Does anyone know of any moving companies in Kunming with experience moving families from Kunming to other countries? I have found that the regular commercial shipping companies don't understand how to deal non commercial shipments into or out of China.

Which country will you be moving to? I have been contacting some companies about shipping household items to the US. I am not sure about what the regular commercial shipping companies are charging these days. If you go the route of the international moving companies, you might want to be prepared for some sticker shock (I have found full container -called FCL- prices to be around 11K US). Partial space in a container is also available at lower prices, but of course, half a container would be significantly more than $5500 which is half of the FCL cost).

Moving Companies that I have heard from:

Links Relocation: www.linksrelo.com

Asian Tigers: www.asiantigersgroup.com

Crown Relocation: www.crownrelo.com

Stamford Relocation: www.stamfordrelo.com

Euro Transport International Division:
www. internicmovingservices.com

*These companies all state that they are door-to-door moving services, so their fees should include packing at point of origin and unpacking at destination.

If you find any good deals on shipping to the US, please post a reply!

P.S. Also let me know if you are thinking of shipping to US East Coast. Perhaps it would be possible to ship together at a reduced cost? We will be moving early-mid June but are very willing to send the items we want to ship earlier.

I'm surprised by this new post. There was a similar one last month.

I have been contacted by 'Links' in Shanghai, who quoted 30,000 RMB for 3 sq. meters of boxes shipped door-to-door. Obviously, I'm not shipping furniture. They seemed to be very professional and, I believe, would be prepared to negotiate.

I have also contacted 'Air Sea Transportinc. (sic)' of Kunming www.airsea.com.cn (0871) 3210191 who quoted less than half of 'Links', but were not door-to-door. They collect from my apartment and ship to the Customs depot in Toronto, i.e., your nearest Customs depot, and one collects from there -- which I prefer. They have offices on the west and east coasts of the USA.

Naturally, I'm a little concerned by their low price (as yet to be finalized). I'll be shipping next week and I'll report back as soon as I collect it at the other end.

We've asked for quotes for many of the above listed companies.

Most of these are outside of Kunming and claim they can do one of two things

1. Send an empty container and a crew do Kunming to do all of our loading for us
2. We do our own loading and send the goods via truck or train to Shanghai or Beijing where they transfer to an ocean container for shipping to the USA.

We're not crazy about option 1 since it is very expensive. And, Option 2 seems to be flawed in that the goods get transferred twice during the move thus increasing the liklihood for damage. Plus, we won't know EXACTLY what we can fit into a 20ft container since the truck in Kunming won't be exactly the same size.

Option 2 above seems to be running $5K - 6K to Texas (not sure if that's to our house in Texas yet or not). And, i'm thinking I don't need a full service moving company to do that.

I'm headed down to Kunming customs office tomorrow to apply for my "Personal Export License" which is required when a family wants to move their belongings outside of the country. Once I have that, I hope a regular shipping company can do the rest. But, I'm not sure.

e-squared-

Thanks for the update. Very interesting info. I had not heard about the option to personally send items to Shanghai or Beijing. What company (s) gave you that option? Was it a regular shipping company or specifically a moving company? Was the 5-6K for a full container load to Texas? Also, do you mind if I ask what type of visa you have? Do you know if you have to have a certain kind of visa to get an export license? I'd love to hear more about what you have found out about this process, and about what you find out from the KM customs office. Feel free to give me a call if you would like: 13108763610 Thanks for posting the update!

Brian

It's difficult to comment on prices, but $5k sounds like a full container to me.

Air Sea Transport Inc. is of Kunming. They delivered everything needed two weeks ago as I prefered to do my own packing. They have yet to supply the Personal Export Licence and assure me that they can obtain that for me, i.e., without my attendance at customs.

Tiger-

Thanks for the tip about Air Sea. I called them and a rep came to my place today to measure the things I want to ship. Let us know how it goes with getting the export license (when did they start trying to get it, and how long do they estimate that it will take?) and anything else you think might be useful as you go through the process with them. What kinds of packing materials did they deliver for you to pack things in? Are you shipping any furniture or just boxes of household items? I wouldn't mind packing most things myself, but I wonder if they would somehow wrap the furniture in foam or bubble wrap or cardboard for protection?

Tiger-

Another question for you when you get a chance to respond: I got a quote from Air Sea that I was pretty pleased with. The quote did not list any US ground transportation costs though. And it listed the port of entry as Los Angeles (it did list the port of discharge as Raleigh). Ground transport from L.A. to Raleigh would obviously be several thousand dollars. I asked the representative clearly (twice) about where the goods would be delivered to: L.A. or Raleigh. He assured me they would be delivered to Raleigh. Did your estimate from them list anything for Canadian ground transportation fees from an arrival port to Toronto? And again, were they able to obtain the necessary export license for you? Thanks in advance for your response!

Brian

Hi Brian; after writing a long reply, but before I could send, my computer crashed!

Perhaps you'd like to phone me to share experiences?

137 5914 8333

Let's try again!

Export license not required for used personal goods. I'm assured that you simply need the Bill of Lading which they will e-mail to you once it has been authorised in Guangdong.

Air-Sea Transport Inc. can pack for you or will supply anything needed to help you pack yourself. My shipment is now on the train to Guangdong and they did a good job of the packing.

Ground transportation costs are a concern because (I think) that they don't have close contacts with offices throughout the world and, thus, prefer that you take responsibility for that. I don't know how big your shipment is but 'thousands' of dollars for the land transport sounds high to me.

Bonded warehousing and transport. In my case, although Vancouver is the Port of Entry, bonded transport is used to my city of Toronto where their bonded warehouse permits checking by Customs -- most cities throughout the world have bonded warehouses. It'll take ages for your shipment to be checked in L.A., which is why I believe that it'll go to Raleigh (or nearest) Customs.

My payment is for shipment to Toronto -- this is my prefered method as I don't have a delivery address right now.

Hope this helps.