CARM -ageddon? Canada’s Trade Advocates Call for Collaboration

Machine Automated Transcript:

folks we’re in for a great show with the simply trade podcast. And this is our Canadian version, this is going to be a Canadian focus show. And with that, I won’t say I am really excited as we expand the audience there in Canada, I have a personal connection with a lot of Canadians because I brought home while working up there, I brought home a can, as I would say, a Quebec, my daughter was born in Mississauga, and which is outside of Toronto for those that you don’t know. But anyway, all that to say Lalo. I am excited about this is something new that we’re doing and in collaboration here with some folks in north of the border. So what do you think is, as we’re launching this?

I’m getting? Yeah, so we’re trying to build this a little more than what these are baby steps right now. But we are trying to make it more formal, where I will have, you know, guest speakers and everything, but and then we’ll have more of a formal host to this as well. But for right now, you know, we’re just hopefully, hopefully, hoping that this kicks off. Well, and everybody enjoys US and Canada, like you said, and I know we’ve talked to Kim here in the past, and she’s told us there’s really nothing like this in Canada, so So we’re hoping we can fill that void. Only because we’ve been told again and again, very humbling. I have no idea that people come up to us and like, hey, hear from that podcast. It’s like, oh, really, you know who we are? You know, it’s kind of strange to see that. But But anyway, and of course, it’s not. While I’m at the grocery store anything, there’s no way but when I met more like at a at the conferences, which is really cool. So anyway. But for this one, we’re going to kick it off with a more formal discussion on Carm. Which, and I’ll ask him here later, but which I got an email earlier this week. I think Kim are late last week that it’s delayed. So I’m sure there’s a lot of celebrations going on right now as some of us are for sure. So Andy, you can go ahead and introduce her since you know her very well. So

the for folks that had heard some previous podcasts. Kim Campbell has been on our show before. Kim and I have a great history. And I think you reminded me in Fort Lauderdale Lord have mercy. It was an excessive 20 years ago, if met in the war, then you must have been seven and I must have been nine years old. I don’t know. So anyway, Kim Campbell has her own consulting firm. Now she has a phenomenal background. She’s was when I met her she was with Canadian customs. And she actually was the supervisor working the sort facility that I was running. So trust me, folks, she wasn’t pulling any punches. This was you know, it wasn’t till way after I had left Canada that we actually became

friends because she was tough. tell you. But anyway, we have you know, we worked together on implementing back in that day, the lbs program, if you remember. And that was tough. And there was a lot of things in that went on. And so anyway, saying all that I have a tremendous amount of respect for you cam and not only your background, obviously, again, you were with Kenny Canadian customs. I know you had worked with FedEx, and there’s been some others that you’ve worked with. I’ll let you go into that, if you care to her contact information folks will be with our show notes. But Kim also welcome to the show, and why don’t you introduce our other guests here.

My pleasure. So thank you, Andy for always your kind words. And you know, I just think about the E commerce thing and Al and I both have a passion to re re energize at some point because I’d be shocked to hear we haven’t actually changed anything since you left. So that’s a big a bit of a hole we have to deal with in Canada at some point once we get past this car one, but I’m so pleased outside of the my the paint jobs you just just discussed. I’m very passionate around my volunteer work. So Allah and I have had a couple of journeys together and that’s how I know Al and have a lot of respect for him and he’s a great colleague of mine in our not for profit place. We have worked on the board of the Canadian Society of customs brokers al still sits there. And also Alice just joined my existing one of my current boards, which is the Associate Canadian Association of importers and exporters. I was a new board of directors member so very glad to have him here. I think this is my third time on the podcast. The first time we kind of did some general stuff, including karma, obviously, a few weeks ago, we talked about karma. And Andy, that all that work that we talked about, we reap the benefits of that on Friday with the deferral. So you gave some great words and advice about get to your politicians right in. And we had been doing all that stuff for many weeks. And it’s awesome success of that. And Al has been a big part of that journey. We want to do talk a little bit about more about current today, kind of the the technical pieces of it and how it’s actually going to function. Because we were supposed to be sparked starting the blackout period today of April 26, which would have been almost a three week of downtime, as you were bringing up the new system. So I don’t I can talk about that a little bit in a second. But I guess the other piece of the story is we are a little bit of in that no man zone right now. Even though we know that next deferral date is October, all those pieces about blackouts and things like that we’re still not exactly sure what’s happening. We know from the trade perspective, we’re not in one, but customers claims they’re implementing themselves still. So we’re still waiting to hear from them since the big announcement. But getting back to owl he is a query of Alan think you’re like one of those rare special birds that have had a career at one company. And you’re just entering I think your 40th year right, I teach why

