Punitive customs handling fee

[cwah]

Hello all,

Every time I receive a parcel with custom fee I have to pay a clearance fee... and the fee is sometime much higher than the VAT cost. Today I've received this:

I have £6.73 VAT to pay but have to pay a fee of £12 for handling!!! It's double the cost of my VAT!!

Is there any way to avoid this robbery?

 

[Fordulike]

Rowing boat, North Atlantic, South Atlantic, Indian Ocean

 

[soundwave]

you can ask them to send it as a free gift or test item to get rid of the vat.

 

[EddiePJ]

I've recently bought a pair of RedHead Hunter boots from the US, and then a few weeks later received an invoice for £30.00
In my naivety, I wasn't aware of handling fees, and my cheap but superb work boots, are now suddenly not so cheap.

 

[flecc]

It's the British government to blame. They require courier companies to do their tax collection job, and the couriers rightly resent it.

Since they don't see why they should carry HMRC's costs they've started charging for the collection, accounts handling and transfer of the tax money.
.

 

[cwah]

But can't that be paid beforehand?

 

[cosybike]

You intended to evade Tax. Someone else had to remind you. It cost them time and money. Seems fair enough to me.

Buy it from a uk dealer?

 

[cwah]

You intended to evade Tax. Someone else had to remind you. It cost them time and money. Seems fair enough to me.

Buy it from a uk dealer?

I didn't evade tax as I reported item value and will pay the right amount of VAT. Furthermore, the item I need isn't for sale here....

My problem isn't the tax.. it's the handling fee that is twice the VAT in this case.

 

[anotherkiwi]

The people who sent all of Europe's industrial jobs to China don't want you buying direct from there. You have to buy from one of their importers/agents here so that they make lots of money off you. Just in case you didn't understand that they have other people here who will take your money away if you try to do it.

The stockholder must be paid you foolish thing!

 

[flecc]

But can't that be paid beforehand?

It's not practical though, since you are paying an overseas company who can't accept UK VAT and aren't liable for it anyway.

By law VAT collection is done by the UK seller or service provider, but with personal imports it's HMRC. The only alternative would be for HMRC to seize the goods and demand payment from you before releasing them and at one time that used to happen. If that still did you'd have to arrange collection from the HMRC warehouse once you'd pay the VAT, and that could be even more expensive.

I think it's possible to refuse to accept the delivery and then settle the VAT separately, leaving you to accept the delivery only, but I've never tried that personally. Someone who has might be able to advise.
.

 

[soundwave]

my watch come from china and never had to pay vat or any other charges so must be a way to do it there end.

 

[flecc]

The people who sent all of Europe's industrial jobs to China don't want you buying direct from there. You have to buy from one of their importers/agents here so that they make lots of money off you. Just in case you didn't understand that they have other people here who will take your money away if you try to do it.

The stockholder must be paid you foolish thing!

No, nothing to do with that. As I posted above, it's simply a VAT collection cost issue and the government's avoidance of that cost which has annoyed the couriers, including the Royal Mail.

For quite a while the couriers bore the costs, but finally refused to carry on being unpaid tax collectors by recovering the costs from the customer.
.

 

[flecc]

my watch come from china and never had to pay vat or any other charges so must be a way to do it there end.

You only avoided it either through the sender marking it as a gift or sample (Chinese companies sometimes do that), or because HMRC didn't spot it in transfer.
.

 

[cosybike]

I see, They have a guide here - https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/notice-143-a-guide-for-international-post-users/notice-143-a-guide-for-international-post-users

For the once in blue moon that this would ever affect me, I don't think I can get excited.

 

[soundwave]

it was a rep all black rolex and paid 200 quid for it nothing on the box bar my address.

rrp for a real 1 is 16k lol

 

[flecc]

it was a rep all black rolex and paid 200 quid for it nothing on the box bar my address.

rrp for a real 1 is 16k lol

Perhaps HMRC felt sorry for you, being unable to afford the real thing!
.

 

[soundwave]

doubt it as its how they send them how they get through customs god knows how they do this as 100s come in a week some ppl get 10 at a time with no fees ect

you can get a real gmt master 2nd hand for 3k black 1 forget it.

http://www.discoverprohunter.com/collection/gmt-master/gmt-master2-steel-gold

 

[flecc]

doubt it as its how they send them how they get through customs god knows how they do this as 100s come in a week some ppl get 10 at a time with no fees ect

you can get a real gmt master 2nd hand for 3k black 1 forget it.

http://www.discoverprohunter.com/collection/gmt-master/gmt-master2-steel-gold

Duty and VAT application from China is a bit erratic and often missed for some reason. It used to be like that from the USA , but these days everything from the USA into the UK gets caught.
.

 

[soundwave]

its madness tbh as if you are in Germany or few other eu country's its impossible to import them dir from china as all get seized.

but if they send them here and then get sent/forwarded to Germany ect they all get them there end lol.

 

[flash]

I buy a lot of radio stuff from USA, Russia and occasionally China. I rarely pay VAT or handling on the stuff from China. I have never paid a fee on anything from Russia or Ukraine, but I nearly always pay at least the £12 handling charge for items from the US. I recently put in a large order of components from a supplier in Florida so that I would only have 1 lot of £12 to pay. Low and behold turned up with no charge. Happy days. The worst I have had is for 2 capacitors value $3.50. I had to pay £12 handling fee.