Question on Goods to Follow

Moving Here
1

We have a question on Goods to Follow.
I will be moving to Canada on a work permit, will be reaching Canada next week… My wife has got her work permit but will be getting it stamped in a couple of weeks. I will need to enter Canada and report to work before her.

I have filled the goods to follow form. Do I bring it along and get it stamped and my wife just comes in later without the goods to follow form? Will there be any customs changes if I am bringing all the goods stamped in my name only.

Appreciate replies based on your experiences

2

If you were the primary applicant, you can arrive before your wife. If only you provide the GTF list, it should be alright. You can send a scanned copy to your wife of the stamped form once you are in Canada just in case she needs to show it when she arrives. However, I don’t think she would be asked for one.

3

Thanks for your reply.i will send a scanned copy to my wife as u suggested, just in case she is asked.

4

Is there an expiry date on the GTF form, from Customs & taxation perspective ?

5

No, there is no expiry date.

6

Do you have to appraise for GTF or Goods Accompanying any jewellery that you wear on a daily basis? E.g ring, chain etc? 1 each per person.

7

@mrandmrs @avj @ak45 Any notes on GTA or GTF, how detailed should it be? Any important points to consider?

8

Made a simple list with estimated values but was never asked anything at customs. Your mileage may vary.

9

For gold and silver items, we took photos and weighed whichever items were available. We put approximate weight for the ones which weren’t available. Based on the gold and silver rates on that day, we put the approximate values for each item and put a short description of what the item was. It’s a good idea to keep this available. Even if you don’t use it for GTF list, it helps with insurance if you decide to get a locker in the future.

For electronics, we put the item#/serial#. This was for the electronics which we had with us. For the ones which we have in storage, we didn’t have the serial numbers available.

For the rest of the stuff, we just put an overall category name and approximate value. For example, household goods, sheets & linen, clothes etc.

We have a car back in the US which we are still unsure about bringing to Canada but we did mention it in the GTF with it’s VIN.

Overall I feel they don’t really care about the goods which you are carrying with you. I don’t know how much they look at the GTF list when you bring in items later since we haven’t shipped our items from the US yet. We didn’t put in too many details on the BSF forms but we did attach photos of the gold and silver items (including the jewellery which we use on a daily basis), and of the bigger electronic stuff which we would be bringing in later so as to avoid any issues in the future.

10

Mostly I categorized into electronics, furniture, kitchen items, clothing, sports, miscellaneous for GTF and just items in my suitcase (electronics, documents, clothing, miscellaneous). You can add documents but don’t put a value on them.

You can put large electronics separately if you want because usually it’s easy to price them. Rest everything can be as grouped as per convenience (e.g don’t list all your clothing separately, just write, “clothing 3 suitcases etc”, or “Kitchen utensils 5 boxes” etc.)

11

We were planning on creating an excel for each of the categories.
For Jewelry - How the photos should be? Do we group the Jewelry together, weigh them and value them?
Should we write some serial number (matching the excel sheet) for each of the Jewelry category and take a printout? It would be great to see a sample picture (redacted of course) to get an idea.