Item Held Up In Us Customs

[reeder]

A couple of weeks ago I sent a sword off to Hong Kong.  I've sent a number of swords to this particular buyer with no problems with US or HK customs.  Usually the sword is delivered within 6-7 days.  This sword has now been held for over 10 days by US customs for "further inspection."  Has anyone else experienced this problem?  I filled out the customs declaration form exactly the same as I have in the past...  TIA.

[Fuuten]

I've had this exact same problem with the UK customs last month. This took a total of say 2/3 weeks, when certificates etc were communicated with their inspector. After that it was released, but still took a few weeks more than the first wakizashi.

 

Any chance its a long katana or tachi?

[reeder]

It's a standard wartime Type 98 katana.  Box was about 42" in length.

[Fuuten]

Its very possible they simply picked one of your packages out at random for a more thorough inspection. Either way not much you can do about the lost time.. Better to try and communicate with their contact person and give them anything they need to release it.

[1tallsword]

customs can hold items for up to 10 working days to do inspections and investigations(not including weekends or holidays) if nothing is found to be an issue or illegal activity they have to legally release the item.they from time to time will make sure values are consistent with purchase price and contact the buyer to confirm so. its also quite possible that the scan into the postal system was not uploaded directly and in which case it will take awhile for the next scan to update in the system. keep in mind even though no scan or tracking is showing up on there web site it can still be in transit and you may check it one day and all of a sudden see an update with several scans and the item is in the foreign country ect... you can also get a snag if the item is not stated as "personal" if an item is for a business or commercial then you get into another kettle of fish all together and thats a conversation for another day. I have been a licensed importer and exporter of weapons for 10 years now and have seen almost everything in my time...

[Mark]

i had the same happen a month ago. They held it for a week or so and sent it back because there was same' on the handle and I could not export it. They also did not repack the box very well and I think decided to kick it around for a couple of days, it was beat up

[reeder]

Mark, were you able to ship it back out? Any problems since then?

[Derek]

I recently had one of my swords held for an extended period in customs (Chicago)....

A very nice katana in shirasaya from Japan.

I kept checking the USPS tracking, but it stalled for a week there, so I sent an email to the contact form on USPS.  They sent back a polite email telling me that it was out of their control.  The sender (in Japan) also emailed.  It was released the next day.  Not sure if the emails helped or not, but it was an interesting coincidence......

[Mark]

Brandon

 

mailed it again, passed through US customs ok this time

[Ken-Hawaii]

My sword mentor had a BOOK that was stuck in U.S. Customs for a few days! Go figure!

 

Ken

[manfrommagnum]

The item can be held up because someone else's items were in the same container and flagged an inspection.

[Darcy]

Swords have organic materials in the shirasaya and koshirae so it is not unusual for them to stop and do an inspection, and in fact inspections seem to be going up. If it is flagged as a sword or as an antique then this is going to pattern match with things they want to stop and inspect. There is no getting around that.

 

One thing they are looking for is ivory. This is a big problem and anything with ivory in it should not be shipped.

Same, I have heard has been stopped in the past, and after identification as rayskin, it came back with a question, "Which species?" So apparently there is something on a list somewhere. Not surprising since sharks at the moment are under a great deal of attack for shark fin soup (which is ridiculous, they take the entire shark just to get the dorsal fin and toss it back to die).

 

Because our eastern friends consider everything under the sun to be food, we can't have nice things anymore. They will scrub the planet clean shortly of elephants, tigers, sharks, you name it... because they like the ivory decorations, they need powdered tiger penis (when they could just get viagra), and so on. Not like western culture is immune to criticism, but frivolous destruction of endangered species for what amounts to very small entertainment value (or placebo value) is horrific.

 

That is creating some backwards pressure on any channel that may be using materials from endangered species, and specifically is affecting us with shipments of antiques.

 

I had fittings stopped for inspection because I did not indicate the material. I didn't want to write "gold / shakudo" on the label because I felt it would just be a reason for someone to steal it while handling. Customs is welcome to inspect to check the material if they wish past the antique declaration, I don't mind, I am more concerned about some minimum wage guy seeing "gold" and setting it aside for himself.

 

Probably the solution to these problems is to further research the harmonized tariff codes, in 9706.00.00 there is a trailing digit pair.

 

The last two digits I think, I don't know for sure, but I think might be country specific. So one country's .90 may mean something different elsewhere. I am having a look right now.

 

A sword in shirasaya destined for Canada should probably be best described as:

 

9706.00.00.90

Antique Japanese sword made of steel, more than 100 years old, in wooden storage scabbard.

 

The .90 in this case means "other" in Canadian Customs lingo. The same sword though going to the USA is 9706.00.00.60 ...

