US Customs blocks export of all vehicles with a NY title nationwide

UPDATE MAY 8, 2020: The previous disruption with exporting NY titled vehicles has been solved. US Customs offices nationwide are again accepting NY titled vehicles for export. No other workarounds required, only an additional 5-day processing time for documentation clearance.

Effective today Friday, February 7th 2020 the US Customs and Border Protection agency is unable to connect to the NY State DMV and clear NY titled vehicles for export. The reason is political and is tied to inability of the DMV (NY State) and US Customs office (Federal Government) to share information between the two systems. The NY State is trying to protect the identity of illegal immigrants with NY State driver licenses and no longer shares access to its database with any Federal agencies.

We are very disappointed by such damaging decision and are still evaluating the impact. This will impact vehicles leaving all ports, not just Port of NY/NJ.

We strongly advise clients to not purchase any NY titled vehicles until this situation is resolved.

So far we know there will be $1000s of fees/fines from the ocean carriers and trucking companies for each container delivered to the Port with NY titled vehicles. Those containers will need to be returned back to our warehouses and unloaded.

West Coast Shipping is your partner during these difficult times and we will not accept ocean carriers to charge you any fines/fees for containers which must be returned from the port.

At this point we have two options to help mitigate this problem:

1. We can help owners with NY titled vehicles, older than 25 years, to be re-titled in another state through a legal process. Our current estimate for this process is 5 business days at which point we will be able to submit the new title to US Customs and export your vehicle from the same port as originally planned. There is a significant cost to this process and we estimate our expenses at $1000/vehicle. Unfortunately this option doesn't apply to vehicles manufactured after 1/1/1995 or salvage vehicles. PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING OPTION IS NO LONGER AVAILABLE

2. There is an option to re-title vehicles manufactured after 1/1/1995 but the process is more complicated and involves transporting your car across the entire US. The cost is $1750/vehicle. PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING OPTION IS NO LONGER AVAILABLE

3. Resell the vehicle at a US based auction where you purchased it originally through the same dealer. We expect the car values to take a hit due to a flooding of these NY titled vehicles at auctions.

If you have NY titled vehicle in our or your possession which you planned to export internationally, please get in touch with your dedicated Account Manager to select the option which works for you.