The 1st car shipping method, and by far the most common, is the open-transport-truck method. Normally these are trucks independently operated. The truck driver is normally the business owner and works for himself. Many of these truck drivers have their own routes very much like a paper route. They drive to the same locations every week or so. Some have a route the expands across the entire United States while others only cover Canada and the northern US. Every situation is different. I want to use and example to help demonstrate a typical car shipment from Vancouver, BC Canada to Miami, FL USA. While there are some transport truck drivers who will drive all the way across the country, many times a car will be transferred from one truck to another. Think about this like the greyhound bus or an airline. It is more efficient for them to operate using transfers. A car being shipped from Vancouver Canada will probably be transported to a major meeting area for transport truckers, like Denver. While in Denver, the car will be transferred to another truck driver who runs routes between Miami and Denver. The problem is that most independent transport truckers don’t have the capacity to arrange all the logistics between all the other people who run routes across the US. This means that “you” will have to handle the logistics of getting your car picked up in Vancouver and oversee the transfer all the way through to Miami. This can be a cumbersome experience. In this situation, you can use two options. Go onto Central Dispatch or find a company that can ship a car to Canada like AA Auto Transport. \

The 2nd car shipping method is using a closed tranport truck service. This car shipping method is used much less often because it’s more expensive. In addition, while an open transport truck can carry 10 cars and split the cost of fuel, a closed transport truck can only carry up to three cars. The main reason someone would use a closed truck would be to protect the car from nature’s elements. If we follow the example we used above, shipping a car from Vancouver Canada to Miami could be super expensive. The person shipping the car may in fact have to pay a FULL round trip price for the open transport trucker because normally a closed transport trucker doesn’t have long distant routes like open transport truckers do. Normally we recommend this car shipping method if a person is shipping an exotic vehicle like a Bentley or Ferrari.

For those of you who want to permanently export your car to or from Canada, you will have to report this to US Customs or Canadian Customs and the DMV for the appropriate state. If you have any questions regarding anything on this blog post or want to comment, please do so below.

Domestic Motorcycle Shipping
There are many domestic motorcycle shipping companies where anyone can get rates, especially on the internet. There is a BIG difference if you do it yourself with uship or get motorcycle shipping rates from 1AA Motorcycles and have them take care of everything for you. With uShip, you’ll be doing all the work and coordinating. With 1AA Motorcycle, they’ll pick up your bike from your front door and deliver it to any door in the US or Canada. In fact, you may be able to save $100-$200 using uShip, but make no mistake, you will be working, making phone calls, and sending emails. If you don’t mind and have the time, use them. If you are a normal hard working American with kids and wife, just save your time and have 1AA Motorcycle take care of your shipment.

International Motorcycle Shipping
Shipping a motorcycle overseas is very different than domestic shipping because US Customs and Border Protection is involved. In addition, a motorcycle must be put into a container which will be lifted onto a container ship. Sometimes it can be rolled onto a ship too, but that depends on the destination port and the type of ship. The picture above shows the inside of a RoRo ship (Roll On Roll Off). If you are interest in getting rates for motorcycle shipping overseas, click the big green button below.

As a professional international motorcycle shipping company, we have streamlined the shipping process so that a customer can have peace-of-mind. You can also meet us at the shipping port if you are close to it or you don’t mind riding you bike. That may cut some shipping costs, but the added travel expenses may prove to be more than if we picked it up. No matter what company you choose to ship your motorcycle, make sure they are a BBB member in good standings. Earlier we mentioned uShip. uShip is not setup for international shipping. It’s typically a door-to-door service.

If you have any questions or comments regarding this post, let us know below. We are glad to help (even if you’re a competitor like uShip).

There are two main things you should look for when selecting an ocean freight forwarder. One factor to look for is if the company is currently registered with the FMC (Federal Maritime Commission). You can visit the FMC website to verify that the ocean freight forwarder is legally registered with the US Government.  Never work with a company that does not a carry a valid license because it is not legal for that company to take possession of your goods. In addition, it is a high probability of being a scam. If the company does carry a valid license, then risk is almost eliminated and all you have to do is look at the second factor.

The second factor is BBB member registration. If the company is both a member of the BBB and carries an FMC license, you can feel comfortable shipping $1,000,000 worth of consumer goods. The reason BBB membership verification is important is to show that the company is actively involved in shipping and to check for any complains by their customers.  Any company of decent size will have complaints so don’t let that determine whether or not you will work with a particular company. What is important is to check if the company has numerous complaints regarding the same manner all within in short amount of time, especially if it is recent.

Once these two factors are verified, it all comes to price and service. If a company needs to ship a container to Europe, it must decide whether to take the product to the shipping yards (Port-to-Port) or to have a truck driver arrive with an empty container to pick up the product (Door-to-Port). Door-to-Port is more expensive upfront, but the company may incur additional expenses if they are far from the shipping docks. Door-to-Port takes care of all the logistics of getting the product to the shipping docks for you.

One final thing to make sure of before shipping a container to Europe is to have the receiver contact their country’s Customs Department for import duties and/or licenses.

