Joseph McLuckie can’t count the number of sleepless nights he has had ever since the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) determined about three months ago that his small business owes more than $180,000 in tariffs on a more-than-a-year-old shipment. McLuckie is the managing director and owner of JPSM Golf, a small business based out of Pickering, Ont., that sells electric golf trolleys. These trolleys carry golfers’ bags throughout the course as they play. JPSM Golf has been operational for the last 20 years, starting off in the basement of McLuckie’s home in Leaside before it moved to its 9,000-square-foot storefront. Instead of celebrating his company’s 20th anniversary, McLuckie is agonizing whether he will be able to pay all six of his long-term employees should he have to pay the $182,883.95 the CBSA says he owes. “You wake up in the middle of the night, you have a random thought, and it keeps you awake for a couple of hours, because I know if I had to pay this tomorrow, I’m out of cash,” McLuckie said in an interview with CTV News Toronto. The shipment in question was delivered to JPSM Golf from China in April 2025. It was a 40-foot container filled with 330 Formula remote trolleys, a brand McLuckie’s company designed and developed on their own. McLuckie paid Canada’s standard 6.1 per cent import tariff on the trolleys and paid a little more than $19,000 at the time. Thirteen months later, McLuckie said he received a letter from the CBSA saying they had reviewed his shipment and stated the trolleys have been reclassified under a different tariff, subjecting them to the China Surtax Order. This federal tariff first went into effect in October 2024, hitting a wide range of Chinese-made EVS from passenger cars to delivery vans with a 100 per cent levy that was added on top of the existing Most-Favoured Nation import tariff of 6.1 per cent. Ottawa officially repealed the surtax on March 1, 2026. Trade lawyer hired McLuckie said he called the CBSA to see why he was being charged this tax, perplexed on how this could even be applied to his trolleys. He was instructed to file a submission to the CBSA, which he did with the guidance from a trade and customs lawyer. “The position we took was, ‘Well, first of all, the surtax was intended to assist Canada’s auto industry.’ That means automobiles that are motor vehicles, not things that technically are classified as motor vehicles like golf trolleys,” Greg Kanargelidis, the lawyer JPSM Golf hired, said in an interview. “The challenge is that the tariff classification number quoted on the import documents was the one that’s in the surtax list.” In their submission, JPSM Golf argued its products are properly classified under the tariff code 9506.03, representing other golf equipment or as accessories to golf clubs, and that the CBSA should permit redetermination of its products. The CBSA rejected JPSM Golf’s argument. McLuckie raised his eyebrows at the agency’s response. McLuckie pointed specifically to a section of the letter where the CBSA quoted Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, saying “your product does meet the terms of a vehicle.” In the letter sent from CBSA, reviewed by CTV News Toronto, the agency did refer to Merriam-Webster and Cambridge dictionary definitions to determine the separate meanings of “motor” and “vehicle” as each are not defined in the tariff. The CBSA officer concluded the trolleys employ an electric motor for propulsion and are used to transport golf bags, “undoubtedly” qualifying them as a motor vehicle. If a traditional wheelbarrow can be considered as a vehicle, the CBSA officer noted, so can a golf trolley. Based on previous decisions by the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, the independent quasi-judicial body responsible for appeals of CBSA tariff classification decisions, relying on dictionary definitions is “appropriate” when the terms are unclear in the existing coding system, a CBSA spokesperson told CTV News Toronto. The CBSA otherwise could not comment on JPSM Golf’s case specifically, citing confidential customs information. With regards to surtaxes, the enforcement agency said the CBSA makes their decisions based on the “legal wording of individual surtax orders.” “While the Agency does not have the authority to deviate from the wording of a surtax order in its administration, under section 115 of the Customs Tariff, the Minister of Finance has the authority to recommend remission to the Governor in Council,” the CBSA’s statement reads. These remission orders provide full or partial relief from federal tax. Kanargelidis says the remission could amend the China Surtax Order to exclude items like golf trolleys or, if there’s a remission order already in place, it could be amended to add as another item where the surtaxes are remitted to include these products. He says they requested a remission from the Department of Finance, which could assist JPSM Golf’s case in scrapping exorbitant surtax. “Two ways to be successful here is to change the surtax order or to demonstrate that the tariff classification was incorrect to begin with,” Kanargelidis said. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) and Juanita Nathan, MP for Pickering—Brooklin, confirmed to CTV News they have advocated for JPSM Golf to the federal finance ministry. “It’s basically, what we believe, a misclassification of a product, which is what’s happened here. Like it’s basically saying it’s a Chinese EV when, come on, really,” Corinne Pohlmann, executive vice-president of advocacy for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) said in an interview. More than 100 remission requests A Department of Finance Canada official confirmed to CTV News that it has received more than 180 requests for remissions over goods pertaining to the China Surtax Order since October 2024. The official added that the department is currently reviewing another tranche of more than 30 requests “with a view to advancing a sixth remission order this fall.” The department did not directly comment on JPSM Golf’s remission but noted processing times can vary depending on the complexity of their request. “Each request under the China surtax remission framework is thoroughly assessed on its own merits by the Department of Finance, in consultation with domestic producers, to determine whether the goods are in short supply in the Canadian market, cannot reasonably be sourced from non-Chinese suppliers, and whether other exceptional circumstances exist that adversely affect the Canadian economy,” the official wrote. The whole ordeal, in McLuckie’s view, has turned his company into the “unintended consequence and collateral damage” of an act meant to aid and protect the Canadian automobile sector. “If the purpose is to put a 20-year-old small Canadian business out of business, then they’re doing a great job,” McLuckie said.
