Swathdiver:

Its called brokerage. Basically UPS and other couriers hire special customs twerps to do their shipments separately. Try looking at the fees sometime. I have, on a recent quad-box set of the Bond movie remasters. It was valued at $19.99 US, and UPS brokerage set me back $21.17 If it had gone USPS as I asked, it'd have cost me less to ship, and only seen $5 in Customs fees (flat $5 Assessment) and 20 cents in taxes (14% Ontario PST/GST) I've seen MUCH worse.

I've had a guy ship stuff from Calif, cannot remember if it was UPS or FedEx. They lumped $65 in shipping & brokerage, but it was headed back to Calif before I knew it had been here because they did NOT leave delivery attempt notes like Canada Post does. I had him re-send via USPS, can't through at $16 bucks, and SAME delivery transit time. I'll add the package was not even WORTH $60.

Remember, once it hits the border into the US, its all US Customs and USPS service. Blame your OWN country for the delays, NOT Canada Post. Same thing the other way... into Canada, the delays we see are Canada Customs and Canada Post. I've had Customs wreck parcels... (failure to repack items properly after assessment) and they take NO responsibility for this, and you can't get a dime back if it gets wrecked. I'm sure this happens the other way too, though usually Canada post will cough up if US Customs wrecks it.

Yes, even thought an item says its Tracked, unless it goes Purolater (Expedited/ExpressPost do not qualify) it has no cross-border tracking, because USPS does not enter our numbers (and we do not enter USPS tracking #'s either, so the flaw is two-ways)

You want it fast, or you want it cheap. Take your pick, you don't get both.