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Send it USPS.

Buying Corky was the least expensive part of the process so far, and he came with a free rusty Huffy.

Exporting frames is the hard part... declare a low value to avoid excessive customs taxes, and take the chance on traveling without adequate insurance or be honest and pay the government hundreds of dollars for a bike that was sitting in a barn two years ago worth little more than scrap metal.

HOnest? The bike would be lucky to fetch $200 on ebay being completely unknown, even in it's painted state. Honesty is $200 and so uninsured is the only way go.

the gulbransen family mafia has recovered what is ours and now its heading back home. Muagahahaha!

I feel worse than when I put down my cat of 18 years. That was just a few months ago.

I just got off the phone and "signed the death warrant" for the $200!


Let us pray..........., amen.

Thank-you! Did they say it will go through in the timely manner, i.e. no red tape after trying to clean things up?

Drive it to its destination. Cheaper, and you get a little vacation.

I guess my original prayer didn't work. Bummer!

Now I need to pray the $200 value is good as gold.

Shoot, you should have shipped it to one of us here--TommyL is right there in Bellingham!, and we could have smuggled it across...

East Hill

Im sorry..new here.. how bout a link to the original story??

Probably they think its tubes are filled with contraband.

My view from experience now is this: ship it in a crate, the volumetric pricing of boxes that can fit a bike frame raise the "weight" to the point where a wood box with internal reinforcement provides the insurance at no additional cost. the common carrier insurance offered is just not designed to handle out of production, vintage, verging on antique items.

Nothing speaks "don't mess with this" more than a crate, not perfect, planes do crash...

Otherwise, ....are you feeling lucky today?

If you search "corky", you'll get nine pages of links. It's a long story.

I'm glad I'm close enough to pick up my Peugeot!

I sent the young giant "Tommy"his frame today.
But I sent it Canada Post. And I would never send anything that crosses the border USPS.
Once across they will take you to the cleaners with brokerage and duties.
I only put a $20 value on the frame as that is what I got in trade (shifters).
If you declare more, you pay more.

I've never had any problems at all shipping kites to Canada. I use Priority Mail. I sent one to Vancouver a couple of weeks ago in a long triangular chart box. I've noticed that they sometimes arrive with a hole punched in the box and I've wondered if that's for some kind of drug/explosives sniffer.

Had it been located in Montreal, I would have drove it for you.
US Citizens are allowed to return with $200/month value of purchased goods for personal use, getting it out.
And we are allowed to bring $60 in gifts in to Canada.
If they hassle you, you can protect yourself by filing a declaration that the item will exit with you and they can't tax it. (of course you should be telling the US customs officer that you are returning with said item.)

More details:
https://www.dutyfreeexpress.com/forms.cfm

The US/Canada border crossing customs is highway robbery. Canadian customs have taken me for $300 so far on 'gifts' for Canadians. And they search my car each time. A 30% tax!

After shipping over 10 bikes with FEDEX to the USA I just realized that the trick is to declare the country of manufacture as USA when shipping to the US , or Canada when shipping to to Canada. Did that with the last two bikes I shipped and instead of the usual $100 bill from fedex both bills were for less than $30 (I usually declare Italy as the country of manufacture).Now...you declared the value as being $3000.From what I was told , with these carriers (at least with fedex) anything with a declared value over $2000 is a whole other world and requires diffrent export documents. Shipping accross the border is so much fun...

P.S I always declare the full value

Wait a minute. Let me see if I understand this.

You consigned the bike to the UPS store. They quoted you a cost. They screwed up by seperating it into two boxes. They arbitrarily re-valued your property. Then They encountered a shipping problem - despite being the "Professionals" who you had paid an agreed upon amount for handling these specific services?

Are you saying that they are now trying to extort from you an additional amount BEYOND their original contractually agreed upon fees?