I’m actually passed for talking, let’s not talk about

that there manages both sides of the border. Excellent colleague. The other reason I really wanted owl to join us today is he’s again, one of those where unicorns, that’s been actually testing in the system, there’s only been initially 75 companies and they whittle it down to 40. So Al’s got some really good insights that other people might have in terms of the trips and tribulations that one has trying to deal not only getting onto quorum, but then what you can expect to see in there in this new version that they will be launching at some at some point, aren’t you? I was kind of the one I go to say like, Am I missing something because again, there’s only a few people that are allowed to test

I’ve had the absolute privilege of working under Kim on on boards, and I’m continually learning from

her in that regard. She’s, she’s been a pathfinder for the industry. And so many of us want to have

her in that regard. She’s, she’s been a pathfinder for the industry. And so many of us want to have her on a board. And I’ve been had the privilege of serving as a vice chair under her as a board on the CSCP. And now, I’m wanting to follow that because continuously learning in that regard. And Auntie you you. You said something that really moved me a moment ago. So you’ve imported but I guess use the free trade agreement. You imported your, your daughter from Canada, as Kim is sure this is Kim is well aware. I take importing rather seriously as well. And I’ve I’ve imported the two children and through international adoption that we’ve actually imported from Russia. Like we understand the we’ve been ported to children from Russia, we understand that the things have changed since when that originally occurred. But we’re there’s probably constraints and restrictions that exist and but at the time, I was a Trusted Trader. And hopefully as we see where this podcast goes, we’ll we’ll talk about we’ll talk about more book trade and how how karm matters to particular particularly importers that want to bring things into Canada and look forward to seeing where we go in our dialogue here. We have valued and appreciated being a tester, and more to come on that.

Well, and that’s one of those things when when you’re actually you know, you have the concept of a new project, it becomes reality through lots of hours of meetings, planning, whatever, then there’s coding and whatever and then where the rubber meets the road, you start testing the system and you start going through your normal process and that’s where you’re actually going to pick up on some things so we’re gonna get into that in a second but let me stop for just a second for our listeners is okay, those that are probably in the brokerage industry, you know, customs brokerage that is, and transportation, they are probably familiar with Carm but for the average Joe out there, like me, that’s dumb as a box of rocks. Alright, what the Sam Hill is carved. I mean, it’s like okay, is it you know, some new system? Is it some new candy bar? Is it some what I mean, what do we got here so,

so I’ll maybe I’ll take a start and then fill in color and if I miss anything, I think the quickest way to explain it is we are replacing a legacy accounting system. So just like in the US, you have ace and you fall 75 are ones in there and do your post summary corrections and there may be some other things you interact with customers if they request documents on a CF 2029 type of thing. This is basically what karma is. So for the most part our our 75 of wands, we call them be threes now have been automated for almost 40 years. So it’s upgrading and putting into new technology, that part of it, what and also automating some other things that are post summary corrections have been still paper are drawbacks are still paper. So that part of the process is also being automated. That’s all really good stuff. The problem has been, we’re not just now moving to NEC talk new technology customers is really changed some of the ways they fundamentally want to do business business with in terms of data, the data sets, the technology suite is all changing under current. So net new for both the government and the private sector, for example, we’re going to the cloud are starting to use API technology. I know it’s pretty standard across most industry sectors. But for governments, that’s still a little bit of a new thing. So so that part we’re bringing in but the other part of it, which is really the consternation of a lot of it is they’ve taken on the the calculations, they never calculated before. I think we’re the only country in the world that’s calculating duties and taxes. And this is where we’re discovering a lot of the problems, we can certainly get into that in a second. And then the other piece of it is some of the policy decisions they’ve made. In other words, we talked about the bonds, the I did a webinar yesterday had tons of questions, stone bonds, we call it release party payment, financial security, us knows that just as surety bonds typically. And so those pieces, they’ve completely changed our landscape. And all this was supposed to happen on one magical day, which was May 13. And now we seem to be heading to another October date, still to be decided. So do you want to color in anything that you think was important? I missed?

