It's the Jeraly spamathon shipping thread! Had quote from John Mason for £585 door to door - not sure if this includes packing and materials but have sent another e-mail to clarify

John Mason price includes packing and materials so is looking to be the favourite so far out of those that have got back to me at least - having to wait til Thursday though for Pickfords... I just hope it is easy enough for mum to get it all sent off if I don't get it organised before I leave!!!

Doree Bonner appear to want a Social Security number which I found interesting...

This is a quote i got yesterday from virgin - which i thought was interesting cost wise, i thought i would check out there prices as there excess baggage charge is £60 per bag upto 25kg.

I was thinking of shipping between 4 -6 tea chests so this one seems cheapest quote i've got so far look like makin it upto 101 kg is worth the saving of £1.48 per kg

___________________________________________________________________________

Thank you for your enquiry regarding Virgin Atlantic's unaccompanied
luggage service to Washington DC.

I am pleased to offer you the following rates:

-100Kgs = £3.04 per Kg
+100Kgs = £1.56 per Kg

+ £56.00 Admin fee

Please note the following:

1.Our minimum charge is £150.00
2. We only offer a Airport to Airport service.
3. You would need to telephone us on 08450 701701 to make an appointment to
deliver your items to our Heathrow cargo facility.
4. You would need to deliver your items to our warehouse at Heathrow at
that appointed time.
5. Payment can be made by cash, credit card or UK cheque supported by a
cheque guarantee card.
6. You must not send any hazardous items (such as aerosol sprays, flammable
liquids (includes nail polish & nail polish remover), fireworks, batteries
or matches) with your goods.
7. You are required by Customs to provide us with a packing list of your
goods that we need to forward with your shipment.
8. We do not accept plasma televisions, petrol generators or freezers /
refrigerators.
9. All items must be suitably packed for airfreight.
10. All items will be charged by weight or volume whichever is the greater.
11. You are responsible for arranging Customs clearance of your goods at
destination, we do not offer a Customs clearance service.
12. We will not accept goods destined for re-sale, commercial or exhibition
use, please contact a freight forwarder to ship these items.

Well, Pickfords just quoted me £975 including insurance

I am so p*ssed off right now - I just don't know what to do. I am so so fed up with all of this.

Owel - panic kinda over - I got super stressed then went back over all my other shipping companies and tried to get revised quotes and clarification of details.

Turns out that John Mason are my guys - they were the first to call me on Monday morning and their correspondence and help has been excellent. Quote is £595 door to door although insurance is on top but at this point I don't care anymore!! Roll on normality ><

Glad to hear it!

Glad you sorted one out

Turns out that Pickfords used the "industry standard volume" of fruit boxes which is 4cuft, making the estimation of my belongings 60cuft - I measured and it is no more than 36cuft...

SO if anyone uses Pickfords - make sure you check the volume they quote you for

The guy is going to give me a revised quote tomorrow so am holding off on sending other forms back - might see if I can knock the other guys down if Pickfords come up trumps on cost...

Thank you for the feedback, Aly. Sorry it's turned out to be so stressful.

That's two high recommendations for John Mason so far. I did like their website.

Pickfords have come back to me with a quote of £458 (not including the £175 insurance because it is on a minimum 100 cuft) based on 36cuft and I was told that if it was slightly over that they would throw in a couple extra boxes free - I just e-mailed John Mason to see if they could match it...

I called a local small place in Clapham and they told me airfreight was going to be much cheaper for what I was shipping
about £1.88 p KG to Seattle and £1.98 to Boise

I filled an entire shipping drum (55 gal) with about 500 DVD/video games, and it weighs in at 70KG
the other one has lots of AV gear / screens and the extra DVD/video games lol, not weighed it yet

Allfreight wanted to charge me £2.00 p/kg for the BRONZE service which takes 21 days, my local are saying 3 days

awesomesauce!

Just in the middle of trying to sort out some shipping stuff, one thing I'm not clear on is when I'm good to order. I'm still waiting for the visa after the interview last week (assuming the medical results are clear). Do I need to have my visa in hand to order shipping? Or if not, will they need to see it at some point?

Yours hopelessly confused!


Stu

All my stuff is in the US already before we have recieved the visa. All that was required was the USC (John) be the one signing the customs forms accepting the shipment and responsibility for it.

Hmm, interesting. For the purposes of tax exemption on the items you move, I thought I'd read you had to show you're emigrating and that the goods couldn't arrive before you.

Have I got the wrong end of the stick?


