swatch cards. HC 187 has more blue, and was almost black, which was good and bad. Essex Green is a dark old fashioned green. Somewhere I read that it is the most popular color for shutters ?

Essex Green is dark, but is visibly different from the black the sash windows are painted whereas the Black Forest Green was so dark as to be almost black except in very bright sunlight.

[Manalto]

...the Black Forest Green was so dark as to be almost black except in very bright sunlight.

That's the green the historic districts in the southern US (and maybe elsewhere) self-name: Charleston green, Savannah green, New Orleans green, etc. It looks good with just about everything.

[Corsetière]

Previously you had liked a door I painted BM Black Forest Green - HC - 187, right next to on the swatch cards. HC 187 has more blue, and was almost black, which was good and bad. Essex Green is a dark old fashioned green. Somewhere I read that it is the most popular color for shutters ?

Essex Green is dark, but is visibly different from the black the sash windows are painted whereas the Black Forest Green was so dark as to be almost black except in very bright sunlight.

Yum! They are both very attractive!

[Mick_VT]

Very nice, I remember saying way back that a dark green would go nicely on your house