U.S. grandmother mistakenly hit with $802 tariff bill on $30 Barbie shipped from Canada

What was supposed to be a CA$30 Christmas gift shipped from Canada turned into a US$802 surprise for Boston’s Bonnie O’Connell after a customs paperwork error triggered the U.S. tariffs on Canadian goods.

The grandmother received the tariff bill from FedEx several weeks after a Barbie doll mailed from Nova Scotia was delivered to her home.

“I just got a pain in the pit of my stomach,” O’Connell told local ABC affiliate WCVB in an exclusive interview. “I didn’t even know what to do or say.”

The doll — dressed in a Professional Women’s Hockey League jersey with a Tim Hortons logo — was meant as a holiday gift for a four-year-old granddaughter who recently started skating and has an affinity for Barbie figurines.

O’Connell spotted the reasonably priced item while perusing Walmart’s Canadian website and asked a cousin in N.S. to pick it up and ship it to her in the U.S.

That’s where the problem began.

Because U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration have imposed a 35 per cent tariff on goods from Canada, all cross-border shipments now require additional customs paperwork. The U.S. later eliminated the de minimis exemption, a rule that allowed shipments under $800 to enter duty-free, though it still grants a duty-free gift exemption if the goods being shipped are worth less than US$100, are clearly marked as a gift and are shipped from one personal, non-commercial address to another.

O’Connell told WCVB that a clerk at FedEx advised her cousin they would handle the paperwork.

When the shipping form was prepared, she said her relative was unaware that a decimal point on the item’s declared value — CA$29.97 — had been shifted two places to the right, increasing it to almost CA$3,000.

“How many Barbies do you know that cost close to $3,000,” O’Connell wondered to WCVB.

After converting the inflated value to U.S. currency — about $2,100 — and applying the 35 per cent rate, customs officials assessed a tariff of about $742. With additional FedEx fees, O’Connell’s bill was $802.

If she owed that amount, O’Connell wondered why the carrier delivered the package to begin with.

Frustrated when FedEx told her it could take months to resolve, and after receiving a final demand for payment recently, she contacted WCVB. The news station contacted FedEx, which has since removed the charge from her account.

On its website, FedEx notes that “inaccurate declared values are one of the most common reasons for duty and tax disputes.”

When shipping internationally, the shipper, the recipient or a third party can be selected as responsible for any duties and taxes owed after the goods are assessed by customs. If one isn’t specified on the shipping label, the bill defaults to the recipient, in this case, O’Connell.

National Post has contacted FedEx for comment and more information on how duties and taxes are processed for items shipped from Canada to the U.S.

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