Importing Ammo from USA

R

robmika

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Has anyone tried this yet. Legally.

As canadians we can pesonally bring in 5000 rnds per import, for personal use.

But of course the US laws dont allow us to purchase anything "gun" unless we have a BATF permit (sorry dont recall the permit name).

I understand that you
1.find a dealer that will sell to you (who will send the paper to the BATF ofr approval)
2.get a end user certificate/import permit from the CDN govt (fill in a form and mail it off)
3. mail the copy of the form and payment tot he dealer
4. they send the copy of the form plus ??? to the US govt.
5. US govt approves the export
6. they mail to you
7. pick up and pay the pst/gst
8. blast away

Some ammo prices down there are fantastic. Naturally to save $50 on a small quantity would not be worth it. But if you max out at the 5000 rnds, you are saving hundreds of dollars (paperwork is the same whether you buy 1 or 5000 rnds... plus the dealer is more likley to sell to you and put up with their paperwork for a larger order).

So the question is:
1. has anyone personally done this?
2. am I missing any steps in the process?
3. are there other costs I am not mentioning here?
4. is it actually no big deal, just fill out the forms and wait?
5. no discussion about the economics of it... obviously if the cost/benefit in time/money is not worth what you are order ing it is a moot point!

Thx
R
 
From my limited experience;

The US Exporter needs to have a license (costs like 3K and takes a couple months to get)

But the process if you have a licensed US exporter; (however I can't see how you would do ammo)

you get an IIC from the Cdn Government
fill it out and send it back to them
When they send it back to you
You send it to your exporter along with an end user declaration
who will send it (state or commerce depending) and a request to Export
When they approve it your vendor can ship you the product...

Now again I don't see this working with Ammo since you cannot buy it in the US...
 
My experience is you had better have a big group order as, if they do not have the US Exporter Licence, bear.23 spoke of, they will probably not even consider it.
 
It only costs US exporter US$1700 for the export license IIRC and there are exporters, willing to deal with the canucks.

Canadian vendors, unfortunately, want too much money for our convenience. I do not mind to pay extra for something, made in Canada, but paying extra for something, imported from the US, only because someone has done the paperwork is nonsense.
 
I do this type fo work every day so I will explain why the 5000 order above won't be worth it.

- Import permit easy to get, and is not required for 5000 rds so the skies the limit for quantity
- export permit only granted to the few licensed exporters.
- Shipping is VERY expensive on such a small order. The minimum I import is per 20' container.
- Don't forget import brokerage costs and customs inspection fees. (for a 20'FCL this runs about $700)

Most importantly 5000 rds is a very small order. 100k rds is a small order. You are unlikely to find a dealer willing to handle such a small order for the 15% markup they charge on the goods in the US.

Last but not least the ammo must be on the approved list with NRCAN or it won't get through. This means you can forget most of that cheap surplus.

Cheers,

Chris
 
What is so different in Canada, that Comm block surplus ammo is times more expensive, than in the US?

BTW, my son was told by his teacher, that penicilling was invented in Canada. Maybe that's why...
 
svt-40 said:
What is so different in Canada, that Comm block surplus ammo is times more expensive, than in the US?

BTW, my son was told by his teacher, that penicilling was invented in Canada. Maybe that's why...
Click to expand...

2 reasons:

-Small market. I know guys in the US that move 300 cases of ammo per day out of a small mail-order operation.
-Ammo must be approved.

Most of the ammo you see in the US cannot be sold in Canada. If you see it at shows it was because it was smuggled out of the US.
 
CanAm: you are a business and it is pointless to argue with a business. No matter how much I might want something, it does not happen until you want to give that to me. So please, no lectures! I am no stupid and have done business in several countries, so export and import is not new to me. There is no reason any goods in Canada should be times more expensive than in the neighbouring country. It is only because we spoiled our bureaucracy beyond any measure, we have to put up with this crap of having imports approved, containers approved and labelled in two languages. This is how it works in the dictarorships. Canada is a dictatorship.
 
Trident said:
Why not contact a Canadian vendor, who already imports ammo, and ask about extreme quantity discounts. Then you can set up a group buy.
Click to expand...

