I'm putting this out there, sometimes it can be hard to be a Canadian collector. Everywhere you look, you see great deals but they're saddled with the dreaded "US ONLY" stipulation. For example, I have been chasing some fairly common CIB games lately and the only times I ever see them available are on eBay.com, not the eBay.ca that I can actually buy from.

This whole "will not ship to Canada" thing is nonsense. We're practically the same country, it's not as if you're shipping overseas or anywhere that speaks in a foreign language. So why the refusal of service? Every time I see someone give their reason to not do it, it's always accompanied by something like "oh, well, I heard things get lost at the border" and I rarely see anything from personal experience. Has someone actually, genuinely had a problem with it? Please be honest.

The only times I have had problems with shipping between the US and Canada, it was, in fact, USPS that dropped the ball. One of my items arrived at a sorting facility on American soil and it ended up being directed to a completely different state. The other time, one of my items that I purchased ended up at an LA sort facility and was never heard from again.

I would really like to hear some personal experiences or reasons why you would refuse to ship to us Canadians. We're good people up here!

With that being said, does any 'Murcan want to be my package receiving buddy for US-only auctions?

I have shipped a lot to Canada, but if someone hasn't done it much before, there are unusual things that make it take longer or be harder than normal. If it's a common item that will sell in the US just as easily, then there is no incentive for the layperson to go out of their way to ship to Canada. I assume that's the main reason that many people don't ship to Canada. That and the fact that paypal doesn't offer first class international shipping labels, which is a huge flaw/oversight in the system.

I know you're good people! I'm jealous of your Tim Horton's too!

Having shipped to Canada in the past and not currently shipping there, my main reasons are all the customers end. It takes time for them to get there and people live in the "I want it now" society. They don't understand it has to usually be shipped to a different us address which then ships it to Canada and most people buying your auctins don't understand that it also cost them money for whatever canada charges you guys. It's not worth the negative feedback to go through all that for a few dollars. Example, I forgot to put US only on cart I sold on Ebay a few weeks ago. Sure enough someone from Canada bought it. The game was Spiderman:Max Carnage and he bought it for $16 he then had to pay $15.85 to Canada Customs or whatever to have it come into Canada(luckily ebay took care of this part, all i had to do is send it to a center in Kentucky)

That sounds like the Global Shipping Program which is a whole other elephant in the room that we won't be addressing in this thread...

I only ship to Canada in certain situations. Like if I am doing a trade with someone. As for Ebay, I don't do it simply because its a pain. I ship hundreds of items a month, and its easy to print postage for US packages, just enter in the weight and hit print, but if shipping to Canada, it takes a lot more time, filling out a customs form, and since I already spend hours a week packaging and shipping packages, adding in customs forms would greatly extend the time it takes to do something I already barely have time for.

On eBay it is far too easy for a foreign buyer to make a claim for an undelivered package. Whether there is actually a problem or not doesn't matter when the deck is stacked against the seller. For big sellers that is just the cost of doing business, but an occasional seller won't take the risk.

Yes I have had a few packages to CA go missing, which means I have lost at least a few hundred dollars. USD, not those worthless CAD

A: USPS doesn't offer international tracking for first class or Priority, opening the door for more scammers.
B: Also, when stuff takes more than a week to show up, which it often does, buyers are constantly writing "WARE ARE MY GAEM! TRACING # NAO!"
C: Shipping rates went up, and I can't count how many times I've been bitched out for charging ACTUAL SHIPPING from tight wad Canadians, which is annoying.

But I still do it, because I've had more pleasant transactions than poor ones. But A-C are super irritating.

So far mostly good reasons, which I can understand.

I guess I didn't take into account that most buyers aren't rational people. There ARE a lot of idiots out there.

So, I understand not wanting to open it up for Canadians on eBay, but why the same for NA then? Minor inconvenience?

Well it seems like most buyers on eBay are pretty irrational, whether they be from Canada or the US. I've never had a problem on NA that I can remember.

i would have no problem doing it for an NA member and i have in the past.  There is a different set of expectations when its an NAer Vs an Ebayer

The few times I have shipped to Canada the post is outrageous and they treat the package like shit and throw it around breaking whats inside...That's why i don't ship to CA lol.

THIS. I hate shipping to CA, but will for members here.

I posted this in another thread at one point, it might be useful for those who are squeamish about selling on Ebay to Canada due to lack of tracking on packages for methods cheaper than Express Mail:


Never got a confirmation on those questions at the end, but I'm still fairly certain I'm right about tracking. Might be useful for those shipping large packages via Ebay over the boarder.

As of July 29th, those services do have delivery confirmations (depending on the country). I'm not sure if this is just for Endicia customers, or for everyone. Here's more info from the email they sent me:

• Electronic Delivery Confirmation International service is now available to 13 countries in addition to Canada.

• This service is available for the Priority Mail International Flat Rate Envelopes and Small Flat Rate Box, as well as all First-Class Package International Service parcels.

Rad, it's about time! I think that tracking will solve many of the problems that people are having.

Is there a list of countries with delivery confirmation ?

Wow, that sounds awesome, but can anyone actually confirm the list of 13 countries mentioned? Annoyingly all I've found so far at usps.com is "to select destinations" with no country list...

Shipping rates and delays has put Canada on the half way point of being worth the hastle. On NA not as much of problem but E-Bay leaves you open to scrutiny. Being collectors we understand the transit times better her on NA. The fact it is also an open forum makes leaving negative feedback harder. If the buyer understands the costs and time delays related, package is out the door. Have had 1 problem recently shipping to Canada. The buyer refussed the package, it was held by the carrier, and then they picked the package up a few days later. It was more of a dirty bastard trying to screw me. The tracking part being from US to Canada made things harder to sort out. No matter where the package is going trust worthy buyers is was it boils down to.

I know a little site with great low prices that ships worldwide with tracking...*coughcough my signature coughcough*

WARNING: **SHAMELESS PLUGS AHEAD**   LOL

I believe the United States Postal Service has a Flat rate for packages that ship to Canada.

Here's a partial list:

Australia
Belgium
Brazil
Canada
Denmark
France
Germany
New Zealand
Switzerland
United Kingdom

Lots of good info in this thread, thanks everyone.

I've said it 20 times already but people still don't understand that you can get delivery confirmation across the border. Whenever people ship something, they look on usps.com, it hits the border and then never gets updated again. People don't seem to understand you then take your same tracking number, go to canadapost.ca, enter it and voila.....you now have tracking inside Canada. You can see where the package is, if it passed through customs yet and if it has been delivered or picked up. If you require a signature on the pickup (a $1 service I believe) then you can see if they picked up the package or not.

scammer: I didn't get my package.
seller: Well it shows here you signed for it when you picked it up.
scammer: Uhhh.....I must have forgotten.

The only other reason is people that don't buy across the border often will get very frustrated that their package was held at customs for 6 additional days, it was also opened and searched, plus there is a $30 fee waiting when they pick it up. They're going to contact the seller and yell at them because they should have been notified of this beforehand when the seller had no idea it would happen neither. They get yelled at enough that they stop doing it.

I bought a switchblade off Ebay for $9 back in 2005 when it was still legal and Customs seized it at the border. I was new to the scene then so I contacted the seller and told them they should have notified me it was illegal in my country prior to allowing me to purchase it and they were forced to refund me my $9 even though they never got the blade back. It's things like that which make them stop shipping to Canada.

* Disclaimer: the knife was for novelty purposes, it was $2 with $7 shipping charges. Not something to hurt people with.

Haha why would it be up to the seller to determine whether a random buyer can legally bring that item into their country?