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Buying bins from abroad (1 Viewer)

barnetbirds

Well-known member
Hi All
Just been reading some threads about buying bins from abroad. What with custom duties/postage, do you get real deals from abroad, if you do , why dont we all it, (if you know what you want!!).
TC
 
From the US to the UK yes I think you can.

Problems:

Some companies exclude folks from outside their retail area.

Warranty returns are a pain. You can end up paying VAT and duty on a replacement pair if you don't do the paperwork right. The local supplier usually won't support "grey market" imports. Sometimes they do.

Plenty of overseas sellers won't deal with "foreigners" too much credit card fraud and it's difficult to catch the perps.

But some do so it may be worth the effort as you get either products you can't get locally or prices that are about £=$ (though the $ has strengthened recently).

Paying duty and VAT is done by the shipper and they add a small charge (< £10ish usually) plus the actual cost of the duty and VAT. Duty should be 4% though sometimes it seems to be waived.
 
I usta buy all my optics from a broad....her name was Millie & she worked at Lawrence Photo before it went belly up back in '91.
 
Watch out for defective products. If you have to return it, make sure you have proof it is yours, they will make you pay customs on it twice.
 
Hi All
Just been reading some threads about buying bins from abroad. What with custom duties/postage, do you get real deals from abroad, if you do , why dont we all it, (if you know what you want!!).
TC

It´s a bit tricky nowadays from south of Ireland if buying from the U.S. Customs slap a hefty excise on everything, stuff that used to go through without it. The charges seem to me to be fairly random, and you have to pay the postal delivery person at the door on receipt. If it´s by courier, the courier company send you a bill a few days after delivery. I was charged 60-odd euro on an eyepiece that cost me 90 USD a few months ago. Maybe if ordering from the U.K. things are a bit more sensible.
 
Bought from binoculars.com and very pleased.
Was charged duty, but still got them (2 sets) a lot cheaper.

Saw a post a week or so ago (elsewhere) and the person said:
VAT is charged if the item is above something like £20. Cannot recall the figure.
Duty is charged if it is above £135. (Do remember that one)

Not sure when an item falls under VAT and when it falls under Duty. Not sure if it can fall under both.

The binoculars I bought was 5 years back and the cost was about £160 total.
A spotting scope I bought afterwards came to about £95-100, less then £100, and I was charged nothing.

They came via FedEx, have read that if they come via UPS then over here there are handed over to the Post Office who will charge VAT and will charge you for charging you for the VAT. Basically you cough up for the VAT and a £8-10 handling charge.

Will I be getting other items, yes. The saving can be such that it is worth it. I want a scope from WO who are in Taiwan, even if I paid both VAT and DUTY I would save £300 on something that retailers sell here for £1500. I suspect that I would only have to pay one not both so about £450 saved.
 
Not sure when an item falls under VAT and when it falls under Duty. Not sure if it can fall under both.

You usually pay both. It's not either/or.

Anything imported from outside the EU will be charged VAT (unless it's a gift or below some rather low threshold).

Depending on the product, it's value and place of origin (outside the EU) it may or may not be charged duty to at a given rate for that kind of product. The Customs keep lists of items and their appropriate rates of duty.

For goods already inside the EU you will have paid VAT on the original purchase and as you are within a free trade zone there is no import duty.

The law is clear on this but sometimes the application of it (as Sancho says) is not totally obvious.
 
Have heard that you get charged both, and that is part of the problem. I have several things bought from the US, Canada and Australia and I have always been charged just one of them, and sometimes as said neither.

I always allowed 20% of the cost of the item to get a rough idea of what I could expect to pay this end, and in all instances what I have paid has been slightly less then 20%. And it is quite easy to tell the difference between 17.5% and 35%.

Several items (5) I have had sent from Canada have been over the £2500 mark so well above any threshold, and also as said a big difference between 17.5% and 35%. Same for an item bought in Australia which I paid the duty for at Heathrow coming through customs.

One point is that you have simply bought whatever and imported it, you have not added any value to it by simply transporting it from A to B, it is unchanged. So does VAT apply? None of it is helped by the fact that the rate of Duty and VAT tends to be the same so the payment is often refered to both ways.

Recently checked the HMRC site and oddly they mention VAT a lot but not Duty. When I collected one item from the VAT office that handles stuff coming into Heathrow (Harmondsworth?) they specifically said not VAT but Duty only. I recall as I initially refered to the payment as VAT and it was corrected by them that I was not paying VAT but Duty. I know I only paid Duty for that item and no VAT, yet the original value was as I recall C$4500.

As I said I was stood in the main Heathrow handling Customs and Excise office and paid them at the time by cheque, then they handed over the paperwork for me to get/take the stuff out of the BA Heathrow Warehouse.

Have ended up asking HMRC the situation via email as I would like the scope, waiting for a reply presently.

Possibly it is different for an individual as opposed to a company importing goods.
 
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