Mexican customs frustration

[jim_mex]

Just a gripe I've already aired with a few folks but it's still annoying me.

A few of us members who live outside the US and Canada sometimes get a bit despondent about the relative ease by which members north of my border can easily obtain almost any materials they require for their scrolling pastimes. We outsiders normally have to live on our wits and make do or make sacrifices in pursuing our hobby. This is just one example of how I'm affected

A few weeks back I became very enthusiastic about going into small scale toy making particularly after I'd been given the name of a manufacturer of wheels, axles pins, dowels etc in the US which I reckoned would not only speed my work up but make my pieces look much more professional.

I ordered 50 USD of wheels pins and dowels as a trial. It cost me another 60 USD in freight (FedEx) and 80 USD in local shipping and customs admin to finally get this small order to my door. This might not seem a lot but factor in that Mexican salaries are about 25% of their US equivalents and you are talking some money. But it was a trial, I knew it would cost and I bit the bullet and everything worked hunky dory and I was happy

Last week I ordered around 200 USD worth of product from the same company but this time it was shipped by a freight consolidator who used DHL services. DHL ship through Mexico City main airport whilst FedEx go through a smaller cargo airport close by. This landed my consolidated shipment in the 'Black Hole of Calcutta' of the Mexico City customs agency.

These 'ever so friendly' people took one look at my bags of wheels, dowels and axle pins and immediately refused to pass them because they were 'unfinished (ie not painted or otherwise coated) natural wood items which had no certification of fumigation according to international norms'. They gave me two options

1) destroy the consignment in order to free the other item of hand tools and saw blades which I'd included in the shipment

2) pay another 100 USD for a fitisanitary inspection (or something like that) and wait up to 15 days for the results. This they said carried no guarantee of the items being passed - a bit like a lottery except with a lottery there is usually a slim chance of winning!

After a lot of soul searching I told them to destroy the goods so I could get the other items which I urgently need for work and resigned myself to throwing almost 300 USD down the drain. Also for the moment bang goes my idea to bring in a few exotic woods for intarsia work, or baltic birch ply for portrait and toy work.

Apart from being a clear case of double standards, - why did my other items get through when the same rules should apply at both airports? - it's almost impossible to get any help locally to resolve this matter.

It seems in the future I have to find a certified fumigation service in the US who I can ship any wood products to and get a certificate from before then using my freight forwarder ship goods on. All this will obviously carry much more cost on a product which is already heavily hiked by US standards.

Yep, I know it's my choice to live here where I do and as such I'm stuck with this mess, but that doesn't make it any more palatable.

Ok - that's my moan over. I'll live through this one.

Btw - I was up at my engineering pals workshop a little while back looking at a plastic injection molding press he's made and I got to thinking that with a little colorant I could maybe eject some nice coloured swatches and have a go at making plastic intarsia pieces. What da ya reckon?

[oily]

Jim, How close are you to the boarder? PM me if you are close.
How about relaying parts through an individual?

[jowshu98]

Beuracracy at it's finest. I used to work for a post and beam mfg designing homes and they shipped the lumber overseas and went through all kinds of hurdles. Each piece needed to be heat treated to kill any bugs or other organisms. I guess it's all for the best...too many invasive species and all; still a pain though. I feel your pain, pretty costly to get the items we here in the states are fortunate to get relatively easily. I don't do intarsia but I'd be afraid of clogging my sander up with melted plastic . Hope you get it all sorted out.

Don

[evilbadger]

Jim

Plastic intarsia might be fun to try. Plastic is kind of a pain to work with though after you cut it then you need to polish it to get rid of the blade marks. I made an aquarium out of Lexan and polishing the edges was a real challenge. You almost need to wet sand everything and work it through the various grits of sandpaper.
It would probably be easier to just make a mold and inject it with different colors. But what is the fun in doing it that way?

I would imagine there is a loophole to get stuff through customs but I don't know what it is.
I will do some searching and let you know what I find.

[jim_mex]

Just to clarify guys - I know there will be offers of help because that's what this place is all about but rest assured I will find a legal way around this mess.

I'm not normally against loopholes but to some degree loopholes - probably used by the FedEx guys - got me into this mess and I need legal and correct means to get me out otherwise I'll never know when I might get stung again.