Okay, I think you’ve covered that all very well. I’ll leave it at that.

Well, let me let me jump in then is that alright? So it’s replacing the accounting system, which generally, let me again, I got to dumb it down for for me. So hopefully the you know, the the grade school folks out there that are equal to be listening to the show that can grasp onto it. So you have a shipment that comes in it is you’ve got some kind of an entry that’s going into for release that want to clear this, I want to go ahead and have it delivered and begin to use it. But there is this time thing that is like the B three, as we said that’s maker three for those. Because I’m speaking southern here, so be three and it’s when it’s filed, that’s say it Okay, when you do the release, I have a widget that comes in and say it’s a case of coffee cups, and then coffee mugs or whatever it is. And a week later, when the B three is due. It’s still it’s coffee mugs, here’s the country of origin and a much more detailed things than the Harmonized Tariff and the duties and taxes that are assessed against that. And that goes into the what will now become Carm. That’s the accounting side of things, right? Is the release part of that clearance process? In the entry? You know, is that part of Comm also? Or is that a separate system that is connected?

It’s definitely a separate system. So that’s the good news. But where an hour maybe you can talk about this part, what has changed. So fundamentally, is there any new requirements for goods to be released. One is the now every employer has to have their own baje. And you have to have what’s a current client portal account. This is where the current portal comes in. So I guess I’ll let I’ll maybe take that this part over. But I think there’s a couple of things though, like the karm. Even though it’s accounting, they’re starting to layer some requirements around release. And they’re doing it in a funky way. Like they’re not saying you also you have to have a portal account. They’re saying your finances security has to be in done via the portal. So in order for you get to get your goods released at the border not have to pay duties and taxes, you have to have a current client portal account where your financial security maintains otherwise, you would have to have your goods stopped and have to do a paper entry to see type and you would have to pay at the border. So that’s where it gets funky. It’s not just a county so our Dow can certainly explain more. I like

I like the space that you’re in and the maybe we’ve got that similar import feel happening here just this morning. And I did share with Kim just moments before this podcast because it blows my mind. Just this morning I had a contact of mine said to me, look I just want to import a mattress. I just want a good night’s sleep appear in Canada. And so the person received the information that Hi, we no longer in Canada here, except goods on a delivered duty paid basis, we won’t allow you to have that come in unless as what you heard Kim make reference to that you have a portal and that you’re making direct payment with the Canada Border Services Agency. That’s something that you’re on accustomed to in the United States, like, I think there you get better night’s sleep. But in Canada, you’re not getting that sleep. So what’s what this gentleman heard is that he could import like that. And so he he reached out to say, how does that relate and Kim is 100%, right, you can have things come through under the normal release process. But that has to somehow map to your, I’ll call it your, your visa statement or your Visa card number. And if if I think of how things work in Canada here, I generally try to always go to a particular chain of gas station, because those chains of gas station, they have that record of my account, and then I’ll often get a rebate at the end of the year. So it’s a little bit self serving in that regard. Well, sometimes I might be somewhere other than where I’m normally traveling to and, and have to go to a different station. And I’ll call that in the case,

instead of just using a broker, like a company that I work for. I’ll use one of the couriers, or I’ll use a freight forwarder to handle the work on my behalf. Because it’s just easier. Well, what calm does is it creates restrictions, and it requires a much deeper planning in that regard. And so that was what wound up happening with this gentleman who just tried to import a mattress. He’s like, How can I? How do I do that. And he was unable to do that as a result of karma. And that was his experience. And, Kim, if you want to take team as a little bit of that insight that I shared with you, because that that does align with what you’ve said the functionality exists, but the practicality is a challenge?