"We" contacted several Canadian gun shops and were refered to importers.

"We" were particularly interested in 50 cal ammo.

All responses we got were total crap.

For example, "gucho del morone" of reowned ontario importing co., has quoted us, 12 bucks for a whitebox of 9mm_124gr if each of "us" orders 5000 rds. My response was GFYS in the face to the guy who quoted "us" for a total quantity of 100000 rds.

Anyways, there was a shiny moment last year when one of our beloved CGN members managed to import 5000 rds of 50 cal M33 Barrett from an exotic country ( Not USA ).

He was so good christian that he sold others a portion of his cache. The total cost of shipping, etc... made it perfectly feasible.
 
CanAm said:
Most of the ammo you see in the US cannot be sold in Canada. If you see it at shows it was because it was smuggled out of the US.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure people here are talking surplus ammo. I'd love to see some normal stuff imported . like wincheaster 9mm is $10-12/box here and around $3 in the USA.
 
svt-40 said:
There is no reason any goods in Canada should be times more expensive than in the neighbouring country. It is only because we spoiled our bureaucracy beyond any measure, we have to put up with this crap of having imports approved, containers approved and labelled in two languages. This is how it works in the dictarorships. Canada is a dictatorship.
Click to expand...

You'll get no argumeent from me on these points.
 
Another point... CANAM mentioned that the ammo must be on "the list"... oh the immortal precious list... but... and a big but... this list is for factory ammo... how does it explain the multitude of surplus ammo that comes in... I am speculating here, but I think I am fairly certain that the ex-yugo govt nor the importer, did not seek CDN govt testing of the gillions (ok maybe that is a stretch) of rounds of surplus ammo that come in to Kanada. Now before anyone jumps up and down, I checked the list and on page 13 of 23 it states NATO alliance countries, BUT for use by LEO, mil, etc only. Nowhere did I find surplus is OK. Actually for that matter, I dont even see NORINCO on that list, yet its here. Soooo... I really do (no attitude here, just really want to know) want to know why surplus and some other brands that are not on the "list" are for sale. I appreciate deeply that they are hear to buy, but what lets them through?


As for the importation. In my original statment I noted that the CDN must find a US vendor who will sell to CDN. From what I understand, you CAN buy gun, parts, and accessories from the USA ... IF you have the CDN import permit, as an individual you ARE still limited by the 5,000 rnds per shipment/importation... AND the US vendor submits the export approval to the US govt (batf???).

The long and short is that if some vendor in canada did do thepaperwork and get in crap loads of 762/556/9mm/etc (the uber popular stuff), they could get it at a better than shotgun news price (as they can buy from who those guys buy from), and ya they may spend a grand on shipping and a grand on customs etc, but the paperwork on 1,000 or 100,000 rounds is the same, and those costs distributed across a crap load of ammo becomes very small. That vendor CAN sell the ammo cheap and immediately ... they ONLY sit on inventory (hence invested money) when they become GREEDY and try to suck more. Economics class is done (yes I know what I am talking about as my company imports millions a year... I do the numbers... unfortunatley nothing is gun related).
 
helicopterbase said:
Anyways, there was a shiny moment last year when one of our beloved CGN members managed to import 5000 rds of 50 cal M33 Barrett from an exotic country ( Not USA ).

He was so good christian that he sold others a portion of his cache. The total cost of shipping, etc... made it perfectly feasible.
Click to expand...

Helicopterbase -

Can you tell us more about the M33? What country, how much of a hassle, approx cost?

It wouldn't be hard for lots of folks on here to justify several dollars a round for a big boomstick, if only it were available somehow.
 
svt-40 said:
What is so different in Canada, that Comm block surplus ammo is times more expensive, than in the US?

BTW, my son was told by his teacher, that penicilling was invented in Canada. Maybe that's why...
Click to expand...

That's not true, 7.62x25 at Marstar are the cheapiest price you can get...
 
CAN-AM;
Well it's great to see that someone (SVT-40) has solved all the problems for us ammo importers, this is great news....
The solution is so simple how could have both overlooked it ?
Best Regards
John
 
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