Manufacturer in this case will be left out.

A number of "non-firearm" rifles hit the Canadian border going to a dealer.

Border Services gets them, sees the label stating they shoot "560fps" and says "whoa- hold that stuff- there's firearms in them thar boxes"- which is justifiable up to this point.

Next step, dealer says "no, I won't give you a firearm dealer license number- we don't want these things to be listed as "firearms" coming in, having to register them for a buyer in Quebec, and collecting firearms license information from buyers elsewhere- they are "non-firearms".

Border says "huh?"

Dealer says "there is a 'non-firearm' designation on these rifles in addition to the 'firearm' designation and these units are the 'non-firearm' units".

Border people - "we need to check that out".

Dealer- "OK, but here, I'll make it easy- I will email you a note from the CFC with the 'non-firearm' information and test results on the product indicating it falls below the threshold for 'firearm'."

Border- "No, fax it."

Dealer- "OK"

after receipt of fax;

Border- "what does this mean? We will have to wait for the Senior Compliance Officer to come in next week to look at this."

Dealer- "it's called false, or at least, misleading advertising on the box, the gun can only shoot 475fps using regular pellets, maximum."

Border- "I don't know what you're saying but it sounds pretty dubious to me, we'll wait until next week."

Dealer- "Fine. But, why not call or direct the Senior Compliance Officer to call the CFC to figure this out through your own means- nobody's BS'ing you here."


So, dealer waits till the next week, talks to CFC for details on things, gets a note back from CBSA that apparently the rifles in the boxes don't match the specs on the rifles listed in the FRT- so they must go on the side of caution and label them 'firearms' until proven otherwise.

CFC people understand the legal definition of 'firearm' and agree that if the products fall under the threshold, they are not 'firearms'- but there is also a 'firearm' version of the gun on record so it must be determined how to differentiate them from one another. CFC calls manufacturer for details. Manufacturer does not seem to understand the question(s), dealer calls manufacturer to see what they are doing about this.

Dealer talks with manufacturer and determines the gun was designed to never shoot over 4.1fpe- thereby making ALL versions of the rifle ever built "non-firearms" but the manufacturer labels them at 560fps because that's more marketable for the US. Dealer convinces manufacturer to put this on paper and send to CFC so they can remove the "firearm" designated product from the FRT and have the current batch of rifles release by CBSA and all future shipments to any dealer/seller in Canada fly through customs without any issues. Manufacturer constructs letter and agrees to send to CFC.

CFC contacted about the content of upcoming letter and is told "wonderful, but the 'firearm' designation must remain in the FRT until such time as the rifle is not advertised as being over 500fps".

Dealer- "Huh? None of them are or ever were, 'firearms' by the legal definition!"

CFC- "But the boxes say 560fps and this is bound to cause confusion to border people and the general public."

Dealer starts scratching his head over this bizarre conundrum- in reality, the product has never been a "firearm" but will remain as a dual classification as a possible "firearm" because the manufacturer puts a misleading fps number on the packaging. Score: Reality, 0, Bizarre Perception, 1.

Border people- can't figure out what to do because the firearm designation still exists and there is no way to determine what's in the box except by learning the entire law/history of the product and then still have an incorrect label coming into the country- so "firearms" they remain.

Dealer goes back to manufacturer and discovers they "mailed" the letter to the CFC- so it won't show up for two weeks in CFC office- meaning even if something can be worked out, the rifles will be sitting in a customs warehouse for 3-4 weeks by the time things might be resolved. Dealer asks manufacturer to write another letter indicating he boxes were mis-labeled and they are in fact below 4.2fpe/500fps using standard pellets, but that they had no "Canadian" packaging so they were put in US-spec boxes. Manufacturer says "we've done so much already, and it should eliminate any problems having the rifles sent to Canada in future, so go away".

Dealer snaps, tells manufacturer where to go from this point forward, sends email to border people asking them how to have the products released back to the US side of the border to be returned to the manufacturer and gives up.

Total time invested by dealer- a week with daily telephone calls, emails and faxes.

End result- nothing but a waste of time.

But, this manufacturer has a product line that has not been popular for years (and hasn't had a 'new' product brought to market for at least 5 years) and any previous orders have been pooched up by them anyways.

The main point here is that unless a couple hundred of these things were going to be sold in Canada- it couldn't begin to pay for the time wasted trying to sort things out- which it still has not been, technically speaking.

So, between a border service that is somewhat limited in its ability to do things on its own as it must rely on the CFC for information which is technically incorrect but put in place to avoid "confusion" for the border people and Joe Public, and a manufacturer that proves time and time again they really don't give a damn about running an efficient, go-forward type of company (I have been betting for years they will be out-of-business in about 10 minutes if they ever lose their Wal-Mart USA business) and people wonder why the number/variety of products in Canada seems limited at times? This is but one of many of the potential answers...