The Confusion about Tariffs
People who have never imported goods themselves for either personal use or for retail sale may be confused as to who pays tariffs but it is my experience that it is the recipient of an imported good that eventually pays freight, duties, tariffs and taxes.
I have personally imported books, compact discs, DVDs and blu-rays from abroad and none of the businesses have paid tariffs on my behalf unless that had done so previously to import these goods into their country, to then sell it to someone else.
No eBay or Amazon seller that I have purchased goods from has ever paid customs brokers for products made in their own country and this is how I had managed to save money for decades, as I’ve mentioned in a March 2010 page on this blog.
Instead of placing special orders at my local CD stores, which resulted in a considerable mark-up and delay in receiving the CD, I had taken advantage of a postal importation exemption that allowed me to import shipments valued at less than CA$20, duty and tax free.
No costly customs brokerage fees. Nothing. And it was advantageous on light shipments like that of a CD single, DVD or blu-ray, whose shipping and handling costs were low because they were light. And shipments from England were relatively inexpensive and fast as well.
But I digress…
Like duties and taxes, tariffs are only calculated and billed at the border, by custom brokerages working for the courier. And in my case it was Canada Post because I avoided the major couriers because of their higher brokerage fees. And to facilitate shipments, some companies like Amazon do have their own customs brokers, calculating and including an estimate on shipments to Canada.
Amazon Canada also provides estimates on goods that might be imported, so it is always the customer that ends up with the final bill, not the manufacturer of the product ordered.
After all, they’re the people buying the product and they’re willing to pay to import it mainly because it isn’t made or still available in their country.
Tariffs are based on demand and the British, French, Scandinavian and Australian compact discs, compact disc singles, DVDs and blu-rays that I purchased were not manufactured and distributed in Canada so I paid to import them. And had I purchased them via a retailer, they would have paid a distributor a markup to cover their payment of these fees, which would have been recouped from me by the retailer when I purchased the product there.
The same scheme applies to most products, including American dairy imports. But the Canadian dairy companies importing it to make products have yet to reach the threshold that would result in tariffs, the “tariff rate quota”, so they haven’t paid any tariffs on American dairy for decades, nor have their Canadian consumers until the retaliatory tariffs kicked in April 2025.
This 25% tariff has not been added to books, musical instruments, compact discs, DVDs or blu-rays made in the United States and hopefully that wont happen in the future. But I’ll keep an eye on the situation and update this blog accordingly if something happens.
I hope this helps people that were confused about the situation. And remember, shop around!
- What is a tariff? An Economist Explains
- How Tariffs Work – Export Development Canada
- The Smoot-Hawley Tarriff – United States Senate
Pain In The Tariff!
So, I was eying “Dexter’s Laboratory – The Complete Collection” at several retailers and had never considered that the tariffs would have a secondary effect on goods that are not tariffed so I didn’t expect sticker shock a few days back – The price of this DVD collection just skyrocketed, by $30 at some of these retailers.
Like CDs and vinyl, DVDs and Blu-rays are not currently included in the list of goods that are being subjected to tariffs. But I suspect their prices will go up in the states, well above the $20 postal importation exemption, which is rather annoying. And I presume any shipment from the states would be delayed going through customs because they’ll have more forms to fill out, unless Canadians just stop importing from the states via mail.
I did just order the collection from a Canadian seller on eBay for the amount I had encountered before the hike, preferring to avoid the American and Chinese sellers. And if need be I could always try the U.k and Europe for other releases as well.
I personally like Amazon u.k, Amazon France and FNAC for CDs and Region Free DVDs from Europe, and I do have a region free DVD player for some French films that never made their way to DVD in North America. But sometimes deals can be had for under $20 Canadian, not including shipping, and sometimes the shipping rates are acceptable.
I have emailed my local MP and several electoral candidates suggesting a $60 exemption for postal importations from Europe, the U.k and several more of our stable trade partners so I’m hoping we’ll be able to order more from those countries after the election is done.
