If you’ve been working in Canadian customs or trade compliance for more than a few months, you already know how quickly things can shift. A tariff is suddenly subject to SIMA duties. CARM functionality changes. A government directive lands on a Friday afternoon with implementation expected Monday morning.
That’s exactly the environment CSCB was built for.
The Canadian Society of Customs Brokers has spent decades making sure that Canada’s customs brokers and trade professionals don’t have to navigate that environment alone. We represent more than 200 licensed customs brokerage firms across the country and recognize Designates as a professional community. We advocate daily on their behalf with CBSA, Global Affairs Canada, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), and parliamentary committees.
This spring, we’re taking stock of everything we’ve been doing and making sure you can see it clearly. Over the next four months, we’ll be sharing more about our advocacy work, our education programs, and the ways we’re supporting the profession. Not because we need you to be impressed. Because you deserve to know what your association is doing for you.
- We ensure CBSA understands the real-time operational impacts of their system outages on your business. We hear your frustrations with delayed transmissions, lost transactions, and the on-again, off-again need to shift to paper processes. And we communicate these concerns to CBSA early and often. Where we can, offer recommendations for resolution. We are active contributors to the work of the CBSA Systems Outages Working Group, and we ensure your views on the Systems Outage Contingency Plan reach those who need to hear them.
- CARM implementation continues to be a challenge for many of our members. We work daily to receive and remedy your CARM-related operational concerns. As CARM implementation continues to evolve, operational challenges remain. We actively gather feedback from the trade community and advocate for system enhancements and process adjustments to address these issues. At the same time, we help connect the “big picture” of CARM implementation for government stakeholders, such as the Office of the Auditor General, enabling non-expert decision-makers to better understand the real-world impacts of CARM.
- In January 2026, the Customs Act was amended to strengthen “importer of record” (IOR) liability. Long before that change came into effect, the CSCB was at the table with CBSA and other industry stakeholders to identify the potential impact of customs brokers and their clients. We’ve provided decision-making tools to help you minimize the liability risks on your business that comes with the IOR legislative amendment, and we continue to keep an eye open for potential unanticipated consequences.
- The CBSA has been promising to review the customs broker regulatory and licensing regime for several years. But we don’t want to wait for them to tell us how that regime might change. The CSCB has developed a proposal for a renewed customs broker regulatory framework that balances business fairness and compliance obligations with adequate protections for the work that customs brokers are licensed under the law to perform. We will continue to be active in promoting the professionalism of licensed customs brokers and protecting the good work we do from being diluted through participation by non-licensed entities.
- For more than a year, the CSCB has been working closely with the CBSA and the Department of Finance to navigate the constantly shifting landscape of Canadian Surtax Orders and Surtax Remission Orders. Members have shared what remains unclear and what isn’t functioning as it should, and we’ve been there throughout; helping you interpret the changes and manage the daily challenges they create.
A few highlights from the past year:
- Over the past year, CSCB has been a trusted partner in helping government better understand surtax implementation and its real-world impacts on trade compliance and operations.
- CSCB has served as a go-to resource for raising, escalating, and helping resolve CARM-related operational issues impacting members.
- CSCB provides a practical and informed platform for advocating enhancements to CARM based on direct operational experience from the trade community.
- When systems are not fully functioning, CSCB works closely with government partners to help reduce processing delays and mitigate downstream outage impacts on trade.
- CSCB is a practical contributor to the Auditor General’s review of CARM, providing operational insight grounded in day-to-day system use.
- CSCB continues to be a constructive voice on proposed valuation regulation changes, advocating for approaches that are workable, compliant, and informed by operational realities.
- CSCB acts as a trusted interlocutor between the trade community and government, sharing operational challenges and advocating for meaningful, evidence-based change.
- Over the past year, CSCB delivered many webinars supporting professional development and practical learning for customs and trade compliance professionals.
None of that happens without a strong, engaged membership. And none of it is possible without an organization that stays close to the work.
We’re glad you’re part of this. And if you know someone who should be, send them our way.
Learn more about our work here.