shipping goods

[Guest robandmags]

hopfully in final stages of visa application and started to look into shipping,thinking we are going to need a 20foot container. And after being advised to make full use of it, i am thinking of taking things such as tools,motorcylce,trailer,lawnmowers,strimmers etc.Can anyone advise me on the process of cleaning these items to meet the standards of AU customs :?: Could do with keeping the cost of things down by doing things myself i.e oil/fuel removal and thorough steam clean :?: or would i need papers to say this has been done professionaly.

happy packing

hope to be on the sunny side soon Rob

[Guest dp n dd]

Hiya,

 

just a quick reply cos i'm no expert,

 

we had a couple of quotes last year, they said that to take a bike

- I am! - or similar, you need a pro steam clean & a certificate.

AU customs can still get it re-done and charge you if they think its not good enough.

I'm taking all my trade tools an am gonna risk just giving them a

mega 200 bar blast at work

they also said you can't take any organic material such as ornamental wood or stones etc. - like twig bunches from ikea etc :lol:

 

cheers then P & J

[Guest dglamoore]

Hi Rob

 

We are also taking trade tools and machinery so giving them a good blast before packing.

 

Regarding your garden mower and strimmer I would not worry about taking them as they have to be thoroughly cleaned (as in not one blade of grass :roll: ) and every shipper we had in for a quote said they would be flagged up for inspection straight away by customs so we are leaving ours behind.

 

one tip - get lots of quotes!! We had 6 companies in and the price for sole use of 20 ft varied from £3700 to £6250 :shock:

 

Also haggle - the company we are going with were not the cheapest but did come down to match a lower quote and also dropped to 2% for insurance so we saved over £850 from their original quote :lol:

 

Lisa

[Guest happy-jools]

Sorry to be such an idiot really

 

but what type of things is everyone taking or planning on taking.

 

We have three leather sofas which we only purchased in December (duh!!!) and a new double bed from Next that we got in the January sale. Two 32inch flat screen TV (again under 6 months old). Other than that we are not really that bothered about anything else. Im sure this wont fill a container, so do we take it or leave it and buy new.

 

Oh god Im rambling, but were in such a dilema.

 

Im sure once we really look into things we will actually have a lot more stuff, but the above seem to stand out as they are practically new.

 

Ive heard of people sharing containers ?????

 

Anyway any help/suggestions would be good. :roll:

[Guest dglamoore]

We have a 20ft container arriving in a few weeks and plan to cram as much in as possible as the cost to replace everything on arrival would be huge :shock:

 

We have a super king size bed, 3 seater and 2 seater sofa, dining room table and chairs, single bed, bedroom furniture, tools plus loads more and all going in with ease. I think you will be surprised how much will fit.

 

We had 3 companies round back in October for quotes so we could work out roughly what we could take and it turned out to be more than we thought would fit in. Then we had 3 more quotes last month and booked the one we decided on once we had the visa in place and flights booked :lol:

 

You can get shared containers too and the shipping agent will go through all your options with you when they come to do the 'survey'. They also advise if you have anything it is not a good idea to take due to customs.

 

Lisa

[Guest Bex & Nick]

We're getting a shared container as we don't have too much - a bit like you really, two sofas, table & chairs and a bed plus the usual books, CDs etc.

 

Bex

[Guest dp n dd]

We were going to take loads of stuff

but then having thought about it, the list got whittled away.

 

The leather sofa is tired - kids :roll: - my son chipped the glass dining table :roll: and our TV has started to play up. Has anyone

successfully taken glass tables!

 

We just seem doomed to be taking a carrier bag full of clothes each

cos everything else is done in

 

Does anyone have any details of any companies that transport

motorbikes cheapish? Or can you put them in a container too?

I know they need steam cleaning, emptying of fluids n av a cerificate,

but i can't remember what the shipping agent said about them -

he just included them in our old quote - about 12 months ago now.

 

cheers - Paul

ps. I have to do most of the form filling n stuff cos Jeanette is an administrator & is sick of forms :shock:

[Guest jen&ian]

Most shipping companies will transport your vehicle too. They put it in your container then build a frame round it to box it in to make the most of the container space by packing stuff on top of it. Most will steam clean it for you at their depot, we've had this cost as part of some quotes, others have said it costs about £75 quid (thats for a car might be less for a bike)

 

Hope this helps

 

Jen

[Angela]

Hi All

 

If you ring the shipping agents you can easily get a quote, then just compare & try to barter them down, esp if you have a 20ft container a couple of % off the price will always help 8) if you don't ask you don't get 8)

 

We have decided to part ship, using cartons - well thats the latest, not had any quotes as yet but got 3 or 4 suggested agents from this forum to ring & arrange for quotes.

 

I think it is costly in some ways to buy again in Adelaide but its part of the adventure & we are happy to start basic, there is also an IKEA so you can get most things there at a reasonable price

 

I don't like the idea of sharing a container but I guess that you have to if you can't fill one, will know more when we get a few prices together

 

Good luck everyone

 

Angela

[Guest dglamoore]

If you ring the shipping agents you can easily get a quote, then just compare & try to barter them down, esp if you have a 20ft container a couple of % off the price will always help 8) if you don't ask you don't get 8)

 

Angela

 

Definitely haggle. We are going with Allied Pickfords and have saved over £850 (which is a good chunk of our flights paid for) from their original quote by making them work for the business :lol:

 

They dropped to match their competitors on the container price then dropped from 3% to 2% on the insurance to ensure they got the business 8)

 

It pays to be cheeky

 

Lisa

[Guest lazymazy]

my sister migrated to NZ in 2000 and they decided to whittle down and share a container, on asking her advice about what to take she said EVERYTHING, she really regretted havung to buy a new sofa, table and chairs etc when it would have been more cost affected to have a full container and take all her belongings.

you'd be surprised how much you've got as we were when we had a shipping survey done last week. plus if you share a container, it takes longer to get to au, and both parties need to be present to open it. we were quoted 35 days for shipping but shared was 8-9 weeks.

don't forget you're gonna start erning $'s. they don't go as far as £'s (advice from my sis)

good luck all

andy

[Guest simtrakyra]

Two 32inch flat screen TV (again under 6 months old). Ive heard of people sharing containers ?????