Normally when someone is shipping freight, it is done by an ocean freight forwarding company. You can go directly to the shipping line and pay full retail or you can use a freight forwarder who has contracts with many shipping lines. Think about shipping freight forwarder as a broker. They can work with many different shipping lines to find the best price for your shipping needs. They are not limited to using only one shipping line. In addition, they get wholesale pricing since they bring a lot more business to a particular shipping line. If a person is looking to use an international freight shipping broker, they will pay less than if they approached the shipping line directly. Additional benefits aside from cost savings is US Customs Clearance. The broker would take care of any paperwork for you including US Customs Clearance. If a person goes directly to the shipping line, then they have to do everything themselves. A company exporting controlled goods may have to obtain a license from a government agency before taking a container to the shipping docks. By using the expertise of a shipping broker (also known as a freight forwarder), delays in shipping would be minimized.

Another thing to look for when engaging in international freight shipping from the USA is to check the BBB for complaints against a certain company. In order to reduce any type of fraud, check the FMC (Federal Maritime Commission) for the company’s NVOCC License. Make sure it is valid. If the company you are looking to use checks out on both the BBB and FTC, keep them as a candidate. If you are not 100% sure of a company, ask them for a copy of their license from the FTC.

Most international freight shipping companies will bring an empty container to a warehouse where the shipping department fills it. The truck driver will wait for a couple hours and once the container is full, it is sealed and the truck driver takes off to the assigned shipping port. One way of cutting costs is to bring all the product to the warehouse at the departure port, but this mean all logistics will need to be coordinated by the sender.

Normally there are two shipping methods used when shipping a car. The differences between these two methods are big. Aside from air transport and hiring a private driver, the two main auto shipping methods are 1) Open Transport Truck and 2) Closed Transport Truck.

Using an open transport truck will greatly reduce auto shipping quotes for many reasons. They open transport truck can pack on about 9 vehicles at any time. This helps to split the fuel costs when shipping a car across just a few states. In addition, most of the open transport truck operators specifically work on shipping cars and nothing else. They have their own routes that can cover many states and even go into Canada. Auto manufacturers and dealerships use this type of shipping method because it the cost per car is much lower compared to the next car shipping method.

The closed auto transport truck (sometimes called enclosed transport truck) is not as commonly used as open transport trucks. Typically this is much more expensive, but for the people who use it, the cost outweighs the benefits. Once a car is put onto the ramp and goes inside the transport truck, the car is free of nature’s elements. The types of vehicles that are normally shipped in this are luxury, exotic, classic, and race cars.

In addition to using knowing the associated costs of open and closed transport trucking services, another cost can be cut up front if a person knows what type of auto shipping company they are dealing with. Auto shipping quotes can be easily found on the internet, but many of these companies are lead generation companies that don’t have a real auto shipping operation. They can easily be spotted in the search results stating they will get you 8 quotes from different companies who are fighting over your business. A real car shipping company will give one quote and one low rate. Also it is normally better to work with a n auto shipping company with large operations because they can cuts costs for you by using coordinating the routes and transferring a vehicle from one truck to the other. It is very similar to an airline where there is a transfer. Also like airline, the last minute buyer normally have to pay the highest price, so another way to cut car shipping cost is to take care of it about 1 month in advance.

The two shipping methods can be used for different purposes. If a person is only shipping a car, then most likely a RoRo ship will be cheaper. The car must simply be able to Roll On Roll Off (RoRo) the ship. The container shipping method is great if items in addition to the car are being sent, like household goods and/or boxes. With this method, boxes can go inside the trunk while in RoRo there can be nothing in the car.We have many departure ports in America. Below are the arrive ports.

One thing we do for our customers in the Middle East is to pick up their car and take it to the departure port. We have many people who purchase cars over the internet on sites like eBay Motors. All the customer needs to do is fill out all the paper work so we can take care of customs clearance.

We give a helping hand for our customers to find information on duty import fees to the country they are shipping to. Normally the best way to find this information is to contact the Customs Office for the country. If you are in the Untied States, calling the country’s Embassy in Washington DC would easily get you that information.

Normally when shipping containers overseas, there is no license required to export product. There are some circumstances where a license is required. The best place to find information regarding importing and exporting products to the United States is through the US Customs and Border Protection website. The CBP is the governing body in the US who enforces the importation and exportation of product in the US.  The CBP acts in an administrative capacity for other agencies.  The CBP is one of the Departments of Homeland Security. It has the largest and most complex components, with a priority mission of keeping terrorists and their weapons out of the U.S. It also has a responsibility for securing and facilitating trade and travel while enforcing hundreds of U.S. regulations, including immigration and drug laws. Enough about that.

Most people who are shipping containers to other countries are doing it for business purposes. If you need a container shipping quote, fill out the Get a Free Quote button on the top right hand corner of this website. Let us know what you are shipping, the dimensions and weight.

If you are thinking of shipping a container from the US, we handle all the necessary paperwork for you as part of our service.

Most of our shipment originate from the United States and go to other countries, that is, we export containers.  In the future we will begin importing containers from other countries to the United States. Perhaps one day (when our system is set up), we will ship from countries that don’t even involve the ships coming to the United States.

We hope that this area of international shipping is very successful. The barriers to entry seem so high that competition is fierce. Wish us luck because we are a tiny company stepping into the monster world of big players.  Even on a bad economy we are expanding so hopefully this is a good sign.

As always we will start small and grow. Since we have a lot of experience shipping cars on RoRo ships and in containers, we really doubt we will have any problems. As always, if you are curious as to how much it costs to ship a container overseas, fill out the “Get a free quote” button at the top of the website.