As his Brownic Majesty the Chancellor of the Exchequer is hell bent on screwing us Brits out of as much dosh as he possibly can (see any of the comments about MOT Tax Etc, or look in your own pocket). Can someone clarify the likely import costs we are going to pay when getting items from outside the Eurosphere, that are unavailable or vastly expensive in dear old blighty. My understanding is that we will be charged 17.5% VAT on anything costing more than about Q(uids)7.00. and we also pay VAT on the shipping. On top of this will be about Q5.00 admin charge. When the total amount is about Q100.00+ we will also start to incur additional import duties up to a maximum of an extra 6%. If anyone could be accurate, maybe putting it in as a sticky could be helpful. Particularly since many overseas "bargains" can end up costing similar or more once they've arrived.
Not that I'm bitter, but I have just hopefully sorted out FedEx charging me nearly an extra 50% on something from Singapore (check for companies charging VAT on fictitious and ludicrous extra shipping fees etc.)

from what i can work out you pay approx

17.5% on anything over the total value of £35 plus 4.5% import duty plus admin charge for them paying all this for you,

I usually work on adding 25% of the total cost to the item, as this is what you will pay if they catch you for duty.

As a side note you are more likley to pay duty if you use a courier (Fedex,UPS etc) than if you ship via normal airmail.

The couriers are a little more savy than Parcel Force or royal mail.

some time it pays to ship them in smaller packages, you pay a little more postage, but save on the import fees.

cheers

keith

Hi all , the rule is very simple , If the import costs more than £18-00 then vat is paid on the import and on the postage at 17.5 % , if customs open it then a levy is charged by the Post office for the delivery of opened parcel and you pay at the door or at the sorting office , The post office levy has no ryme or reason for rule of the value . I was charged £4-65 on a combined kit and book total value £32 . I objected and was awarded a VAT refund as the kit was under £18-00. No vat is paid on books or magazines.
So be very careful , if you combine as I did to save on postage you will be clobbered > I have taken this all the way to Gordon Brown , and the offical reply is It is a european protection to save jobs in the Europe . .Not a hope in hell of getting it raised to a reasonable level of say £100 . I hope this clears it up .I have been clobbered twice and I am reluctant to import again . So they have won in a way cheers ian

Is it worth buying from overseas then, I know that the pound is strong against the dollar but does this save any time and money if there is extra tax to be paid.

What then is the best country to buy overseas from?

Jamie

Hi Everyone,

Here we go again with another tax rant, don't blame me I didn't vote for them. What I have found, and I can only quote my own experience, when I've bought from luckymodels in HK and I've bought one kit, PE for said kit and figures it's come to less than £40 from Lucky compared to £ 60+ from the LHS or a distributor in the UK (We all know who) I get them to ship and it comes Royal Mail and I havn't been charged VAT or import, so as far as I'm concerned if I buy one at a time it's more cost effective, even with the extra postage,

Sherman 111 from Lucky @ 31.99 USD = 16.56 GBP
with postage @ 44.41 USD = 22.99 GBP
UK Price @ 27.99 GBP W/o Post
(and I have sen this in my LHS for £ 30+)

So if my maths is right Ican get two kits for the price of one (or just over) and still fall under the 35 quid.

BTW the shereman is out of stock AGAIN.

HTH

Craig

Edit, forgot to put in that I didn't get any VAT charged on that as Lucky put the invoice inside the box and only put a customs declaration on the outside 'plastic kit valued at ****HKD (Hong Kong Dollar)

If you buy from Countries in the EU you should only pay the price including postage and no extra tax. Outside the EU you will incur VAT and Duties Etc. However, sometimes your package from outside may "escape" this, or the people you buy from may "incorrectly" label an item (which is not legal!). Only experience shows which company is more economical than others, there are no outside EU countries which are better than others.

04090
Hi
yes it is worth getting your kits from Hong kong or
Japan if you pay tax you still win well i have
good shopping
cyril

I've bought from HobbyEasy and Luckymodel recently who are both HK based. On at least one site you can ask them to declare a 'low cost item' and when both of the items arrived, one was indeed declared low cost, and the other as a 'gift'.

I only spent around £20 at each site, but paid no duty on either item. I would certainly use them again. Even with duty (if I was charged it) and postage, this is cheaper buying from the UK, which is a real shame for our model shops and economy, but as I have a family etc, I will spend my money where it goes the furthest.

I bought the AFV Club 1/35 scimitar and scorpian from LuckyModel.com.

I paid £26 delivered for both models. I paid no tax and i have seen each kit for sale @ £25 ea in the UK.

Regards

Mark

Hi all,

Further to my earlier post and to the two above. The other thing about Lucky (I havn't dealt with Hobby easy) is that they reply to e-mails both personal ones and others raised in this general forum, apart from being cheaper this is much better after-sales than we have to put up with in the UK, I'd better qualify that, from a large UK mail order distributor anyway.

Craig