eBay

svigo_store · ‎11-15-2025

I've bought a book from a US seller for $291. I paid $30.31 for EIS, which is almost twice what many sellers charge for shipping a book to Canada, but it was the only option the seller provided. The tracking shows the seller shipped the book by USPS to the eBay hub, where DHL accepted it. Now, eBay advertising EIS claims: " When your buyer selects eBay International Shipping, they will see a calculated shipping cost at checkout. If any import fees apply to your item, your buyer will have the opportunity to pay those fees upfront at checkout".

To my surprise, I got an email from DHL:

"We are reaching out to provide an important update regarding your recent international order, currently being processed by DHL eCommerce. Upon reviewing your order, our systems have indicated that your package may incur duty and/or tax charges.

To ensure a smooth and speedy delivery, we highly recommend prepaying your duties and/or taxes. This will help prevent any potential hold-ups at Customs and avoid any delays in the delivery process.

Please note that prepayment is entirely optional, and you can choose not to proceed by either selecting “No thanks” on the payment page or waiting until the prepayment window expires.

If you decide not to prepay, your package will still be delivered to you; however, it will be Customs or the delivery service provider’s responsibility to collect applicable duties and/or taxes from you. The methods and fees for collection may vary depending on the local Customs agency, such as picking up the package at the post office or paying upon delivery.

Amount to Prepay

Description		Amount
Import Duty Assessed
Import Tax Assessed		13.86 CAD
Customs Entry Fee		12.50 CAD
Total		26.36 CAD

I opted out of paying now in case it's needed later.

So, what did I pay eBay for?

Does it mean that US buyers might see a similar request to pay import fees for Canadian shipments, despite paying a pretty high price for EIS?

I opted out of EIS because I don't see any advantages for me with this program. I sell books mostly.

marnotom! · ‎11-15-2025

The US eIS is a bit wonky when it comes to those pesky import charges for Canadian buyers. Sometimes it will charge them at Checkout, sometimes it won’t, and sometimes the buyer is offered a choice between deferring them or paying them at Checkout.

As the import charges show as a separate line item from the shipping charge and you don’t mention seeing them in the listing, I’m guessing that this listing was one of those where paying them at Checkout wasn’t an option.

My guess is that this wonkiness is due to the fact that Canada hasn’t joined most of the rest of the western world which insists on eBay charging and collecting taxes at Checkout for all international sales, instead relying on customs or customs-equivalent services to do this job.

john_koenig99 · ‎11-15-2025

@svigo_store wrote:

So, what did I pay eBay for?

You paid for shipping. Duties, fees and taxes are always additional. And, as indicated by @marnotom! , these fees can be either prepaid or paid later COD.

svigo_store · ‎11-15-2025

Thanks for the clarification. Still, the cost of EIS is pretty high.

msau4301 · ‎11-15-2025

That is because you are paying two shipping charges, one for the seller to ship it to the hub, and a second one for the hub (eBay) to ship it to you. The taxes and duties are separate to this unless pre-paid, or if it is an item that is exempt. Sometimes even if exempt if sent by a courer company they can still charge a processing fee (I'm assuming for the time to check if it is or isn't really tarriff free).

svigo_store · ‎11-18-2025

Update. Yesterday I received a notice that my book had arrived, and I can pick it up at the postal office after paying an additional $71.10 in charges. Today I paid the bill and got the parcel. I checked the CBSA postal import form and found the HS classification code was incorrect. They put in the classification code 98252, charged me $22.20 in duties, $38.95 in HST, and $9.95 in handling fees. There was also the eBay customs declaration with the right HS code 490199 (printed books), which is exempt from import duties and HST.

I contacted eBay support through online chat, detailed my issue, and uploaded all relevant documents using the provided link. It took a few minutes for them to review the documentation, and they found my concern reasonable. They promised to refund all extra charges in duties and taxes within the next 60 business days. I don't know what courier messed up with the customs papers, but I figured that it's EIS's concern, not mine. I am sharing this in case someone else encounters a similar problem.

marnotom! · ‎11-19-2025

Wow, that's seriously messed, @svigo_store. I've never heard of that happening with an eIS shipment before. Was a mistake made with the book's country of origin? That's the only thing I can think of that could have caused the item's HS classification being what it is. 9825.2 seems to be kind of an oddball sort of classification and I can't quite wrap my head around it, to be honest, probably because my brain is getting ready to shut down for the night.

https://www.dutyskip.com/hs-browse/9825-goods-imported-by-mail-or-courier-for-personal-or-household-...