Stu

I'm not sure what you mean. By tax exemption, do you mean customs tax exempted? I filled out all the forms and meticulously listed the items, ages of items and relative values and then sent the inventory to John. B/c John (he is the USC) filled in the customs forms accepting responsibility for the items being shipped everything was okay.

We chose this method as we were only beginning the process when I left Australia and I wasn't emigrating then. I will eventually emigrate from here in the UK.

It cleared customs fine. Me signing off sending it and John signing off accepting it.

I just rang Seven Seas Worldwide to clarify. If you are emigrating, you need to arrive in the US before your goods do. If you don't, your goods aren't tax exempt and potentially seen as a commercial transaction.

Just ordered my boxes from them, as they seem to offer the cheapest service (sadly Allfreight don't do a ship service where I'm moving to, only air). He said to get it all packed up and then ring a few days before I leave.


Stu

you got the right info from Seven Seas, but you might have gotten a different answer if you told them that you could send it all with your fiance, a US Citizen's name and his address, as DairyFarmer has done.

But is it a slightly moot point? If you are sending the stuff on a ship a few days before you leave, you will be in the country when they are going through customs on the other side. No?

Pretty much, I'll get there a while before my stuff will. I didn't realise I could send it all to Shan ahead of time, I'm surprised that's not exploited for sending commercial goods to avoid import tax. I thought I read somewhere I had to arrive in the US before my stuff did, although wasn't sure if I had to prove I was emigrating by showing my visa.

Apparently, Seven Seas will take a copy of my passport and query whether i've left the country or something.


Stu

We weren't trying to avoid import tax though. Hence the exceptionally detailed inventory.

Sorry, I wasn't implying you were.

I think we may be talking cross purposes here. All I want to do is do it the correct/recommended way to avoid US Customs charging me import duty on my computer, which would probably amount to quite a bit. I'm part of a community which ships a lot of videogame related stuff internationally, and I often hear of people stung for import duty. That's why I want to make sure.

If Seven Seas are to be believed, I'm doing it the right way, so that's one less thing to stress about.


Stu

We are still waiting on our things to arrive in the US. They were shipped about 4 weeks ago...so hopefully we will receive a phone call shortly saying they are on the way.

For Allied Pickfords, they are providing the packing materials and packing and shipping it all for me - it still hasn't been sent as it wasn't sorted by the time I left and things have been understandibly hectic here!

They required all their usual forms and things and on top of that they wanted a copy of the photo page of my passport and a copy of my visa. I am sure that there were other ways to do things but as it takes three months or so to ship (sometimes less) I figured I was going to be here before it all arrived anyway They also want a copy of my SS card when I get it too

I just want to ship a few items like books, cds, dvds, picture frames and clothes. Is it worth going with a removals company with such a small amount?

It would depend on the volume and if the shipping company has a minimum charge. I think someone mentioned All Freight earlier who send things across via plane and charge by weight - if you don't have much then that might be a better deal?

Worth pointing out that All Freight don't ship everywhere, which may or may not affect you. The closest they could get my stuff to me was Des Moines, which was quite a drive.

Went with Seven Seas in the end, so much fun trying to get only 30kg in a box. Books are so heavy


Stu

It's really just sentimental things I need. I live with my parents at the moment so don't need to ship any furniture etc. I'll have a look at that All Freight.

I'm just really glad that Pickfords pack for me - I bunged everything together in banana boxes back home but it would have been sooo much more annoying to pack properly myself - especially as I left it all til the last minute!!

You might want to keep those documents handy when you get here. We shipped with Pickfords via LAX and agent this end was in Canada. When Pickfords faxed the documents to him some were unreadable and we had to send copies from here. If it is the same people looking after you this end they will call in plenty of time before the ship docks and we found them very good and helpful




The guys at the US end unpacked everything well

Awesome! Not sure where they would unpack to though as we are still sorely lacking furniture

Paid for it today - 458 GBP with 120 GBP insurance for 36 cuft. I'm just glad it's sorted now and I felt by talking to them that they knew what they were on about so am happy to leave it in their capable hands

Was that packed and door to door?

Yeah - packed and door to door Mum said when they came that they took about 90 minutes tops to pack and take my things and there was a bit of space in one of the boxes so she put some more things in as well

How long did it take everyone to get their items in the States. We are going a bit crazy waiting. Its been six weeks and when I called last week, the company that handles things on this end hadn't even received our paperwork yet.

Most places I spoke to said 8-12 weeks - I know that is what Pickfords told me anyway and StillThePrettiest (I believe) got hers in about 8 I wouldn't start panicking just yet

Just went back through my old posts and I can report it took 6 weeks to get from London to New Haven (door-to-door) using Excess Baggage.

