Unfortunately we can't delivery your item…

…because there is a fee to pay!

I’ve received one of these Royal Mail notes through the door today. The payment due is half of what I’ve paid already for the actual item (that was shipped from the US). It looks to be £8 RM handling fee plus £3.25 Customs charge. I only paid £22 for the item.

Does this happen a lot? Could the seller have avoided this?

That’s what you get for importing stuff into the UK, vat and duty charges are always on top if the item has come from outside of the EU.

Does this happen a lot? Could the seller have avoided this?

Yep, but they would be breaking the law.

We are expecting a payrise soon so there will be a lot more of this 😉

Not bad. Parcel Force charge you £13 for the privelege of putting your packet on the shelf until you pay the duty to the tax man.

It was a purchase via eBay. The previous two purchases from outside the EU were not charged. So is it just a random factor as and when you’re charged? Is it based on cost of item?

Not bad. Parcel Force charge you £13 for the privelege of putting your packet on the shelf until you pay the duty to the tax man.

not quite – Parcelforce charge you for them paying the tax man on your behalf, and then claiming it back off you… It would take a whole lot longer for HMC&E to send you a letter, get paid release the parcel to delivery service etc…

It used to be that if a parcel is shoebox size or smaller the chances are it would go straight through, no charges, but lately smaller items are being stopped and charged. And don’t forget you get charged on the shipping cost too.

The only way to bypass this is to put an incorrect value, which is (a) illegal and (b) in the event of a claim (if insured) you cant claim more than the listed cost.

Isn’t there something about marking it as a “Gift” too – or does that not work any more?

The trigger value seems to be £15.
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/customs/post/buying.htm#3

This can be really random. I ordered a few bits of stuff from Ground Effect and just had them delivered -no fuss but a mate ordered some things for both of us from the US and got caned for tax. It was a different sorting office though if that makes a difference.
Incidentally i have totally stopped buying GE stuff because the prices have gone through the roof because of our appalling exchange rate, pity, it’s pretty good.

The natural balance of the universe is being maintained – I got some Raybans for the missus’ birthday from Amazon US. They sailed through customs no problem. 🙂

http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPortalWebApp.portal?_nfpb=true&propertyType=document&_pageLabel=pageTravel_ShowContent&id=HMCE_CL_000014#P20_1785

I was a bit peeved at the RM handling charge,no problem with paying the VAT(which is what they have charged you BTW).
I don’t think there is a straightforward way for individuals to pay the VAT in advance or direct without having to fork out the RM charge.

The natural balance of the universe is being maintained – I got some Raybans for the missus’ birthday from Amazon US. They sailed through customs no problem.

Amazon in tax avoidance scam…never 🙂

Cost of the item and the postage has to be below a certain limit. Over that and you get stung.

If it’s multiple items each less than the limit then the only way is to get the seller to split them up into separate packages and pay postage for each (can work out cheaper as USPS international for small packages is only a few $).

Personally I think they are taking the p**s when the handling charge is more than the customs charge and you don’t get the option to not have Royal Fail pay it on your behalf. I think you can get the seller to pay the fee for you when it’s sent but that takes some extra paperwork. I don’t see why there is no system where you get a tracking reference of the seller which you can go online and pay the duty for (being honest and disclosing the same value that the seller has put on the package) and then it sails straight through customs as long as the values match up.

I work on the glass half full method – take the handling charge plus fees into account as the expected cost and think it’s happy days when I get away with it.

Import VAT is payable on items over £15 and Customs duty on items over £135. Companies should not wrongly mark items as gifts as this is Tax avoidance!

Surely it’s tax evasion rather than avoidance? (Making fr0sty125’s point even stronger).

Quite right it is evasion as that would be falsely declaring something which is illegal.

Postierich that is wishfull thinking it was due on the 1st of April 🙁