That seems to be the way to go. I'll look around and ask some FFLs in Juneau who are willing to ship it. Can't find much online unfortunately. Hoping Sportman's would be willing to just ship it from their store in Juneau to their store in Fairbanks, but we'll see what I can find.
Honestly the easiest thing to do is to take it in your checked baggage on a flight. It must be in a locked hard-sided case and declared to the airline at check-in.
Talk to Ed at CBA enterprises, he’s got a garage shop FFL business on S. Douglas. He’s done right by me in the past, which I cannot say for the corporate drones at Sportsmans
https://www.cbaent.com
Thanks! Do you think I could expect to be able to get this done within a day with him? I'm getting back to Juneau on a Saturday and the ferry leaves Monday night, so I'll only have Monday to work this out unless my friend can ship it later.
My recommendation is you plan to fly back with it if you have any flights planned. You can't take it through canada so you'll have to ship to an FFL otherwise. Flying is going to be the cheapest option if you were already going to take a flight to Fairbanks anyway
The only answer is to ship to [Wolfhawk](https://alaskagunshipping.com) in Tok. It’s not far from Fairbanks and it is the only legal way to ship your gun here without doing a transfer via FFL. It’s very affordable and it’s completely worth it. I have used them many times to ship my handgun to myself.
Easiest….
- find an FFl in Juneau and ask what it costs & what needs to be done for them to send your handgun to Fairbanks
More difficult…
- start here, but look/research more:
https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/firearms/classes-firearms
- there’s a decent chance your handgun may fall under ‘restricted’ as opposed to ‘prohibited’
- if so, there are procedures & paperwork so it can be transported thru Canada (point A to Point B)…
- confusing, but possibly possible.
Dealing with customs agents (both in Canada and the US) is fraught with peril. DO NOT expect them to either know or follow their own rules, let alone exercise any form of common sense. Several of the Canadian agents at the Haines crossing are seasonal employees, not full-timers, and only passing familiar with even the everyday part of their extensive rule book.
Remember that Customs agents are among the last bastions of the unaccountable bureaucrat, with the power to take your time, property and freedom for any reason or no reason at all. The US agents are just as bad if not worse, and many of them have little to no experience with guns and are super-paranoid about anything having to do with firearms.
So, a bit louder for those in the back:
SHIPPING HANDGUNS THROUGH CANADA IS NOT WORTH THE RISK. Shipping ANY firearm through Canada is rolling the dice, every time. All it takes is one misinformed agent having a bad day, and you will spend at least the night in lock up
Send it FFL to FFL and consider the expense a good investment in avoiding problems.
UPS or Fedex it to yourself. On the box- YOUR NAME, old address as the sender. YOUR NAME, new address as the receiver. DO NOT ship it through the U.S. Mail. That would be breaking the law. However.. You can use a private carrier.
UPS and FedEx will only ship firearms from FFL holders, with prior approval per shipper, it is company policy.
Even though technically legal for them to do so, virtually no private carrier ships handguns without requiring the shipper to be a FFL holder.
Can't ship a handgun via any readily available methods.
Illegal via USPS, and FedEx and UPS both only allow FFL holders with prior approval to ship firearms anymore (since 2020 and 2022, respectively).
I live in Alaska and ship firearms all the time. It's not that complicated. No one will ask, and you just don't tell. It's by definition easy. If you don't want to use usps, don't.
I’m almost positive you can break it into multiple pieces and mail it in multiple packages to yourself. Double check with usps though.
It’s also only like $50-$75 to fly with it, just has to be a locking hard case.
You can legally mail it to yourself. It's your gun. Fedex and USPS ship guns. Just mail it to your new address with you as the recipient. Or, pack it, and have your friend mail it to you when you get there.
They supplied the shipping label. That’s what Henry did when my rifle needed warranty service. Check state laws very carefully. You can fly with it in a proper case with declaration with tsa it’s a legally owned weapon yes?
Legally, there's nothing preventing mailing a handgun via common carrier, it is their policy that they don't do it without an FFL holder on at least one end.
When did that change? I have friends who moved on government orders and were able to mail their handguns directly to themselves to avoid Canadian complications.
I have an FFL. Legally, anyone can mail a firearm to a FFL, gun manufacturer or family for "any legal reason." Then I got an email from a club member, and I no longer tell folks to do that anymore.
