Parcel Shipped from Hong Kong is going to the United States first..is that normal?

PointsHubby wrote: ↑ Slow boat from China ...
Literally

Crazy Covid times

Anything is possible

Yours is not the first parcel that’s making its way to Canada via whatever means are possible

And it won’t be the last

I say, be grateful
Cuz at least yours is MOVING

Lots of fellow RFDers still reporting items still stuck overseas in Asia Pacific Nations that haven’t moved since March

And BONUS it appears you have tracking too ... not everyone is getting much of that
Their parcels just last recorded AWAITING TRANSPORTATION TO CANADA ...
and then falls off the radar

Check out these other RFD threads to see / read stories

mail-processing-canada-customs-slow-711375/
canada-post-really-backed-up-2369864/

Inclemental wrote: ↑ Makes sense going to US. Port in LA has much greater capacity and frequent shipment from Asia than Vancouver and it actually gets to you faster. Local vessel loading time is 1-2 weeks and another 21-23 days on sea. Takes 2-3 days to unload off the vessel. This is standard coming over to NA from Asia. What makes difference is after your parcel gets offloaded. In Canada, you parcel will go through CBSA in Vancouver which takes 2-3 days without further inspection. Then it will wait for CP to pick up which where the bottle neck is. It can take at least 2 weeks to 8 weeks to process from its centre and distribute nationally.

Where as shipment coming from US, CBP clears shipment from port in 2-4 days then they will load on to truck and head over to Vancouver for west (2 days) and Toronto for east (3 days). All shipment will be clear from the US CBSA centre which is a lot faster and gets to CP local sorting facilities in Vancouver and Toronto and get out the next day if no further delays. So you may get your parcel in 45 days by routing to US or min. 60+ days from Vancouver port.

Currently I am consolidating all my parcel in China and have them shipped all at once with freight forwarder. They collected and inspected all parcel for package damage. They bought whole container directly coming to Toronto so I will be sure all parcel will be received by me. Container goes on train from Vancouver to Toronto once cleared by CBSA and another custom clearance in Toronto before releasing to me. It skipped all the non sense wait from CP. so far my parcels arrived in between 45 days to 50 days.

mdb1983 wrote: ↑ It still confuses me why the post office there feels it's unsafe to allow air delivery but they think shipping by surface is any safer..

Inclemental wrote: ↑ It’s not safety issue. It’s cost and availability. The cost of shipping by sea is almost next to nothing. Price went up ~20% but it was still relatively cheap. There are a lot of container shipment leaving from 4-5 ports in HK and 4 other cities in China each week to Canada/US. Your parcel is guaranteed to be shipped within 2 weeks once it’s loaded onto a container. This route hasn’t been affected by COVID 19 at all.

We used to have at least 20 commercial flight with cargo coming to Canada each day. Due to grounding all passengers flight to Canada/US in March. It’s virtually impossible to have your parcel schedule to load onto a plane. Then airline converting all flight to cargo only in May but flying 1-2 flight per week. Since PPE were most demanded goods from China to Canada. No way any other parcel would be able to come over by air. My last air shipment in April was routed to 4 different cities in China and multiple attempts to load onto the plane. It finally left China after 3 weeks.

Since availability is very limited, air flight cost went rocket high. It costed me $15/kg before Christmas. In April, it was $60/kg. Then last month was $90/kg.

Your eBay/aliexpress seller paid min. to use postal service instead of courier service. No way local postal will provide you any airship.