Freight / Import duties.

Not model engineering, but could have bearings if needing to import any gear.

Got an Ice hockey shirt for me niece from Canada ,shirt cost 160 odd quid fine, cos its a real shirt not a replica. Delivered today by UPS and had an extra 82.12 to pay for freight and import duty for a shirt !!! Jesus what would it be like if it was a machine or such like . There's been a few tools that ive wanted from USA, but this has made me think twice. This has nothing to do with Hockey Canada , all these charges are UPS and HMRC.

I often buy from the USA. Above the now low limit VAT has to be paid and if it comes here via Royal Mail an excessive collection fee. Royal Mail deliver for all overseas domestic shippers - as far as I am aware and don't get paid for it. UPS etc handle both ends.

There is one major difference. If insured UPS cover it from door to door. The others generally don't - just cover it while it's on their territory. I've never let that worry me as the cost differences can be pretty dramatic. All things I have received this way have been well packed.

To be honest I have no idea how they work out the tax. It seems to vary. Lower % wise as the price increases. The most noticeable case of that I have had was a microscope from the USA. Tax seemed to be well under what I thought it would be. Sometimes shipping costs get included as well but that hasn't happened to me - yet.

I had something delivered via UPS recently and thought great no tax - then had a letter asking for it forcibly. My brother had a different experience with them. Wondered where the item was so phoned them to ask and it was sitting there awaiting him to pay the tax. It was a rather expensive electric guitar.

John

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It's something to be aware of, is all. I'm guessing on top of the £13 odd squid UPS charge for handling customs charges etc there was the initial postage fee plus for some items an additional import tariff (usually 2.5%) then vat on the whole lot. so £242+ squid ex vat around £201 - £13 = £189 - 2.5% = around £184 suggesting about £24 for post and packing??

If buying stuff below £135 cost then you'ld avoid the customs duty although vat will still apply.. and if sent ordinary mail you might or might not get lucky and avoid interception and vat depending on sellers declarations.

The chinese are particularly good at making packets look valueless and lying about their contents.Indeed if they charged vat and a handling fee for every incoming parcel they'ld probably balance up our trade deficits and destroy the chinese economy.

Many USA ebay sellers are very understanding about out tax system. Actually I don't mind VAT too much really but the collection fee that I suspect mostly helps RM pay for delivery stinks especially if done electronically on the web.

Canada is a bit different to the USA. There is no ultra cheap USPS and their shipping costs are high anyway so I doubt if people like UPS charge less. I've seen several things in Canada that appear to be what I want and the sellers always mention their high shipping costs - they always have been. Bit like the UK really.

The aspect that really annoys me is the recent drop in the vat free limit. Protectionism and it doesn't really help as smaller concerns are gobbled up by big ones slowly but surely and those don't have any reason to drop prices and still charge the same or often more when the smaller people have gone. If the initial £18 had been increased according to inflation it would be way way higher now.

John

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Edited By Ajohnw on 29/12/2016 15:19:23

That surely has been one of the beneifts of being in the single.......I'll stop there

For anywhere other that the EU ( at present) there is import duty to pay on imports ,the amount varies . I rang up HMRC and they sent me a very helpful document .

For example the import duty on second hand motorcycle parts is 1/2 % not an ureasonable amount surely.

Lets look at a worked example

some M/C part £150 , carriage £50 total = £200 import duty on total £1.00

Plus VAT on £201 so whats that ,

£40.20 total at present .

Then some one ( the courier ) has to get in touch with you and collect the money plus all the additional work of submitting the parcel , recollecting it from customs, collecting the money off you paying it to HMRC and making sure all the paperwork is up to date , so how much do you charge for that,  is  £25.00 unreasonable?

Total now £65.20

All for £1.00 import duty

Edited By stevetee on 29/12/2016 15:53:17

All for £1.00 import duty plus £40.20 VAT...

The best advice is to buy a lot of stuff then the small admin fee becomes less of an issue as when taken as a percentage of the total cost it is far less

I don't think the royal mails £8 fee has a limit so it may seem a lot on a £25 item but not such an issue on a £500 or £1000 one.

Edited By JasonB on 29/12/2016 16:36:17

You should import antiques Ketan - no duty at all providing they are over 100 years old. Maybe Sieg could stuff some away for your descendants.

John

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A U.K. seller is required to abide by HMRC regulations, pay duty and VAT at point of import, and similarly charge you - the U.K. buyer VAT at point of sale.

The overseas sellers - especially those selling through Amazon and Ebay commit all kinds of fraud, to please you - the U.K. buyer - especially by undervaluing goods, as well as using state owned companies (specifically with reference to China) to ship goods at subsided as well as black market rates.