Well, well, let, let me let me stop for a second, I’m gonna give us four, let me kind of give an example of what I’m hearing with the information you’ve provided, and what the impact would be at the border. In a sense. So folks, I mean, as we’re looking at this, you know, there’s so much e commerce that is going on, you go online, you order something, and you’re you’re ordering up something, it’s going to be shipped to you, okay, great. In the midst of that, it could be coming up via the postal, it’d be coming up via the couriers, it could be coming up through a, you know, a broker that’s got a bunch of trucks, whatever, you know, the scenario there is, let’s just say that. And with a courier and postal both, you’re going to have 10s of 1000s of packages that could be on one truck. So the equivalent of about, let’s say, 30,000 parcels on a truck of the 30,000, based on what you just said, everybody’s supposed to have all this, these requirements. So let’s just say that in the beginning, at best, only 40% of importers have established themselves and gotten the bonds of whatever and done cross the T’s and dotted the I’s and gotten the account. That means 60% has not

Well, that’s a good number, because it’s actually higher than that. Okay.

So 60% Yeah, so another 70 You have personally I have not alright, whatever the case is, alright, so but the point being is now, folks, as this is coming across the border, that truck now has to be stopped, which means that only if we’re using 3070, roller 30% of the freight could be, you know, free to go. But 70% has to have a manual process done because basically, the Canadian government has established certain requirements that are so rigid, there’s no flexibility. What do you think’s going to happen? A carrier, being the post office being a courier being a truck driver, whatever, is not going to be able to segregate out just the small percentage that could be going on out of all it’s all mixed together. So it’s it’s kind of like putting all the ingredients into a pot and when you’re making chicken soup, oh, wait a minute. Now you’ve got salary, you’ve got chicken you You’ve gotten noodles and all that. Guess what 30% of your noodles are okay, but 70% You’re gonna have to pull out of that soup. It is not going to happen. So it’s going to delay all of your supply chain is that am am I going like the pendulum is way too far Andy you’re full of beans or whatever or what

are your bang on the money. I will say though a couple of things in Al’s it’s definitely a can give a lot more nuanced on the ecommerce processes. We were heading exactly in that perfect direction. For me 30s Because they had doubled down on all the requirements, you just said. Probably mid February, when industry started really pushing back on a lot of this stuff, we had some big policy changes. So there’s definitely a big one that will occur even when we go live and the new date. And that is you don’t have to have a portal, you don’t have to have RPP initially, as long as you have a business number, you’re fine. So that a lot of that huge border disruption won’t happen day one. But Andy to your point, it’s been punted down the road six months, 12 months, it’s still gonna happen. You know, based on what we’ve seen so far. I think though the lbs and the courier, this is a whole

different complication. Because there is so many issues that have not been answered on how this is to look and feel. We don’t have a good strategic footprint about how we need to re engineer this program, it’s the same kind of thing that we’ve had in place 30 years. And we have a lot of competitive issues like only certain people are allowed to play in the courier space and get certain benefits. Now we get into this whole complication about is if it’s a person at home, making a shipment versus if it’s a company bringing in a bunch of staff, we call it casual versus business, those processes are completely different and confusing and have different requirements. So I’ll I know, this is one of your sweet spot. So I don’t know if you want to color that in a little bit.