 

What I found:

 

.10 = furniture (Canada only)

.20 = silver (USA only)

.40 = gold (USA only)

.60 = other (USA only)

.90 = other (Canada only)

 

Note that these material codes are *only* for 9706.00.00 ... depending on the category they have different meanings. For instance 9701.10.10 is "original painting, pastel or drawing"... adding .10 after that in Canada means "specifically a painting", while in 9706.00.00 it means furniture. So you can't mix and match.

 

The recommendation is to look up the right material code for the destination and use it, in particular if it is gold or silver, then you don't have to use the text "gold" or "silver" which will end up getting your item stolen.

 

If you add photos into the pouch it also will give them an idea of what is being sent and help avoid inspections. The goal with avoiding inspections is not to try to slip something through undetected, it is just that the fewer inspections your item undergoes, the less chance of it being stolen (I have had items stolen while in the care of customs) or damaged (I have had items damaged while under the care of customs). This is why I am a big proponent of over describing. The more I show them up front, the more I show them I am aware of obligations and know what I am doing and this is a big part about the item sailing through with no problems, as well as them having all the data necessary to write up the entry without the package needing to be opened.

 

Lastly if you don't know the material code or it doesn't apply (falls into "other") then if there is nothing special involved, just list the material in the text description and it will save an inspection. I think in this case you have to deal with the primary materials, but if you have anything in there that is a problem, like ivory, it needs to be listed. Keeping in mind that ivory is a complete failure state anyway so shouldn't be exported no matter where you are.

[cabowen]

I have had tsuba held up in customs in Japan and told since they were "sword" guards, they needed to be registered, not once, but twice.

 

Sometimes, things get held up simply because government/postal/customs people simply don't know what they are doing....

[Darcy]

More to the subject, here is the failure list:

 

Endagered species components that will get your item confiscated/destroyed probably (latin species list):

 

http://www.cites.org/eng/app/appendices.php

 

USA Ivory regulations (note that a legal use is difficult to impossible to make, and commercial imports are completely banned, exports are allowed on antiques but as mentioned, you're setting yourself up for an argument and I would never send an item over to them to sit in their care while I am arguing about it):

 

http://www.fws.gov/international/travel-and-trade/ivory-ban-questions-and-answers.html

 

More on endagered species and import/export:

 

https://help.cbp.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/64/~/endangered-species,-cites,-endangered-wildlife,-plants,-exotic-skins-and-animals

 

Problematic species list:

 

http://www.fws.gov/le/tips-for-travelers-species-list.html

 

Looking all of this over, it's my opinion that the question "what species" when it came to rayskin is because someone has to look at the WTO rulings and compare the species against the list of latin names. So they're asking not because a type of ray is a problem, but they need to exclude it and they can't do so easily if you just say "rayskin".

 

Probably when the same item above was rejected, it was because they couldn't figure out what species it was, and because of that couldn't verify it against the list. And believe me this is a pain in the butt, I am going through the various latin names right now trying to check to see if anything at all is on the list. If it is boiling down then to a judgment call you will get random results.

 

I'm going to try to find out what species they use for same and get the latin name, then we can exclude it or have an answer on hand if this same/tsuka issue comes up again in the future. This page says it's just stingray:

 

http://www16.plala.or.jp/katana-iimura/samekawa-e.html

 

Wikipedia says it's the Pearl Ray though in this article:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shagreen

 

But Pearl Ray links to Cowtail Stingray:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowtail_stingray

 

And the Latin name is Pastinachus sephen ... so probably we have an answer to give there on "what species?" And I can confirm it's not on the exclusion list.

 

Sadly I note this: "and its populations are now under threat from heavy exploitation" from the listing. Which is bad for us of course. Also it explains the bucket I saw of about 50 tsukas having their same soaked off in Japan.

 

Note also that some species of trees are endagered and shipping wood articles can also trigger problems. So probably on shirasaya we need to say pawlonia wood for top level of paranoia.

[Brian]

Thanks Darcy, added the new info to the comprehensive thread stickied in the commercial section here:

http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/1860-importingexporting-and-customs-queries-and-advice/

 

Brian

[Ted Tenold]

I had researched a ray species a while back and came up with Trygon Sephen in an old book.  Darcy's info confirmed that it's the same species, just under the more contemporary binomial he listed.

 

One small correction is that shirasaya and saya/tsuka foundations (including the liners in gunto saya) are made from Honoki which are the species of either Magnolia Obovata (Japanese Big Leaf Magnolia), or Magnolia Hypoleuca (Japanese Whitebark Magnolia).  Neither of these species are threatened, or species of concern, though Sayashi still tend to lament a diminishing supply of nice shirasaya worthy stock.  :-)  It's good to have these names on file also in case you are asked.  

 

http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/193981/0 

 

Kiri (Paulownia) is used for boxes and furniture among other things and is also grown extensively in the Southern US as a decorative and also for sustainably harvested lumber.  An interesting characteristic of Kiri is its' low thermal conductivity. It has about twice the ignition temperature, which makes it more fire resistant than most other hardwoods.