This is acceptable to many, at the cost of U.K. companies loosing jobs, and HMRC loosing revenue.

To make things a little more fare, it would be easy for the politicians and HMRC 'to make' overseas sellers 'collect' the duty and VAT on behalf of HMRC... at point of purchase on such platforms. This way, there would be no question of at least the 'undervalue' fraud which currently takes place.

So far, such suggestions made to HMRC have fallen on deaf ears. I can only presume the reason being that key politicians are on the advisory consultant payroll of Amazon, Ebay, and such like.

Ketan at ARC.

I don't think that having the vat collected overseas would be feasible Ketan. They would want paying for collecting it.

The point of sale aspect is interesting. Often now when I buy something off Amazon it isn't shipped from the UK so I wonder where the VAT goes. I recently bought a compressor - turned out that the best buy came from a German retailer - shipping costs to me £9. I assume this area touches on why the UK gets a rebate. It might also explain the wish for brexit in some quarters although major pundits have mentioned the court of human rights.

I recently bought several things ex china warehoused in the EU in Germany, as is often the case. The prices were significantly lower than any UK supplier offering the same thing. No difference what so ever in quality only profit margins. Higher here because the sellers aren't busy enough. Also more of a what can we get for it rather than working on margins. Simplistic view but there is some truth in it. The retailers on these items here are relatively small. You might say not busy enough to justify their existence and no much larger organisation has gobbled them up. However in many areas where some big company does gobble up markets things don't get cheaper and certain items can then become harder to find as the smaller retailers have gone.

It's all called life and there isn't a cast iron solution to the problem.

John

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AJohnw,

Amazon, Ebay, etc., have the ability to collect revenue on behalf of HMRC.

To suggest that a legitimate U.K. company/business's margin requirements makes it less competitive, or to suggest that that they are a reason for 'rip-off Britian' would be wrong. There are a whole bunch of rules and regulations which most have to abide by.... which most of the foreign sellers on Amazon and Ebay dont.

Regarding Germany, sorry I have to disagree with you. Holding stock in Germany - in bond, or in Southampton - in bond, is connected with dirty money in most cases. Lets see how many of these even comply to CE, let alone any other regs, relating to minimum wage, welfare and so on. Such sellers are only interested in laundering their money. HMRC know this. A clear line has been drawn for them leading to such operations. Some have been shut down. New ones have opened in their place. 'Giant Shark' or a similar name being a case in kind.... got shut down, MTM bought it... couldnt run it as they figured out that the RC mob.. potential buyers were only interested in buying from dirty businesses without paying any duty and VAT. Result being closure of legitimate model shops, and even their own Giant Shark business shutting down... becasue they tried to run it legitimately... unlike the previous owner.

Long and short, if HMRC really wanted to do anything about it, they could have... a long time ago. Instead, to them this sems to be a victimless crime!. As I said before, I can only presume the reason for their failure to do anything is that key politicians are on the advisory consultant payroll of Amazon, Ebay, and such like.... Legalised bribe.

Ketan at ARC.

My wife bought a laptop from Amazon UK with free shipping, including to Ireland. When she put in our Irish address, the price went up to reflect the difference in VAT rates between UK and Ireland, or so said Amazon.

Dave
The Emerald Isle

I don't think the china warehouses in the eu are that simple Ketan. Some do it as would be expected. However it wouldn't surprise me if in some cases there was a turnover aspect - not enough to require vat. That is unlikely to be the case with outfits like HobbyKing for instance. Globally they used to ask what number people would like put on the customs documents.

Some of the items I mentioned came off a seller that offers a lot more ex china. Just a few things are in the EU. There are others like that too. Anyway our ex PM did mention that something must be done about these EU warehouses.

One thing for sure what ever they do wont really solve the problems that are current in the UK especially and some of the rest of West but usually to a lesser degree. Treasure Island Britain is likely be here for a long long time if not for ever. Economic theory does seem to be changing a little though so who knows.

I have bought things of GiantCod aka later GiantShark. i don't think that they had anything to do with model shop problems. Two things did. It was a cheap hobby that could be started by kids. Then came expensive ready to fly etc. Those really are in the big boys toys area really down to cost in many cases. The other problem is flying them. A lot more complicated than it used to be. For instance at the age of about 10, probably even earlier I used to build model, get on my push bike, go about 6 or 7 miles and fly them at Sutton Park. Doing that slowly but surely that became a lot more complicated but many years later. A crowd of us used to go all around the same age. So complicated that the flying field is now covered in bushes. It's still possible to go fly things in places but it wouldn't surprise me if some of the well known ones even from 5 years ago aren't used any more.

Last time I flew a model aeroplane not all that long ago really it was a built up balsa model. I took my repair kit with me. Super glue, few bits of balsa and some tissue.