:roll:

 

Something worth pointing out in case you don't already know, UK TVs don't work in Australia. Can't say exactly why they don't, but I think its something to do with the transmission frequency or something. I would consider selling your tvs.

[The Monaghans]

Evening everybody. We're the Monaghans and we only joined recently so I guess we're newbies!! We've almost finished the whole visa process, our medical forms arrived in Sydney on Monday so we're just waiting now. I have a couple of questions which will probably be really obvious to you guys but not to us! First question, is it a good idea to take our computer with us or should we flog it and buy a laptop? Second question, could somebody PLEASE tell me what CO is? I'm guessing case officer but I don't know what the context is? Have we got a case officer?? And whats the CO deadline???

[Guest BJF]

Some TV's work and some don't. Our lounge TV worked fine (till it died last year) but the TV/VIDEO combi's the girls had in their bedrooms don't work, it's due the the transmission frequency. If your TV is duel frequency then it will work, same with video players. UK DVD's won't play on an aussie player either unless they are region free. Australia and New Zealand are region 4, UK and Europe are region 2, if you have lots of region 2 DVD's I'd say bring a player with you or buy a region free player once you get here.

 

Other things we were told we absolutly could NOT bring were Chrismas trees, decorations and the Christmas wreaths (the ones you put on the front door) if they had dried berries or pine cones on them, our tree didn't but my wreath did (and it was an expensive wreath we'd used just once - well one Christmas).

 

And absolutely no raw (untreated) wood, which meant all our outdoor furniture had to stay in UK.

 

When coming through customs at the airport remember to tick YES if you have sweets in your luggage (hand or cargo) as sweets are classed as food items, they won't take them off you if you admit to having them and prob won't if you don't admit to having them but it's better to be honest and up front. I bought my cats ashes with me and had no problem but I was advised before hand to have them medically sealed and get a letter from the vet who's put her to sleep (customs knew I had the ashes before I told them so I guess it was recorded somewhere).

 

As sea freight can take upto 4 months we found it easier to sell almost everything before leaving and just buy new when we got here.

[Guest dglamoore]

Evening everybody. We're the Monaghans and we only joined recently so I guess we're newbies!! We've almost finished the whole visa process, our medical forms arrived in Sydney on Monday so we're just waiting now. I have a couple of questions which will probably be really obvious to you guys but not to us! First question, is it a good idea to take our computer with us or should we flog it and buy a laptop? Second question, could somebody PLEASE tell me what CO is? I'm guessing case officer but I don't know what the context is? Have we got a case officer?? And whats the CO deadline???

 

Welcome to the site Yes CO is a case officer and the CO deadline is the date that any info they have requested along with meds and pc's must reach them by. Good luck with the waiting bit.

 

We are taking our main pc in the container after backing it all up to an external hard drive (just in case) and also got a laptop to keep in touch on our way over and so we have a pc when we first arrive too.

 

Lisa

[Guest Tina]

we have had IRC shipping broker round today for a quote and he gave us some good advise and useful info as far as we know so i thought i would share, he said. don't take the fridge(will overheat after a few months), cooker(most houses have built in cookers), uk made tv's, dvd's(cannot change chip), no natural wood (if you can get a splinter) ,no gas canisters (OH has burning off gear plus camping etc).

 

He did say take the washing machine,microwave,etc and basically apart from the above anything but it must be cleaned thoroughly with jays fluid and degreasing agent, where we are going to get degreasing agents from i dont know yet but we will start looking.

[niknjas]

Hi

 

We got four different companies in to quote for shipping and they all gave us different answers and prices.

Bearing in mind that we have been packed with non-necessary stuff for what seems like practically forever, one company said if I had wrapped it in newspaper which I had, it needed to be unpacked and put in their white paper. 2nd company were okay but was not that impressed. Third company that we were going to go with said that we could not take our son's toy quad bike without being charged customs on it as it was a vehicle. the charge was more than we paid for the bike so thought stuff that. The last and final quote froma company recommended to us said yes we could take it as it was a toy, straight forward and £600 cheaper.

This goes to prove ask as many questions as poss and as many have said barter.

Niki

[Guest k8bug79]

Hi, what classes as untreated wood? I have a couple of wooden ornaments (carved wood and then varnished) that me and my husband got when we wer eon honeymoon in africa. Then a wooden trinket chest that stores all of our wedding memories. These bits are the only bits we are really definite we want to take, as these are varnished does that mean they have been treated? I am guessing though that wicker baskets and hampers are out!!

[Guest Lucky]

My advice is don't go with Crown Relocations...we spent ages cleaning our bikes and then they wheeled them onto the container through the muddy alley at the side of our house after it had rained. Luckily it wasn't picked up by customs!

Most things just need to be throughly cleaned, and smell of cleaning fluid!

Good luck.