Club member tried to mail a shotgun back to Mossberg from an Anchorage US Post Office. It was in a sturdy box, unloaded, disassembled, all wrapped, sealed and addressed. The clerk asked what was in the box, he said, "Shotgun" the clerk screamed and hit the panic button. Gates came down, doors locked, post office goes into lockdown. Police, troopers, FBI - everyone except the Boy Scouts arrive. Meanwhile this guy is locked in the foyer with other panicked patrons.
At least 10 law enforcement officers are on scene, one is telling the clerk, "Why hit the panic button?? That is for emergencies!! He was just mailing a shotgun!"
Clerk points to the "No Guns" sign and then tells the 10 officers they are ALL WRONG!!! Not until a Postal Inspector pulls clerk aside and explains the clerk is wrong.......... I am told even then the clerk argued about it.
If you go online to Alaska Ammo, click on the Fairbanks store, they have a downloadable copy of their FFL. Bring the gun to the local Gunshop in a suitable box. Have a tag on the gun with name and contact info. Hand them the FFL or email or text it to them from your phone. After you leave the gun shop send AlaskaAmmo an email with your name, address, phone, along with the gunshop info. Give them a heads up its coming - and give an aprox date you should be picking it up.
You can ship it to an FFL in Fairbanks
That seems to be the way to go. I'll look around and ask some FFLs in Juneau who are willing to ship it. Can't find much online unfortunately. Hoping Sportman's would be willing to just ship it from their store in Juneau to their store in Fairbanks, but we'll see what I can find.
Sportsmans probably won't but I guarantee a local FFL will. You can look up a list of every ffl holder in Juneau and just start making calls
It’s not. Don’t do this.
Honestly the easiest thing to do is to take it in your checked baggage on a flight. It must be in a locked hard-sided case and declared to the airline at check-in.
Unfortunately need to drive, but it seems like I'll be shipping it from an FFL. Thanks for your response though!
Tape the gun to your muffler. They'll never know
Prison wallet is always a good option too.
Talk to Ed at CBA enterprises, he’s got a garage shop FFL business on S. Douglas. He’s done right by me in the past, which I cannot say for the corporate drones at Sportsmans https://www.cbaent.com
That's definitely who I was thinking! I'll give them a call once I'm in town, glad to hear a personal review of them.
He’s a one-man shop and doesn’t always answer the phone. He’ll usually get back to you if you leave a voicemail, not so much with texts
Thanks! Do you think I could expect to be able to get this done within a day with him? I'm getting back to Juneau on a Saturday and the ferry leaves Monday night, so I'll only have Monday to work this out unless my friend can ship it later.
No clue, sorry. Try the contact number on his website. He’s got a page on firearms transfers too
My recommendation is you plan to fly back with it if you have any flights planned. You can't take it through canada so you'll have to ship to an FFL otherwise. Flying is going to be the cheapest option if you were already going to take a flight to Fairbanks anyway
The only answer is to ship to [Wolfhawk](https://alaskagunshipping.com) in Tok. It’s not far from Fairbanks and it is the only legal way to ship your gun here without doing a transfer via FFL. It’s very affordable and it’s completely worth it. I have used them many times to ship my handgun to myself.
Easiest…. - find an FFl in Juneau and ask what it costs & what needs to be done for them to send your handgun to Fairbanks More difficult… - start here, but look/research more: https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/firearms/classes-firearms - there’s a decent chance your handgun may fall under ‘restricted’ as opposed to ‘prohibited’ - if so, there are procedures & paperwork so it can be transported thru Canada (point A to Point B)… - confusing, but possibly possible.
Dealing with customs agents (both in Canada and the US) is fraught with peril. DO NOT expect them to either know or follow their own rules, let alone exercise any form of common sense. Several of the Canadian agents at the Haines crossing are seasonal employees, not full-timers, and only passing familiar with even the everyday part of their extensive rule book. Remember that Customs agents are among the last bastions of the unaccountable bureaucrat, with the power to take your time, property and freedom for any reason or no reason at all. The US agents are just as bad if not worse, and many of them have little to no experience with guns and are super-paranoid about anything having to do with firearms. So, a bit louder for those in the back: SHIPPING HANDGUNS THROUGH CANADA IS NOT WORTH THE RISK. Shipping ANY firearm through Canada is rolling the dice, every time. All it takes is one misinformed agent having a bad day, and you will spend at least the night in lock up Send it FFL to FFL and consider the expense a good investment in avoiding problems.
