Long story but considering buying some forks from the US, I know I’ll probably get stung for tax but its still worth it and if I don’t its a bonus.

If I had an issue with said forks would I be able to send them to the UK distributor or would I have to post them back and forth to the States? If so I’d assume I’d be liable for the cost of postage making my fork purchase less advantageous…

Depends on the manufacturer and what policy they have in the regional market (UK/EU in this case).

You have no statutory rights for anything bought outside the EU (and after Brexit, probably anything bought outside the UK). It’s purely down to the manufacturer then.

For example, though not bike related, my Nikon SLR only has an EU wide warranty, but Nikon have a worldwide warranty on lenses so any lens I buy anywhere in the world is covered if I send it to any local Nikon repair.

Also, you may not even get warranty sending it back to the US. It depends on their policy again. Problem is you exported it and assuming you’re not a US citizen you may not get any warranty. But yes, if you did, you’d have to pay the postage. Same though can be true in the UK.

The UK distributor would likely insist on the forks being sent back via a dealer. If you have a good relationship with an LBS they may be willing to deal with this for you.
(this is assuming that the fork has a worldwide warranty, if not they would need to go back to the US)

I havent had experience with bike stuff but used to work in an outdoors shop and there we/the UK distributors would generally not accept return of items bought outside of the EU.

In fact now I think about it (I now work in a Bike shop) we have tried to arrange return for a bike purchased in the US and it wasnt even considered, they wouldnt look at it and advised it needed to go back to the market it came from.