Importing boat to British Columbia and PST in general-gctid827461

[BryGuy]

Hi all. New to the forum, I'm landlubber from the Canadian province of Alberta (landlocked, east of BC) and I'm on my way down to Washington State to look at some Bayliner 3870's. I'm a little shocked to find out that BC residents pay 12% tax on used boat purchases, even if it's a private sale. In Alberta there is no tax on a private sale, but we do pay 5% on a dealer sale.

It looks to me like I will need to pay this 12% tax if I bring a boat over from Washington and declare it. Just wondering if I'm missing something or if anybody out there knows of a way to reduce this hit. You might want to PM this type of advice.

[Jeffw]

You're not a resident of BC, nor are you required to go through BC, right?

[The_Other_Gary]

Register it with Transport Canada with an Edmonton home port. It costs about $600. You will pay 5% GST to Customs as an imported boat.

I did this with my import and once I had bought but before I imported I got a temporary registration, informed Customs of my pending import and brought it home.

I just called in and they already had it in the system so they told me what the exchange rate was and hor much GST I owed and gave me 48 hours to drop off a bank draft.

Very easy if they know all the detail in advance. I arranged and paid it at Oshawa Airport just a few minutes from home with a small 3 person customs office and not too much to do.

They never even came to the boat.

Much easier than surprising them when they ask "Anything to Declare?" Note that I said federal registration as opposed to provincial licensing. Licensing may work the same but I have

no knowledge of it and you may have to ask Customs.

http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/marinesafety/oep-vesselreg-registration-menu-2311.htm#ports

[Pcpete]

Registration with Transport Canada may be similar to documentation with the US Coast Guard. It is a number that on my boat is under a layer of clear resin in the port lazerette, name and home port based. The USCG has a database that I could search to see if there were other same name and home port vessels as a name I was thinking of. There must have been twenty "Black Pearls" on the list. We wanted a unique name with a family connection and it had to be understandable on the vhf. My wife is of French-German heritage and we found that "Glauben" means "Believe" and there were no other vessels registered with that name.

Point is, when you apply to TC you may have to provide a vessel name so you might as well have it be the one you want.

The US system also includes a title history of the boat similar to a title search on a home and would identify any liens on the boat.

[The_Other_Gary]

Transport Canada has a similar search system.

Your applicaition requires 3 possible names to be submitted. To ensure that you get what you want submit two that are already taken.

In Canada no two vessels can have the same name so it must be unique. In the US system multiple vessels can have the same documented name.

Harder to find out who it is when some idiot wakes your boat.

My vessel is Adios Dinero just plug it in and it displays then click on the official number and the full registry displays.

http://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/saf-sec-sur/4/vrqs-srib

[tdcooper99]

Best check here.... but pretty sure you're OK.... the relevant section is:

Boats Brought Into BC by Non-Resident Individuals

For the purposes of this exemption, a non-resident is a person who does not reside, ordinarily

reside or carry on business in BC and who:

´éº owns real property in BC, or

´éº leases, as lessee, real property in BC if the term of the lease, including the cumulative total

of all options and rights to extend or renew that lease, is at least five years.

Non-residents generally must pay PST on all goods they bring, send or receive delivery

of in BC. However, if you are a non-resident individual and bring a boat into BC solely for

non-business purposes, you are exempt from paying PST on the boat. We may ask you to

provide documentation proving you are a non-resident of BC (e.g. a medical plan card from

another province).

Source:

http://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/taxes/sales-taxes/publications/pst-108-boats.pdf

[freedre]

Check this: http://boating.ncf.ca/buy-usa.html

There are some big words in this, but just read carefully.

[weiss]

There is no need to 'Register" the vessel. You can apply for a Licence Number when you have the import document from Customs. Being from Alberta , you can get a AB number if you want.

You will have to take delivery of the vessel in USA waters { which of course it is} I would strongly suggest you use a Marine Titling Service to do the USA/Canada transfer of title and monies. Most brokers in the US and Canada use this for trans border transactions. If this is a private sale then absolutely use the service.

Cheers, Gary

[green650]

Where do you plan on keeping the boat, and where do you plan on boating?

If you keep it in Blaine, or point Roberts, you don't even have to register it in Canada. You'll just have to register in WA and pay the 8% sales tax.