If you want to support a $60 exemption for postal imports, which is long overdue, you can contact your local Member of Parliament via this form, after the election of course.
Hopefully we’ll be done with this tariff nonsense soon…
My Favourite Canadian Sources
I thought I’d list my favourite Canadian stores for music, film, books and instruments.
My favourite local stores for new and used CDs and vinyl here in Ottawa are Legend Records, The ODDs & SODs Shoppe and Turning Point. But I also like Sunrise Records and HMV, the latter being found in Toys-R-Us Canada stores, and I usually also purchase physical copies of films on DVD and blu-rays from these stores as well.
In Montreal and Gatineau, I shop at Archambault, where one can also find instruments and books in French and English. But for instruments and sheet music in my neck of the woods I shop at Long & McQuade, Granata Music and Steve’s Music.
Indigo offers books and a small selection of new vinyl records at many of their stores, although more vinyl can be found online. And many more Canadian retailers offer goods via Amazon.ca and eBay.ca if you want to do some comparison shopping.
Best Buy Canada stores no longer carry film and music but they do sell them online, some of which come from Canadian retailers. And you should note that Sony Music Canada, Universal Music Canada and Warner Music Canada have their own Canadian shops online.
You might also want to try Saskatchewan chain McNally Robertson and Quebecois chain Librarie Renaud-Bray for books, or Ontario chains The Beat Goes On and Deja Vu Discs for new and used film and music.
Eastern Canadians can also try Taz Records / Backbeat Records for new and used CDs, DVDs, LPs and Blu-rays. And don’t forget that Record Store Day is coming up at many local retailers on April 12th, 2025.
Those are the sources I can think of on the top of my head so I may add some more later on.
Hope this helps.
Where is it?
Remember back in the late 90’s and early 2000’s when the media and content providers claimed we would be accessing content from the four corners of the earth?
Well, it’s nearly 2020 and we’re still having serious distribution issues when it comes to music and film from Europe.
This may not be a problem for most english speakers in this country, who primarily look at Hollywood blockbusters and the odd independent film from the states, Canada, Britain, Ireland or Australia. But when you wander on the Internet Movie Database and encounter films that feature actors and actresses you know from some of those films, you may notice that these have not been made available to North Americans, regardless of the major award nominations or wins these have accumulated.
In my case I have been encountering dead ends trying to rent or purchase recent music and films from Denmark and Finland, that i’ve been searching for since the release of the Academy Award winning film “In A Better World” in 2011.
This excellent Danish drama is available on blu-ray in North America and can be downloaded via Google Play and iTunes in Canada and the United States. But Canadians will not be able to find “Someone You Love“, another Scandinavian drama featuring Swedish actor Mikael Persbrandt, or Danish teen horror flick “Danny’s Doomsday“, which features William Jøhnk Nielsen (one of the young, lead actors in “In A Better World“).
Those films were made available on DVD and blu-ray for a short time after their original 2014 theatrical release and are still available for rental and purchase in Europe via several services, including iTunes and Google Play. But only “Danny’s Doomsday” has made it “across the pond”, exclusively to Prime Video in the states.
I’ve contacted iTunes, Google Play and Amazon/Prime Video repetitively in regards to several other European films and the response is pretty much “we’re slowly adding to our catalog so it might appear online soon”, the response i’ve received for over a decade in response to my requests for several classic french films i’ve wanted.
The delays in regards to the french films i’ve asked for are understandable because they’re rather obscure outside of Quebec and the other parts of North America where french isn’t common. But I won’t lie and say I don’t find it rather irritating to see soundtracks from the more recent films being featured on those services instead.
Seriously, I had purchased some of the music off the “Urban Family” soundtrack from iTunes four years before randomly encountering the Finnish musical on some obscure channel on my Roku a few weeks back. And to make matters worse I have also yet to be able to purchase “Uusi Ullottovuus“, a catchy tune by the Brotherus Brothers, the young sibling trio that features Johannes Brotherus, one of the lead actors of that film!