You know, it’s tough because in Canada, I guess we speak two languages up here. And as you’ve both alluded to Andy and Kim, we’ve got the courier or the E commerce space, and I’ll call that our French space. And then their regular space, I’ll call the English space. So in the French space, but you’ve just said the the couriers or the E commerce aspect, like in the United States, I think of it as your, your type 86 Are your section 321. In Canada, what we have is most careers are having things come up. And in many cases, they’re they’re processing that are the courier is acting as the broker and they’re processing that. What is going to and is happening is that you wind up with two brokers involved in that case, one being the courier and one being the regular broker. And that creates issues when it comes to reconciliation and account settlement that month end. And I mentioned we’ll talk about that in more detail later. But for things that are coming up in the E commerce space, what customs brokers or couriers have done is they’ve stepped forward. And they’ve stepped forward because they have to not because necessarily want to they step forward because they have them they said, Hi put that on our business number. Put that on our statement of accounting, and we will cover that so people like Andy people like Kim, people like Al we’re not acting as the importer of record, we’re, we’re merely part of a facilitation of trade so that that’s what’s happening on an ongoing basis here in Canada. And, and we’re trying to work through nuances of that, as Kim alluded to in the E commerce space. In the other story that we started with the main you, you took us down a different journey, Andrew, but I’m gonna take us back to mattresses. I happen to have a friend who, clearly my friend is got better taste than I do. He’s ordered himself a $4,000 mattress like and maybe that’s common for other people, but it’s uncommon for me. And so his mattress great now is currently like in that stage of being stopped, like they’re concerned as to who and how that’s going to be imported. So that’s, that’s left that type 86 Or that CLV stream in Canada. And it’s created a pause as to how will this type of shipment enter into Canada? I think that was part of where your question or your comment was going. And maybe maybe we’ll turn that back to you is to see where the journey progresses as well as the the stops and checks and balances that Kim was referring to like we’ve got importers that use multiple brokers, we’ve got the whole registration and delegation challenge that you dealt with an ace that we really struggled with here in Canada. We’re still struggling with it, as Kim alluded to one in three. And then we’ve got what what about bonds What about RPP like We start using too many acronyms. And I’ll, let’s, let’s shift that back for a bit.

Well, to your point here, here’s where I was also going is that one is with the disruption of some of the supply chain, some of the requirements, that’s going to delay the handling of some of these trucks and shipments and whatever will the resources for Canada Customs, it’s going to be tied up and dealing with that, because all of those items now have become an exception, then you’ve got the formal entries that are like the the mattresses in the in some of these other big shipments that are coming through and whatever. And they’re needing resources as well, to process those entries. Just for release, we’re not even, you know, we still need to talk about the accounting side. But on the accounting side, they’re still alright, it’s like you’ve got to have your business registration number, and the accounts and different things set up appropriately. And if they’re not guess what is a manual

processes slowing it down. So it becomes another exception. So the what I’m hearing out of this Carmine, we’re just scratching the surface is that the exceptions are going to become the norm, which means that more maybe you know, and an exception requires manual processing. So instead of Yeah, we’re gonna come up with a new system. And it’s a smart system that’s going to do all these wonderful things. Well, from the sound of it thus far, the way this is set up. It’s the dumbest dad Gump system I’ve ever heard of, because it’s not going to it’s it’s not accounting for the exceptions. And therefore the government is one thing, you’ve got the yes, there are government officials being you know, customs agents and other governmental agencies. But it’s going to put the onus on them at the ports and at the border and all these other things, just dealing with the exceptions. And I guarantee you, there’s going to be folks that are going to get their knickers in a knot over this and be very upset and start chewing on these folks at the border, when it’s not their fault, but they just have to deal with it. So they’re going to become the proverbial pooper scoopers at the end of a parade.

And if I just let Kim, I’d like to just interrupt for just one moment, okay, like, You’re 100%, right. And he and the exception has become the rule and what is absolutely unprecedented. And I believe this started the conversation. And I do look to Kim and quite frankly hold her up in this regard. And that Kim is being the past chair of the Canadian Association of importers and exporters and past chair of many other organizations, as well as the organizations that want her to join and be part of the chair. She stood in front of the Canadian Trade committee at the House of Commons in Canada. And she shared what you just said Andy and she she shared that pathway. And it opened the eyes of many associations and what has been unprecedent is unheard of. It’s quite frankly, it’s unbelievable. 22 associations stepped forward to the House of Commons trade committee and said, Hi, this isn’t going to work because it’s currently designed like that. We recognize there’s certain foundation things that are solid, and we recognize that change needs to happen. But it the under the leadership of what occurred with the Canadian Association of importers and exporters in the 22 other associations that’s signed up, we saw something that was unprecedented here north of the border. And and Kim, I I’m sorry, I’m probably stealing some of your thunder, but I’ll let you carry it from here because you know, the nuances much better than I do. Well,