This makes the current 3 weeks (and counting...) to get from the NYC area to Burbank look ridiculous.

Hahaha - oh dear Maybe they are taking a scenic route???

How do you look through your really ancient posts btw? I never figured it out ><

Glyn is convinced hurricane Bertha wiped out the ship and that we just haven't been told yet. LOL....I think he has an over active imagination.

It depends if it was in a shared container or sole use. We had sole use it took 6 weeks, one week of which was over Christmas and the ship docked in LAX on the 24th.

Shared containers take longer as you have to wait for somebody else to make up the remaining part of the load and how long or short that is, is down to luck.

I never knew that, but I guess it makes sense I'm in no rush for my things - it will give us a bit of time to get some furniture so we can put it all somewhere!!!

UPDATE!!!

Just got a call from Bruce, went something like this:

B: Honey, have you called the movers yet?
M: I said when I finished my workout, I would. I just did, so I will. (I now feel like abs of steel, or at least painpainpain.)
B: I just heard from them.
M: Mmmmmmm?
B: Bad news. The truck had a major breakdown. They'll be here in 10 days.
(silence)
M: WHAT? Those m0th3r-effing SOBs, I'm gonna string 'em up by their nads (etc etc)

(silence)

B: Haha! Just kidding. They're coming tonight around 7pm.

LMAO Oh dear - at least he has a sense of humour!! And you'll be able to domesticate soon too!!!

Now I want Jeremy here so we can drive down to Santa Ana... I don't fancy buying a car in the dark and he has to find his registered keeper's certificate thing and change his brakes...

Yay for Mavens furniture arriving!! We don't have any, so I think we're going to be improvising for a while, till we get jobs.

To answer the question above, we were also quoted 8-12 weeks from door in London, to port in LA. We've got a few weeks to go till we hit 8 weeks, so I'll update here when they arrive

Just a thought, if you know the name of the ship do a google search on it.

I did when our stuff was shipped over. The ships name threw up a tracking site and I could see where it was each day as it crossed the Atlantic, sailed down the east coast and threw the Panama Canal. (Not much to do each day when you don't have a job)

POiteen -

Where are you staying when you get here???

Yeah, where? We are trying to get the social occasion of the summer -- your arrival -- organised.

Ooooh, and I have a prezzie for you, Poiteen. I accidentally ordered two copies of a book -- "The Newcomer's Guide to LA." It's very useful and I've used it quite a bit already. Since I have a mint one on hand, would you like it?

I'm sorry that this whole post is going to be OT, but I promise to do a wiki entry in the future to make up for my crimes

We got a very cheap hotel just off Santa Monica beach. It was advertised on Westside rentals, so we'll see. We've only booked it for a week. I think of it as a good way to be by the beach at least for a week of our time in LA, and also to demonstrate to C what the commuting would be like.

Thanks for the offer Maven, sounds great, I'd love it. We splashed out on getting iphones, so hopefully that should help us to get around and find places to live etc more quickly. I've been reading VJ on it, which makes me happy.

We're arriving on the 6th, I got a small conference thingy on the 8th and 9th (Friday and Saturday) but after that I got no plans. So organise away, I can't wait.

Aly - any chance of you coming over to the meetup? Got you're new car yet? Or maybe we could do an excursion to Palm Springs later? Can't wait to see you both again, and also meet up with those I haven't met already.

On me & Robin's side of town!!!

Hmmm - would be great to do that! I'm a sucker for torturing myself like that!!! Maybe I will e-mail Pickfords and see if they can tell me


Ha! New car... well we got to Yucaipa and spent 90 minutes looking for Jeremy's registration certificate thing for his van and couldn't find it so we came home again. I had an awful day yesterday and today I am poorly so I am generally quite grumpy. I just want to eat ice cream

We're in AZ on the 7th-11th (4 nights) doing our legal wedding thing but if like the following week has something planned then we may be able to do something, depending on budget - we have so little money right now it is insane But if you keep me posted on the details then we might be able to work something out Maybe we should continue the plans in the OT thread though

Oh - we could ship me to LA - ok back on topic now

Just a quickie!

I used Allfreight to ship my gear over.

It took less than two weeks and everything got here in one piece.

Only took us around and hour and a half to wait for it to be cleared through customs. I'm sure they had a good laugh when they saw the amount of shoes I had shipped over.

So I'm more than happy with the service I received!

Our things have finally made it to port...now we just have to wait for them to clear customs. It will be 7 weeks on Friday that our things were picked up.