Well fellow members there is news and its all good!! I got more forms and paperwork from my outfitter in SA today, then forwarded them to FWS at SeaTac and within an hour got a reply saying that's all we need and we will clear the shipment shortly. And sure enough the very helpful
overly friendly, good, kind and wonderful folks
at the local FWS was good to their word, the shipment was cleared and good to go to Customs for final clearance (3 minutes, tops!) and then on to Delta (20 minutes) for retrieval. So off my boy and I went for another 4 hour round trip, this time with a stop off at Dicks Drive In for mass quantities of burgers, fries and shakes of course to while away the drive home!
Now I tell you vat. I had all manner of snarky, rude, semi nasty things I was going to send to various depts. of the Govt, about all of this but frankly I am in too good a mood and too relieved and don't feel like being as petty as they were about all of this. In reality this would never have happened were it not for my forgetting about the procedure and telling my boy to keep his pie hole closed. My fault entirely. So to heck with it, done and over. I was so shocked, shocked, this morning when they emailed and said, all good, come and get it, I nearly choked on my coffee!
I had my wife read it twice as I was at first totally disbelieving, thinking it was some sort of trick to get me down there again to give me the rubber hose treatment. Obviously that is a bit paranoid but after nearly 10 days of having this hanging around my neck I admit to getting not just a little concerned.
So let this be a lesson to youse guys. The days of being able to fudge on shipping crates and paperwork are OVER! And I think SSI will confirm that and once again I would like to thank them for their advice and cautions in this matter, I really appreciate their guidance. I can tell you this. FWS will NEVER see my smiling face in their offices again unless by subpoena. I wont do it this way again. Either set it up with a broker like SSI or your taxi at home, but self clearing unless you stay on your nimble toes is getting too dicey for me at least and I can no longer recommend it as an option. Thanks for all the kind words and support from my fellow members! I really appreciate it!
I will sleep better tonight.