I don’t know that I do. Actually. That’s why I wanted you to be here because you have a lot of information here that I don’t even necessarily have. So we’re a good team that way. I will go back to what Andy just said, You’re 100% right. And if anyone you know in Canada, maybe everyone in Canada has probably heard about it maybe some folks in the US has heard we have a bit of a scandal around an app called arrive Ken, that was put in during COVID. And just going through, there’s a lot of investigations about that. But get back to what you said, Andy, the union leaders have come out and talked about that period of time. And the officers were forced into having to help travelers fill in data on an app that nobody could figure out that they hadn’t had any input on his officer hadn’t been tested properly. And just the consternation and the stress and all the havoc that rose this is exactly a prelude to what We’re going to probably see with Carm on the on that on that side of it. So apparently we still haven’t learned our lesson. But hopefully, because we have a bit of a pause, people will be starting to look at that, because that for sure is the downstream impacts. For sure.

Alright, so we we’ve just like I said, kind of scratched the surface here. And as we’re going through, I mean, I, you know, again, I wanted to put this in to the qualify, you know, looks like we’re kind of beaten up the folks that have put this together, there’s Look, folks, you know, it’s easy to play armchair quarterback, I understand that if you have been part of the group that has developed this,

and there’s a lot of heat spotlight coming to Okay, fine, I’m going to offer an invitation, I would love for folks from the current project, come on here, and let’s talk about it. But the point being is, as we’re looking at this, gotta understand those Canadian customs officers in particular, I have a lot of respect for him. We did some great things while I was up there, you know, and I’ve watched him same thing on cbps partners as well, this is going to be a two way street, because there’s going to be export issues. And I’m sure Carm has got some things, we haven’t even got to the export side. But if the border is getting going to have some challenges on the Canadian side for Canadian imports, but it starts backing things up. I guarantee you, there’s gonna be issues here on the US side of the border going what the heck’s the deal, we got a traffic jam or what. So as we’re looking at that, again, Canadian citizens are gonna see a disruption on things. So here’s where I want to go next here is with all these things, and it gets pretty complex, I get that. What do we need to do? What’s the average citizen need to do in this? I mean, you know, who needs to be involved? You talked about 22 associations involved. That’s great. But we don’t need to leave it to where there’s a delay, okay, fine. There, you’re in this quiet period, or whatever it is. Where do we need to go? Let’s take advantage of this. And and, you know, tell some of these folks, not no, but hell no, on the way it’s going. It’s like you’ve got to make changes you you can’t one size does not fit all.

So I feel like the good news is part of the journey that Alan talked about during the house testimony is there is a motion that actually went into the house of commons late last week, or this same committee is going to be take undertaking a study of the whole entire current project and make recommendations. So this is now the work that is ahead of us over the next few weeks, few months, not only to work with the 22 that have put forward ideas, but we’re really hoping to work with that committee. And it could be what you just said, Andy, like we’ve asked for, can we provide Can you provide us a third party to come in and oversight the project, because obviously, there’s a big problem with between trading customs right now, we kind of need a third party in there that is not, you know, tied to either one that can lead us out of this and maybe come forward with a footprint or an action plan to deal with some of these writ large issues. We’re certainly asking for an auditor general report, we have a lot of concerns about how the project’s been managed. We got other few recommendations like that. But I think these next few months are going to be critical. And the recommendations of that committee should be helping us with the way forward in my opinion. So I don’t know if you have any thoughts about that. I

guess NTSC made reference to it and Kim punctuated? Yes, there’s a pause in place right now. And there’s a pause in place because there was concern. You also referenced Andy Anna, and I really applaud this the officers, the frontline, those people are the people that make a difference every day each and every moment. And what wound up happening by the the more senior government officials in the whole card program is they reference that Hi, we’re pausing because they haven’t had the appropriate time to be trained or to be brought up the speed and it just so happened that was the same time as a union thing was in place in Canada and the government. Customs officers have said Yeah, we haven’t been trained. We haven’t we haven’t had the opportunity to to be able to make this project work on behalf of what the what our government needs in our government and as as Cameron the association’s that she has led and belongs in channels. We know there needs to be an ace like solution here in Canada. We absolutely support that. But what we support is is that pause to take a look at some of the foundation To make sure that and Kim, you can speak to the the areas that came forth that the the House of Commons committee like, what will it take to make it work? And I would I would turn to you to punctuate some of that. Because that that will be what brings us all four together. And that’s what we all want.

