shipping to the US

[Joanne and Roy 0]

My visa was approved this week! I'm now figuring out the logistics of moving to New York. Can anyone recommend a reliable and cheap shipping service?

[Julie O 5]

When I moved from Australia to Japan a few years ago, I used Pack & Send. I lived in Perth at the time and dealt with their office in Subiaco. They were the cheapest company at the time and we received great service. I will be moving to the US later this year once I get my green card and I am planning to use that company again to ship my things. I have no idea how much they charge to ship to the US. I was only charged $350 to ship one cubic meter (8 big boxes) from Perth to Hiroshima.

[Adrian_Trischa 6]

My visa was approved this week! I'm now figuring out the logistics of moving to New York. Can anyone recommend a reliable and cheap shipping service?

Hi,

I used Sevenseas world wide.

http://www.sevenseasworldwide.com/?source=google&KW=sevenseas&gclid=CI2yneafuLYCFcdAMgodBEYAWg

They do a door to door service and provide you with packing materials etc. Communication is great. They have two options - either via sea (which is cheaper) or air ( a lot more expensive but shorter delivery time)

Also, check to see what your airline allows with luggage. I flew over with Virgin and was allowed 2 x bags at 22.5kgs each all the way through.

Congratulations on your approval too! I remember how exciting it was!

[travel'n 0]

Hi,

I used Pack n Send. Not having ever done this before, I trusted Pack n Send when they said I could generalise when filling in the contents forms. (I had about 30 boxes.) Big mistake. When the boxes arrived in the U.S. shortly after I arrived, customs demanded that every item be documented including place of origin. Naturally, I couldn't recall every single item, so I was forced to hire an import broker to cut through the maze, which cost me $240. To cut a long story short, customs went to the warehouse and inspected the boxes and then promptly cleared them for release. It was a big hassle, which could have been easily avoided. I hope this helps you.

Regards,

travel'n.

[Julie O 5]

I recently used Pack & Send to ship boxes to the US from Perth to Los Angeles. They charged $470 per meter cube for a port to port service. Each additional 0.1 meter cube was $30. If you buy boxes at Pack & Send and don't use them all, they give you a refund for the unused boxes.

The people at the Balcatta office offered a great service but please be aware that Pack & Send does not offer to do the Import Security Filing (ISF). When you ship goods by sea to the US, you must submit the ISF 24 hours before the ship leaves the last foreign port. If you don't file it on time, you can get a fine of $5,000. In our case, our boxes were transferred to a different ship in Singapore so we had to file the ISF before the ship left Singapore.

We asked Pack & Send for the name of the shipping agent in the USA and we contacted them about the ISF. Their agent charged us $55 for the service which is the same amount other custom brokers charge in the USA. The staff I was dealing with at Pack & Send had never had to deal with anyone needing to file an ISF before so I was a bit concerned at first but in the end, they provided all the information I needed in a timely matter and we filed the ISF on time.

Another thing to be aware is that if you are shipping household goods, you only need an ISF, you do not need to pay a bond. The shipping agent in Los Angeles tried to charge us $70 for a bond we didn't need. We emailed him documents from the US Customs and Border Protection and he then agreed that we didn't need to pay the bond.