I run a small online business and I need to import some goods from the US due to costs and unreliability of current supplier.

Can anyone give me any advice on best way to do this and the costs/duties involved. The goods I'm buying are light weight and probably won't weigh more then 1kg in total.

Thanks
M

Can be expensive, depends on the value of the goods. The supplier the other end might be prepared to describe it as a gift or trade sample on the customs declaration? Probably illegal but some firms are happy to do that.

You need to work out your costs (supplier cost+shipping+duty+VAT) and also how much stock you need to hold between deliveries. Shipping by air is the quickest (about a week) but is also expensive, by sea takes about 6wks so you might want to carry 2 months of stock to cover any delays.

Have a look here

http://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/dds/cgi-bin/tarquer?Lang=EN

There is a better site but it's down just now, google Tarrif codes and go to the business link site and search on product description.

Also you may be charged on volumetric factor rather than weight

Is it drugs?