Yeah. And I think just to like highlight things, we’re really concerned about some of the mandated things like there’s gotta be options. We’ve always said, why can’t we have options? Why does an importer have to use the portal, you know, people can file entries and do work on behalf of clients in the US without having a client being on the aid system? So these are the things that we are keeping is why did these things have to be mandatory? Why does everyone need to have a bond, like even people that are importing a few times a year are forced into having to provide financial security, we looked at other countries around the world, we have a VAT tax here, they’re now insisting that we include that in the financial security calculations that importers will have to pay for in other countries of the world, they don’t do that. If you’re a registered importer, and I’ve been for three years, you don’t have to have financial security. So these are the things we want to start pushing back on, we have been pushing back, but now I feel we have a little more. We have people now hearing it and seeing it differently. I think, though to the biggest thing for us, too, is the calculations. That was I believe one of the biggest reasons why we couldn’t go live is now that the government is making the calculations and telling the importer how much they owe. We’re still seeing grave issues around those being correct. So it’s kind of I guess, the mandated stuff is the system’s performing, or enough people on it are really what kind of pushed the decision that we had to delay right now. Is that fair out? Yeah. Would it

be fair also to say Kim, like when I take a look at what the current program was, it was it was endeavored to be almost like a one size fits all. And I know in your in your profession, Kim and your you deal with trusted traders, like the the upper echelon at of, of traders within CBSA. And it to me karma almost feels like, like, I think of them as a fastener. And they might be a screw. And yet, you know, the rest of us are nails. And you know, carne was this hammer. And hammer doesn’t work that well with screws. And so they tried to put they tried to make that happen, thing of like a round peg in a square hole or whatever. However, that would be said, is that fair as to what Carm tried to, to achieve? And and now within the pause, it’s just it’s looking to be more aware of how to make things.

Yeah, and again, your 100% on some of the original overarching themes they they didn’t deliver on like there was supposed to be one declaration type where you could get released in accounting, because the data is basically the same. So at some point they stripped out, we’re not really sure why. So there was a lot of failures along the way, too. I think for me, the biggest part is it’s all outsourced to a third party, that was not a customs official. So those are things to we’re going to be challenging our government to if we can’t deal with it outright, let’s have the plan to bring it back in house.

Well, let me let me jump in here because it’s we’re gonna have to, we’re gonna have to have another show on this, or maybe a series on this, because there’s quite a bit. The thing that I would say that, you know, the takeaway, folks that are listening to this, I think it’s paramount that you listen from the standpoint that you’re going to need to get involved, you need to your company needs to be involved, you as an individual need to be involved, as well as any trade associations that you’re involved to stop and think about it. retailers out there that are importing, you know, large shipments and all that this stuff is going to get in the way of that. The smaller. Quite frankly, it sounds to me like there’s going to be a huge increase in volume of entries being submitted to the Canadian clearance systems. Because of the requirements. It’s like it’s no longer this mass. Let me do a group of entries or group of shipments it’s going to be individual shipments. Well guess what? That’s like a dime holding up $1 It’s going to be the small dollar shipments, they’re going to hold up the bigger ones and the bigger ones

still have requirements. So all I’m getting at is that we’re not going to solve this here when when I’m trying to emphasize the importance for you folks in Canada. And I’m talking not only the large cities, but the small ones is you’re not going to be able to get your goods timely. You’re not going to be able to it’s going to cost you more money. It’s going to cost the government more money, stop and think also, if you are a Canadian agency, the post office up there and Canadian post your bud is going to get blown out by exceptions, are you and if you’re in the post office and you’re in management and you’ve got a budget, are you prepared to go back to the Canadian government and go, we’re going to have to have more money because of Carms implementation is costing us more money. And quite frankly, you’re gonna say, Well, there’s only so much money to go around. So you’re gonna have to go back in and look at what are you going to be cutting. And if you’ve got services, then the average citizen is going to lose out, go ahead.

