Our Dearest Frieds in the Lord,
First of all we thank God almighty for the peace he has given all. We also hope all is well with you all. Paul and I have received the two cars that were sent to us. We were also blessed by our agent, who brought us into the harbour and for now we are aware of all the process involved in the shipping of cars to Ghana. The agent also did not take money for the service he rendered. He is also a believer and he wants to contribute to our work by helping us anytime we ship cars without getting paid. This service we rendered could have cost us almost $500.
We cannot forget our dear friends, they sent their greetings and those of them who use mobile phones have been calling us these few days that they haven’t seen us. The cars are currently at the Toyota shop here in Accra. We were told by the first mechanic that the accident affected the frame of the car and for that matter there is a special machine used to straighten those parts and since they don’t have that machine they rather recommended we take it to the Toyota workshop since its the manufacturer.
The duty this time around cost us a fortune all because when the first agents found out that we wanted to use a different agent they went to the port and work out the price of the duty which was then recorded into their database and nothing could be done once the vin number gets to the other departments. When it comes to duty and other taxes, the amount that a person can be charged is at the discretion of the custom officer even though they look at the various prices of the particular car.
So instead of paying 10,700($5400) for the 4runner and 5600($2700) for the Camry, We rather paid 14824($7092) for the 4runner and 7790($3800). It also cost us 1800($900) before the released the documents. Two days before we got the cars, a new law was passed and we were told to pay two percent each on each car which also cost us about about $700 in addition to the $650 taxes.
Initially, the plan was to use the 4runner for our trip but looking at the costs we would like to sell both cars to pay all debts. Besides the 4runner is too beautiful for our work and we are not saying that its not worthy of God’s work but we are not traveling on a good road even the Scion is getting weak because of the nature of the road. We also want to trade it in for another car, maybe an SUV.
The car business is a big thing here in Ghana but like David said the main business is the advancement of the Kingdom of God and we are more concern with that than any other business, we don’t want to get involve so much with the shipments and the also the trackings therefore we want to remain there on the roads and visit villages.
On our next trip, both Paul and Richard are coming in order to help us train Richard for future trips whiles Paul is gone to the Bible college. Our next trip will begin hopefully on monday as soon as we receive our funds. May God bless you all.
Paul, Richard and Kwame.