There are also no guaranties that a foreign film will remain available for a long time in North America, which is made apparent by the disappearance of the multiple award winning films like “Good Bye Lenin!” and “I’m Not Scared” from our store shelves and content providers. And all we can do is add titles to our wish lists on the latter, occasionally checking with JustWatch to see if a film pops up somewhere online.
Yes, you could try to find these films on DVD or Blu-ray on eBay or Amazon and use an all region DVD or blu-ray player if these discs aren’t coded for our region but this can get quite costly because of the shipping and handling costs per disc, although the later is more bearable if the DVD or Blu-ray you’re purchasing is compatible with your current player ; Consult your DVD or blu-ray player’s manual for details.
Personally, i’d prefer paying the foreign film producers directly to rent or download their films, when no distributor is available. But there are usually contract issues lingering in the background that keeps that from happening, unfortunately.
I have managed to secure some foreign films on DVD and blu-ray, that were produced in North America. But i’m guessing these are going to get rarer as more and more people just stream or download films legally.
I guess we all need to be patient about these things. But sometimes…
Argh!
Sprichst du deutsch ?
It appears that English speakers are now able to access most of Amazon.de
Knowing only English and French, I had used Amazon UK and Amazon France
They’re still working on translating most of the site though so you might still run into German pages as you browse the site.
Alternatives To Zip.ca
Now that Zip.ca has closed its doors I’m sure some of you are looking for alternatives, so I thought I’d provide a few.
Unfortunately there are few alternatives when it comes to rentals by mail now that zip.ca is gone.
It appears that only DVD Link is offering a mail rental service at the moment. But their rates are pretty good at $9.95 to $54.99, depending on how many DVDs or Blu-Rays you want to rent per month. And unlike zip.ca, this Vancouver based company rents games and don’t charge more for Blu-Ray rentals.
People who like renting from kiosks will of course fare better because Redbox just recently expanded into the Atlantic Provinces and Western Canada.
Redbox kiosks have pretty much invaded my city (Ottawa), and can be found at most Sobeys, Loblaws/Real Canadian Superstore, Walmart and Giant Tiger stores.
They’ve placed kiosks at quite a few of those stores through-out Canada, both indoors and outdoors. And I like them because you don’t need to return your discs at the specific Redbox kiosk they were rented from.
I believe they’ve replaced most of the Bestbuy Movie Kiosk locations at the 7-Eleven, Mac’s, Safeway, Real Canadian Superstore and Walmart stores in western Canada. And possibly the Moviemagic kiosks in Ontario as well.
In the Montreal area they have opened locations at IGA stores. But until they expand further the best solution for rentals in the province of Quebec are the Superclub Videotron stores.
Independent stores can still be found in the largest cities, through-out Canada. But the largest video rental store chain in Canada is now Jumbo Video/Superclub Videotron, which operate stores in Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes.
Quebecor Media owns both of these chains along with Microplay, a chain that rents videogames from some of the Jumbo Video/Superclub Videotron locations. But whether these chains will fold like Rogers Video and Blockbuster Video is unknown.
High speed internet remains prohibitively expensive in many areas, especially in rural communities, so renting individual films from iTunes, Netlix, Cineplex or Cinemanow may still not be a viable option for some.
Another option is to bite the bullet and rent films via the on demand and pay per view services offered by the cable and satellite companies. But at $5.99 to $7.99 per film this can get quite expensive.
They do occasionally offer some discounts on The Movie Network/TMN Encore and Super Ecran but the delays on new films remain on those channels and I’ve found that the Hollywood Suite package is much better if you’re mostly interested in classic films. The later is much more affordable at the moment.
Those are pretty much my suggestions on this matter. I will of course post updates, if some occur. I hope that you found this information useful.
UPDATE : Redbox left the Canadian market in Early 2015, significantly reducing our options. Some public libraries have limited selections of rentals offline but it appears that online film rentals have killed off the physical rental market in Canada. Click here for my first impressions on the Shomi service.