Still, to send them all that way and not pay the few extra dollars for proof seems penny foolish. It will pay for itself in resale if no other reason.
That sort of speaks to my point. Americans get charged obscene amounts of money for what's politely called "carriage", I can tell you from personal experience.
About 6 years ago I sent a pre 1898 gun to the Birmingham Proof House for reproof. Being younger and poorer I did my homework and sent it to them directly. There would be no problem from the US side since it's an antique.
They charged less than 25£ (about $50.00 US) to actually proof the gun. And what does it cost you to have a gun reproofed if you go through a dealer/specialist? Around $800-1000 if no work is needed? So at least $700 "carriage"?
The rest of the story is the Proof House refuses to get an export license so they could ship it back to me. At the time there was no charge for it (I inquired) but they didn't want to be bothered. So I had to pay $400 for a dealer with an export license to get it back to me.
So that's the big deal, if just the barrels need to be sent it should be lot cheaper than if the entire gun needs to be sent.