What was their explanation.That's outrageous! I would call the UPS C.S. toll free line, and certainly scan and send copies of your original invoice to the Customer Service department. Don't let these creeps get away with this. Threaten legal action to recover any mis-quoted fees amounts... plus Court costs,... plus compensatory damages for any actual logged time which you spend away from your work either in court, or while filing and pursuing the case.

To me, without seeing the actual agreement [invoice], it seems like a simple breach of contract... a slam-dunk decision in your favor - which they would NOT even want to get tangled up in for the pitiful initial amount of their screw up. With their billions of dollars of profits, they can afford to just eat the extra couple bucks they hope to get you to simply surrender without complaint.

You might also mention the local TV Action News investigative reporters have nothing better to expose than precisely this type of local consumer rip-off... and that you or your family members also would all be perfectly happy to continuously picket and leaflet on the sidewalk in front of the local UPS Store until you are entirely satisfied that you have successfully diverted away perhaps 1,000 times the amount of your over-payment, and have driven away hundreds of their future potential repeat customers. And that your children's schools might even wish to follow along with this as a school project - examining how our legal system works with regard to small claims courts and issues of consumer fraud.

Log and copy every scrap of paper, and file the complete online record of the tracking and any communications between you and the shipping agent.

In any case, my sincere prayers for Corky's speedy release and safe return.

FREE CORKY! ... FREE CORKY! ... FREE CORKY! ... FREE CORKY! ... FREE CORKY! ...

So, Stronglight, are you a lawyer? Will you take Corky's case?

It must be those MA plates on your car. They never hassle your northern neighbor.

Okay, where is my refund?

Next time, fill the tubes with cocaine and the shipment will pay for itself!

Okay I'll try and add some clarity. Dr. D. wanted to make sure corky was safe and put a lot of insurance on the bike ($3000 option).. he listed the contents as frame/fork/headset, somehow they thought okay there is more than one item in here and the frame and fork are $2000 each, or something lord knows... Alarm bells went off when immediately this popped up under the tracking details:

A HOLD HAS BEEN REQUESTED. PAYMENT MUST BE MADE PRIOR TO RELEASE

I got on the phone with UPS the next business day and they informed me that the declared value was $4000. They also informed me that such a high value item was susceptible to brokerage fees based on that value. Normally it's $35 plus taxes and duties so about $50 on a $100 frame (insanity to begin with). So now I am looking at 7% tax plus god knows what bokerage and duties. That's $280 so probably up there around $350. I panic of course not wanted to spend that after blowing almost as much on shipping as the bike is worth. I mean honestly guys how much do you think this bike is worth. The builder is unknown and it has no pedigree It can't even garner more than one reply on Classic Rendezvous. With the exception of the members of Classic and Vintage the bike is just another old bike to everyone else. Dr.D, gave it a great paint job and paint always costs more than the frame will be worth after it is painted. Honestly I think I would be lucky to get $250 for Corky on ebay. So I would be paying more in taxes than it is worth. So I rang Dr.D. after talking to UPS and asked him to change the declared value which meant loosing the insurance.

He did so, now the question is did we do it in time that it wasn't already processed as a $4000 item? or do I have to pay a $350 bill and then fight to get my $300 back back because in reality it is a $200 item. A completely honest claim.

From what they told me, we DID!

IF Corky shows up at your door tomorrow (I didn't check tracking before posting this reply), you will either;
A) Be handed the box.
B) Be handed the box for a COD amount reflecting the "new" $200 value.

As a note, I didn't get a refund reflecting the LACK of insurance. When I get THAT figured out on this end, I'll send you that refund.

On another note, wasn't Corky a well known & respected framebuilder in upstate NY?
I would think that listed properly, the frame/fork would garner more than $250 on eBay!
Or am I blinded by sentiment?!?

Told ya we should have just smuggled Corky across, a la the 'boy with the wheelbarrow' scam .

East Hill

...or couldn't you have just thrown the frame/fork across the border being sure to catch it before it hit the ground???? Geeeesh, you guys are making this look so complicated...