Made in Canada conundrum

I'm AmeriKKKan born,living in Canada (as a Permanent Resident) married to a European from a former communist (gasp)! country, socialist/democratic / liberal-minded mixed race pinko, and ummmmm.... what was my point here guys? help me out here, i got lost there....
Oh yeah!! I'm never going back!!!!,( even though the prospect of buying an "MTV Crib" for <$100k is appealing) unless of course, Republican Tent-Cities start sprouting up. Canada's 'socialist' postal service, SUCKS bigtime, we can't UPS because of the BRUTAL "handling and brokerage' fees applied to anything coming across the border, our postage $$$, and Nazi-like customs service, not to mention Cable, internet, and cell phone providers are so overpriced compared to the rest of the developed world.... I don't see how shipping here could be seen as a problem, I'm jealous when I see how little it costs you guys to ship up here! Fr'instance: I get records shipped up from third man, they're paying about $5 bucks to ship from Nashville... that's a double LP, and a t-shirt. For me to ship one LP in a mailer... to Nashville? Ready for this??
$14 to $15!!! It'd ri-god-damned-diculous!!! What are we, Uzbekistan?
I don't get it. Yes, I enjoy the overpriced but freely available Cuban cigars, the stellar health care, and public education system, the multitudes of myriad cultures and diversity, yadda yadda yadda, but the prices for basic modern-day services, our constricted content (HBO Canada, anyone)?, our Government's ridiculous insistence of pushing "Canadian Culture" on the rest of the world, only to turn around and loudly proclaim how ignorant those Americans are... thinking we live in igloos, love curling, have mounted police on every corner, and moose roaming the streets freely... (sheesh, wonder where they got THOSE crazy ideas... COrner Gas, anyone?, Due South,anyone)? Sigh.... what I'm trying to say here is.... We're ALL Americans, ok? North Americans.

I don't know how your situation got to where its at but I had no problems sending a piece of gear back for a mod. The folks who did this for me told me what to write and declare, word for word, and presto! Just a standard one day wait at the border.
You would think that if the folks you dealt with sell here, stateside, they would have known that and set it up for you.

I am a citizen of both countries and have shipped several items for warranty service, repairs, upgrades and mods across both borders without a single problem at US or Canada Customs.
It is very easy to make a mistake filling up the simple custom forms for either country, never print the word 'phono'. It can be easily taken as
Take your time and write properly so any fool can understand your hand writing, fill in all all all all the boxes.
Typical declare is eg 'Defective pre-amplifier for repairs and will be returned to sender'
Country of origin, where the thing was finally assembled.
Make use of USPS and Canada Post.
Declared value 100.00
You are asking for more problems and cost if UPS, FedExp and DHL. These boys ha long list of hidden charges especially UPS.
You are liable to receive endless bills.

USPS/Canada Post, write properly and fill out the form properly. No experience needed.

We travel to Canada every year to ride horses in the Rockies for a week. Last year, as every year, we shipped our jeans, hats, boots, western gear, etc, ahead of time by FedEx so we didn’t have to pack it in our luggage. We marked the box to indicate that we were shipping our own personal clothes for horseback riding. Customs in Canada held our clothes up for days and it took an act of Congress to get our own VERY USED clothes released to us. All of the Customs agents I dealt with were either incompetent or rude. We spend about $10,000 a week there ever year for two or three weeks at a time. This year may be the last time simply because of the treatment from Customs.

Btw, the people have always been great. We’ve always been welcomed and treated like friends by everyone in Canada except the government employees. They act like they are doing you a favor to allow you to come up and spend thousands of American dollars in their country..

You can be assured that when you're a Canadian visiting the US, the border people working for the US treat you exactly the same -- doing you a favor letting you into the US.

This is just the way the border people are. Customs, border enforcement etc. is a pain both ways.