GiantCod appeared to work under the vat limit and buy at low prices when items were available like that. Once gone something else would crop up. A business like that doesn't scale well. My son runs his own vat free business in other areas. At least he is aware of that. I suspect the Shark people thought otherwise. Sometime companies get changed to get rid of them too. There used to be a shop in Bakewell that really did undercut. Bought out and told not to do it any more. Same happened to the original Comet only a little differently.

John

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Edited By Ajohnw on 29/12/2016 18:35:59

Two days ago I ordered a face mill off eBay. The front page location said Guernsey but click on the seller and it says "based in China, an eBay member since December 2015". Is there a Guernsey in China ? Price includes free postage and I assume VAT.

The seller has 34980 feedback ratings. I make that an average of more than 91 transactions every day, including high days and holidays so surely must be registered for VAT.

Delivery is promised in two weeks so I guess its not coming from China but exactly where I have no idea. I bet it's not Guernsey!

On the same day I ordered some stuff from ArcEurotrade. I know that comes from Leicester and it arrived today!!

Satch'll

Ebay are a bit annoyed that some eu sellers aren't really but when the contact details show china some things do arrive in the time it would take to ship from the eu.

I had one were they were pre selling before the items even got here.

John

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Given that the vast majority of transactions other than direct person to person ones above "corner shop" levels are made electronically these days it seems the simplest answer would be to replace the current complex tax system with a simple transaction tax. Basically a straightforward levey on every transaction. Works well enough for credit cards so why not tax.

In principle it would need only an account or record for each business or person, presumably business registration number and National Insurance number would do, with a levy on all outgoing transactions. Flat on everything would be simplest but it might be wiser to have a higher rate for payments going out of the country. Especially for companies using out of UK offices to hide from UK tax. Maybe also higher rates for buying finished goods rather than components and materials for UK manufacturers. But no complex web of differential rates for different things. Negative taxation to support those on lower incomes of course, probably quarterly payments, as effectively everyone pays income tax. Benifits, child support et al go throught the same payment system of course. I imagine you'd have to have a higher rate for high earners kicking in above a certain threshold or such a scheme would never be politically acceptable.

Dunno what the current value for monetary velocity of circulation is but I imagine a rate around 5% would work. Hard to evade and, if the basic rate is fairly low probably not worth the effort. Biggest difficulty will be nailing down internal transaction on mighty big industry firms with lots of operating divisions. Properly set up such a system becomes pretty transparent so evasion and fraud money trails can be followed.

Complex systems like the one we have now are an basically an all you can eat buffett for the type of folk who follow you into a revolving door and come out three laps in front.

Clive.

Just out of interest the EU stock holder for the chinese seller is Amazon. UK by the look of it. The seller has a number of listings on ebay most of which state in China. A few don't and state some where in the EU. Germany I think in this case. I have had several things that turn out to be delivered by Amazon. Also some from sellers that list as this latest one does and they do come from where stated.

So there are some chinese sellers that list correctly and have contact detail that are in China.

Only problem is that I spent so much time looking at tig consumables I have double ordered. I started off looking for kits with gas lenses but wasn't happy with what they contained - bits I suspect I wont need. Lots of them. I seem to have ordered some with gas lenses. Then I found a kit without gas lenses that contained what I suspect I will actually need plus little else and ordered that having forgotten the other.

While sorting this I was also looking around for gas fittings and then some method of adding a water separator to a compressor that comes without one. Suspect that didn't help. The connection on the back of the welder is bugging me. Suppose I will have to settle for something dangling on the end of a bit of pipe to make change overs from tig to cutting quick and easy. I don't like bits dangling about on a bit of pipe. Ok when connected up but irritating when the welder isn't in use. I have to pack things away when they aren't being used.

John

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Collect tax at source? That's a good idea. Perhaps then the same system should apply for reimbursing the NHS for operations carried out on medical migrants. About 4 billion at the moment.

Postage charges exorbitant? Few years ago cooling fan in Lappy went spheroids up. Found one in the US of at $2.50 new. Contacted a mate over there to see if he could buy it and send to me to avoid all the currency change hassle. Postage from west coast USA to Michigan - - - - $28 and no, I didn't.

Regards Ian.

I had a similar 'problem' just before xmas. Ordered from China, told it was coming from China, warned there would be a delay in an email apparently from China, and then it arrived next day in a standard Royal Mail parcel postmarked Basingstoke.

Dave

The abuse of the Channel Islands [in respect of VAT] was probably the main reason that the 'threshold value' was reduced [and carriage charges included] by HMRC.

**LINK**

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/VAT-free_imports_from_the_Channel_Islands

MichaelG.