On a slightly different note, do you mind going into why you didn't pay the import charges when you were offered the chance to? I know you explained in your original post, but I'm not sure what you meant by "in case it's needed later."

reallynicestamps · ‎11-19-2025

The taxes were paid to CBSA.

The taxes were collected by DHL.

They are the ones who are responsible for refunding the incorrect duty.

Not eBay or the seller.

And the (correct) duty and taxes would be due anyway the book was sent.

The important thing to remember about eIS (and GSP if you are buying from eBay UK) is that it is a SELLER PROTECTION program, designed to soothe the paranoid and xenophobic US (and UK) sellers who otherwise would not ship outside their borders.

It has little or no value for Buyers.

john_koenig99 · ‎11-19-2025

@reallynicestamps wrote:
The taxes were collected by DHL.
They are the ones who are responsible for refunding the incorrect duty.
Not eBay or the seller.

True, but is was eBay who hired DHL to do the last leg delivery of the item, therefore it is them who have to go after DHL for their screwup.

thebossorder · ‎11-19-2025

I cannot confirm or deny it yet but since I was automatically rolled in the Eis program my international sales have dropped from 5-6 a day to 0 this week. got only 1 and the buyer paid more than what it would have costed him to just select a direct option from me to him.

I'm almost certain your buyer is offering to ship to you but because of EIS you either can't see it or his settings got changed.

I haven't heard back from ebay yet but I opted out of it as there's no way I can go from multiple international a day to litteraly none in a week. so to answer your question I'm going to say that no it's probably not working as intended

marnotom! · ‎11-19-2025

@thebossorder, I think the issue is more that eBay higher-ups (based in the US) are trying to figure out how Canadian sellers want eIS to work, both from the sellers' and buyers' ends.

We're a bit off topic here and you've started a thread elsewhere, but to keep the "flow" of what's been posted, this thread is about a Canadian buyer who purchased an item from a US seller using eIS, which has been in place on the US site for about two years now.

Most US sellers using eIS seem content to opt into the program and let the chips fall where they may. They don't really need international sales the way Canadian sellers do, so they don't care so much about it being an often slower service that ends up costing the buyer more than many direct shipping methods. They may not even realize that the buyer is paying for two shipping charges in one. And the possibility for eIS being a choice along with another shipping method or two just sounds like too much of a headache and may not even been possible with US eIS.

What seems to be happening with this rollout is that there are many Canadian sellers opting into the program who want it to be something that the US program isn't. They want to use it just for the US, perhaps, or they want it to be a choice amongst several other shipping options, or they only want it to come up in certain circumstances. Perhaps eBay was planning to trial run it with a focus group but changed course and fast-tracked its introduction because of what happened to the US de minimis and tariffs in general.

I think most of the features that Canadian sellers want are theoretically possible with US eIS, but since very few sellers have wanted these options, the glitches or idiosyncracies in coding them for the site haven't been on eBay's radar.

eIS works pretty much as intended most of the time insofar as it's a packaging forwarding service that gets stuff from point A to point B to point C and collects any import-related fees in the process, but it's the details that seem to need tweaking.

naturelover55 · ‎11-19-2025

I was wondering why my traffic and sales absolutely collapsed and I saw today that one of my repeat US customers was charged 17$ for a 2$ trading card?!? I've since been reading up on the EIS program and I never opted into it in the first place.

For me in Vancouver British Columbia, shipping to many places in America is way cheaper than having to ship to Ontario for this international selling progam.

This seems like a very heavy handed program that doesn't make sense in some situations.

marnotom! · ‎11-19-2025

@naturelover55 wrote:

I was wondering why my traffic and sales absolutely collapsed and I saw today that one of my repeat US customers was charged 17$ for a 2$ trading card?!? I've since been reading up on the EIS program and I never opted into it in the first place.

Sellers don't "opt into" eIS. eBay does that. It's up to the seller to keep up with their communications with eBay to find out what's happening here and opt out if they don't think the program is a good fit for them.

@naturelover55 wrote:

This seems like a very heavy handed program that doesn't make sense in some situations.

Xpresspost doesn't make sense in most situations, either, but we don't get upset over that. I suspect that eBay is pushing this program because it's a pretty big investment for them (and the company contracted out to operate the hubs) and it needs as many sellers on board with it as possible to make it cost-effective.

svigo_store · ‎11-19-2025

The book is printed in the USA.