It's somewhat ironic that in my conversations with DHL the best suggestion they could offer was that I use FedEx again the next time around! Call that constructive help or wishful thing - LOL!

I have calmed down now - almost!

[JohnB]

G'day Jim,
Have you had any feedback from the supplier mate ?

We have discussed this, and I honestly can't understand it.
You'd think it would be the other way around, things going out of Mexico would need a certificate..............everything

How does your carpenter mate go, importing the Mahogany from South America ?

Is there a Mexican courier that you could use?

I don't know mate, I feel for you though. I got pinged last year to the tune of $70 au for an inspection by customs when I imported the same items via FedEx. Customs have a standard charge that they apply to all parcels which require to be opened, being imported by a private courier. If stuff is sent via Australia Post (USPS) there is no charge although the items still get inspected.

[KTravis]

Bah...sorry for the troubles. That's so very cost prohibitive. Makes me appreciate the States more.

I can't help but grin thinking about illegally getting supplies.

HEADLINES

Ceramicists "Santa" aka Jim_Mex Detained
Mr. Mex has been detained for questioning for an undisclosed amount of time. He was alleged to have smuggled in parts for kids toys. He will be missed....

[jim_mex]

Hi John - up to now the supplier has not commented but I'm going to ask again tomorrow once i can confirm that customs have destroyed the shipment. I know that this is not particularly their problem but I have a little leverage in that I could argue that if they export to Mexico they should be aware of the import restrictions and advise their customers accordingly. On this one I prefer to play the nice guy and ask if they can help in any way.

I spoke with my carpenter friend earlier and his stuff is fumigated before arriving to port. the problem now is that I have to find out if the laws for bulk timber are the same as for wooden artifacts.

Ref a Mexican Courier. At the moment I can't see how this would help except that they would probably be able to find loopholes. As I said earlier i need to find the correct way and evaluate the costs and if its practical. If not then I might have to consider joining the throng or loopholers and shady dealings or maybe digging a tunnel under the Rio Bravo.

I'm even thinking more practically of asking my engineering pal to help me design a mini lathe for making wheels and axle pegs but I think that will be a last resort!

Thanks for sharing the pain

*********

Lol Kip - thanks for bringing me back down to earth!

[Hobbyhorse]

Hi Jim,
My sympathies for your predicament.

As with John in Australia and many other folks on the board from areas other than the States we are all reliant to some degree on the postal/import scenario. Most times it works, but as in John's experience where he was charged extra it does not always do so.

I have ordered some plans from the USA for rocking chair that I hope to build as a winter project which has also turned into something of a mission. Working through a web site I ordered the plans and then received an Email to say that my order status had been upgraded to declined. I tried a second time and the same result. I left it about an hour and reordered and was again declined as I had apparantly tried to pay for it by credit card too many times. I sent of an Email to the store to enquire as to the problem but heard nothing back however in the absence of any action I tried again to order the plans and all was successful.There was a question about the international shipping charges which was to have been resolved by direct Email contact. An Email did arrive the following day in which they acknowledged the order but could offer no answers as to why it had been declined and I selected which method I preferred and all was well...almost....... 5 days later I had an Email to say that my email with the shipping instructions had been forgotten about and just rediscovered and that the package would be shipped that day.....GREAT!!!

On Thursday I had some problems to attend to with regard to starting batteries on our motor home and after 4 hours finally got myself home, made up some lunch sandwiches and sat down at the computer to check my Emails where I found an Email from the USA postal service to say that they were shipping a packet to me and to please check the address. I read down through the street address, suburb, city, post code and all was correct excepting that it had been sent to Australia and not New Zealand!!!!

I have Emailed again and received apologies but as yet no plan package. Perhaps John if you should see it in Kalgoorlie you might just pass it on .........PLEASE.

Cheers mate,

Rhys

[ubgoofy2003]

Hey, Jim, I'm sorry to hear of your shipping problem. I don't do a lot of shipping, but, enough to know, even in the states, its a problem. We here in Yuma, Az. mail a letter to someone a mile away & it has to go 200 miles one way & back from Phoenix. I'll never understand that one. Don't even want to ask anyone for fear it would take months to explain it. Shipping internationally has to be a greater problem, without a dought. Hope you can work something out. Good Luck. --- Perk