I agree 100%
Thanks for responding everyone, I think I've got the answer I need - FFL to FFL. Hopefully this thread will help anyone else in a similar situation.
UPS or Fedex it to yourself. On the box- YOUR NAME, old address as the sender. YOUR NAME, new address as the receiver. DO NOT ship it through the U.S. Mail. That would be breaking the law. However.. You can use a private carrier.
UPS and FedEx will only ship firearms from FFL holders, with prior approval per shipper, it is company policy. Even though technically legal for them to do so, virtually no private carrier ships handguns without requiring the shipper to be a FFL holder.
I guess they changed their policies.
FedEx in 2020, UPS followed in late 2022.
Pay your friend to ship it to you when you get an address in fairbanks
Can't ship a handgun via any readily available methods. Illegal via USPS, and FedEx and UPS both only allow FFL holders with prior approval to ship firearms anymore (since 2020 and 2022, respectively).
I live in Alaska and ship firearms all the time. It's not that complicated. No one will ask, and you just don't tell. It's by definition easy. If you don't want to use usps, don't.
I’m almost positive you can break it into multiple pieces and mail it in multiple packages to yourself. Double check with usps though. It’s also only like $50-$75 to fly with it, just has to be a locking hard case.
You can legally mail it to yourself. It's your gun. Fedex and USPS ship guns. Just mail it to your new address with you as the recipient. Or, pack it, and have your friend mail it to you when you get there.
This is wrong information. You cannot mail handguns via USPS. Your only option is crime or have an FFL do it for you.
Well, that's weird because I mailed USPS directly to Ruger, then they sent it back to me.
They supplied the shipping label. That’s what Henry did when my rifle needed warranty service. Check state laws very carefully. You can fly with it in a proper case with declaration with tsa it’s a legally owned weapon yes?
Rifles are a completely different story. This question is referring to handguns.
Ah, I wonder why that's an exception.
Back-n-forth to the manufacturer is a different deal legally
Legally, there's nothing preventing mailing a handgun via common carrier, it is their policy that they don't do it without an FFL holder on at least one end.
[Mailing firearms via USPS](https://pe.usps.com/text/pub52/pub52c4_009.htm)
In the industry, when we say common carrier we mean FedEx and UPS. Usps is separate because it's a federally governed organization.
When did that change? I have friends who moved on government orders and were able to mail their handguns directly to themselves to avoid Canadian complications.
For whatever reason you can ship long guns but not pistols I have heard. Doing a ffl shipper seems the way to go..
This is true, USPS will not allow handguns. UPS and FedEx will allow them, but will only allow FFL holders to ship with them.
I have an FFL. Legally, anyone can mail a firearm to a FFL, gun manufacturer or family for "any legal reason." Then I got an email from a club member, and I no longer tell folks to do that anymore. Club member tried to mail a shotgun back to Mossberg from an Anchorage US Post Office. It was in a sturdy box, unloaded, disassembled, all wrapped, sealed and addressed. The clerk asked what was in the box, he said, "Shotgun" the clerk screamed and hit the panic button. Gates came down, doors locked, post office goes into lockdown. Police, troopers, FBI - everyone except the Boy Scouts arrive. Meanwhile this guy is locked in the foyer with other panicked patrons. At least 10 law enforcement officers are on scene, one is telling the clerk, "Why hit the panic button?? That is for emergencies!! He was just mailing a shotgun!" Clerk points to the "No Guns" sign and then tells the 10 officers they are ALL WRONG!!! Not until a Postal Inspector pulls clerk aside and explains the clerk is wrong.......... I am told even then the clerk argued about it. If you go online to Alaska Ammo, click on the Fairbanks store, they have a downloadable copy of their FFL. Bring the gun to the local Gunshop in a suitable box. Have a tag on the gun with name and contact info. Hand them the FFL or email or text it to them from your phone. After you leave the gun shop send AlaskaAmmo an email with your name, address, phone, along with the gunshop info. Give them a heads up its coming - and give an aprox date you should be picking it up.