I didn't pay because I felt suspicious about the lines: Import Tax and Customs Entry Fee. It's not the first time I've bought books from American sellers, and I've never seen those lines before. There are no import tariffs and duties on books imported from the USA to Canada. Those lines miraculously disappeared from the final bill.

svigo_store · ‎11-19-2025

It would be wrong for me to call CBSA or DHL. It's possible the incorrect HS code was entered before the parcel reached DHL or Customs. The appropriate course of action was to contact my counterparty initially. In this instance, eBay assumed responsibility for the shipping process.

ladybug2785 · ‎11-19-2025

You cannot call CBSA or DHL as you will be wasting your time. Neither can or will do anything for you from phoning them.

What did ebay put for country of origin when they relabled it at their hub?

Why did you get charged duty (not taxes) ?

Ebay just put china on it by default. Whoever is at the hub has no idea of where that item is made. The seller did not know that it was going to you in Canada and absolutely for sure did not fill out any customs form for a domestic shipment. The new hub does not open and repack like the old hub in kentucky. The seller just thinks he/she is shipping to an american since the hub has a valid USA address. Anyone you talk to at ebay is going to lie and say that the seller messed up on a customs form.

The seller had no customs form to fill in for a domestic shipment. (hub)

You can fill out a CSBA form to get your $22 back for dutys that were not due.

Print this, fill it out, put a stamp on it and mail it in: B2G form from CSBA Send them lots of proof. They send you a cheque. It usually takes about a month from when you mail it until the cheque arrives. (we have mailed in almost 100 of these over the years and only 1 was just denied for no reason)

As far as why or why not ebay lets you prepay it depends on how many carriers handle your item on the way to you. If it is the same carrier for both legs of the trip then prepayment is an option while paying.

marnotom! · ‎11-20-2025

@svigo_store wrote:

I didn't pay because I felt suspicious about the lines: Import Tax and Customs Entry Fee. It's not the first time I've bought books from American sellers, and I've never seen those lines before. There are no import tariffs and duties on books imported from the USA to Canada. Those lines miraculously disappeared from the final bill.

I hate the term "import tax" because for us Canadians, at least, it's just the same GST/HST/PST you'd be paying if you bought the item from a Canadian seller registered to collect those taxes or a Canadian seller selling on a digital marketplace that collects the sales tax.

I did the math and that C$13.86 charge is just a little less than 5% of C$291. DHL, or whoever processed that item for DHL, likely used a different exchange rate than eBay did.

As I noted in an earlier post, Canada hasn't yet legislated digital marketplaces like eBay to start collecting and remitting GST/HST, etc. on sales from sellers outside of Canada, so it falls on the Canada Border Services Agency or non-government agents authorized by CBSA to do that job. CBSA tends to ignore lower-priced items sent by mail, so if most of your purchases from outside of Canada have been sent by mail, there's a good chance they skipped out on being assessed and charged taxes owing on them.

If you do get a mailed item with a tax charge, you'll also get a charge of about ten bucks from Canada Post for collecting and remitting the taxes (and duty/tariffs, if applicable) to CBSA. That C$12.50 charge from DHL is for something similar, and is actually quite a bargain compared to what carriers such as UPS and FedEx charge. I present to you the legendary 950-post eBay Canada UPS Brokerage Charge Thread from 19 years ago:

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Buyer-Central/50-UPS-Brokerage-fee/m-p/60899

svigo_store · ‎11-20-2025

I'm curious, what if I had paid DHL and still faced an additional $70 charge due to misclassification? It would be more difficult to obtain a refund, mainly due to the associated paperwork.

marnotom! · ‎11-20-2025

@svigo_store wrote:

I'm curious, what if I had paid DHL and still faced an additional $70 charge due to misclassification? It would be more difficult to obtain a refund, mainly due to the associated paperwork.

I don't think that scenario's possible. What I think happened in your case is that because you didn't let DHL or DHL's agent clear the item and bill you for the GST due on the book and the clearance fee, it got passed along to another party (CBSA itself?) that either missed/ignored or didn't receive info on the item's country of origin, so it got classified as an exceptional item and you were hit with 8% duties and a full HST charge. If you had paid DHL, the DHL classification would stand because classifying goods is part of the customs clearance process.