I don’t want to make this about asleep at night factor. But to me, that’s a little bit what it is. And I’m going to paraphrase to part of the stories like importers will use multiple brokers, just like the gas station example that I made reference to, if we take a look at this particular situation of the mattress that I talked about, Well, I I have no problem with that friend of mine even though he’s a friend of mine, I happen to be a broker. Most people don’t necessarily have friends that are broker most people don’t own a broker is so. So this, this gentleman heard that he couldn’t get his mattress into sleep at night. Okay. He’s now told yes to register and delegate that you’ve made that Kemp’s made reference to he doesn’t even know what that that is like, he happens to own a business, but he doesn’t know what that is. And then he’s told that he has to post security for for a shipment that’s coming in trade is being hampered and hindered into Canada, it absolutely everything you just make reference to. It will impact it will impact everybody. It’s only meant to channel things from a business standpoint. But how it’s being rolled out is impact impacting and hindering beyond that, and the whole sleep at night

and negatively impacting that that’s it’s a huge negative factor there.

Absolutely.

Where should somebody if they want to find out more about this? And or get involved should they reach out to the two of y’all are what what would be the next step?

I think last time when we can we can do it again, I do, we do have a one pager that kind of can point people to some of the websites and give them some resources, including to go on to the current client portal and register. So that would be a good reference. Obviously, Al and I are certainly available if people need to reach out and have a little more technical support. And then we would also recommend that they contact service providers as well, their customs brokers are also great resources for the existing importers. But those would probably be my my initial ones. LGM. Anything else you think would be good to offer?

You know, it’s an importer program, the Canadian Association of importers and exporters, which is who Kim was the past chair of, they’ve done an outstanding job in creating a flowchart that, quite

frankly, has pathways as to who should register, how many should register? When should they

frankly, has pathways as to who should register, how many should register? When should they register? Who should pay? How do you interact in that regard and other considerations? I think that’s an outstanding document and flowchart that’s put together because there’s no one pathway, we all take different pathways, and I think they’ve done a really good job capturing that. So I would outreach to that, that particular association and ask for that document.

I feel like Allah, I could do that work and either share it with you or ally, or let you know, surely to God to board members of the association should be able to take that one note. Definitely

Well, folks wouldn’t let me just say this is that we are will have their contact information, both owl and Kim’s contact information, with our show notes and all of that, along with I will say also that we’ve got some other really cool topics coming up with our Canadian focus shows here and all that in Chem in addition to the car, which is a huge, complex undertaking. There’s another little thing here that we’re looking at for a future show here that we’re going to be talking about.

Andy, thank you so much. I’m very excited to to say we’ll bring a well parallel pillar on on from Macmillan. He’s a partner there and really probably one of our best trade lawyers, especially on this topic in Canada. So we are a little bit different on the force labor file between US and Canada. You guys have border prohibition we have that. But we have a couple of other things in one is going to be mandated as of May 31. You have to file your first report for larger importers. Now when I say larger, it’s probably smaller than you think. But those people will have to be putting in a report by May 31. So we’re gonna have will come on and just walk everyone through that. And that will, he’s excellent. And really looking forward to that conversation with folks.

Well, fantastic. Listen, folks, share us like us forward this on to other, your friends and colleagues and whatever in the industry. And we’ll go from here out, listen, thank you so much for being on our show and Kim as well, it’s there, we’ve just scratched the surface. And I’m going to tell you, there’s a lot more interest in this. And a lot more that needs to be getting into involved as far as activities, when you start peeling back the onion on this Carm I gotta tell you it, it gets me mad in the wet hand on some of the stuff I’ve seen. It’s like this is this is not good. And

yet like to think north of the border, we will link we value how we learn and partner with us, our friends south of the border. And as Kim alluded to there, you’ve got forced labor, we’re really behind on that you’re you’re decades ahead of us and we’re trying to catch up Carm we’re not quite as far behind in our four letter word compared to your three letter we’re device but we’re, we’re looking to partner and learn from each other. So thank you for all the collaboration that has occurred in that regard. Well, folks,

listen, we’re this has been a great show. And with this, we’ve just scratched the surface. Like I said, there’s going to be a lot more in this. And we’re looking for advertisers and supporters and sponsors and all of that good stuff. So if you’re interested reach out to us simply tre podcast. But with that, again, owl and Cam thank you so much Lalo with all that we’re gonna sign off