Bought £4 soft release button from eBay, charged £12 tax?

dubcat

dubcat

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I bought a £4 screw in soft release button for my x100s from eBay. Post office say customs want £4 duty and are then adding a £8 handling fee on top. Does anyone know where I stand on this and what I can do? Does not sound right :(
 
The £8 handling fee is correct - I was similarly done last week! The £4 duty seems high though.
 
Tell them the intrinsic value is below £15 and you have proof you paid £4 so they can bog off. Unless shipping costs took it over the £15 as customs rather unfairly include shipping costs in their value calculation.

Wouldn't surprise me if it isn't a deliberate ploy by RM to rake in profits from those that don't know this.
 
srichards said:
Tell them the intrinsic value is below £15 and you have proof you paid £4 so they can bog off. Unless shipping costs took it over the £15 as customs rather unfairly include shipping costs in their value calculation.

Wouldn't surprise me if it isn't a deliberate ploy by RM to rake in profits from those that don't know this.
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Royal Mail only charge the handling fee for collecting on behalf of the Government
so it's not their fault this time ;)
 
What was the value of the item actually written/printed on the package, including the postage? By the sounds of it your order should be well under the threshold, so something doesn't add up.
 
One of the hidden risks of buying stuff on ebay shipped from overseas. Customs has cracked down on this sort of importing as they are raising money - thanks to GFC and the serious deficit there will be a lot more of this stuff going on. Buy from UK suppliers it often works out cheaper and less hassle.
 
Al1944 said:
Royal Mail only charge the handling fee for collecting on behalf of the Government
so it's not their fault this time ;)
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It kind of is. :)
They set their fee at £8, the fact that their fee is often higher than the vat charged reflects onto royal mail rather than uk customs.
 
Personally I'd have another look around for a release from somewhere in the UK and write off the £4 you spent on the first one. If you can find one for less than £8 you'd still get it cheaper than paying RM costs. Get them to return it to the sender and explain it to them over ebay and you might be lucky enough for them to refund you. Just another example of how we get legally ripped off every day.
 
As Stuart says, if you have not been to collect it, just write the £4 off to a lesson learned.

I had the same with an imported DVD a couple of months ago, the £8 is a set fee and nothing you can do about that.
 
Have you ordered a few things from abroad recently? There is usually a limit of £15, but if you have been purchasing a lot of items they can get stroppy and believe you are trying to circumvent paying tax.

Otherwise as stated, write off the £4 and try again.
 
just dont go and collect it and write it off.
you should leave good feedback tho for the seller they did there bit.
 
Quick update - it was a different item that I ordered and forgot about. Almost £12 paid on a £20 item. Lesson learned.
 
It's really not worth buying small things like soft releases from abroad anyway, the same item only cost £8.95 including postage here, thats what I paid for mine.

And £12 on a £20 item? thats crazy, I wouldn't pay it myself.
It seems things have changed as it used to only be items with a cost inc shipping & insurance of $100 or more that attracted their attention.

Also remember European purchases should come with no charges as your paying VAT at source on new items and with the free market there should be no import duties.
 
Yes, things have changed and they are definitely applying more scrutiny and catching more items as I have been caught with things just over £15 recently. Could buy them here so not an option.
Paying the duty is fine, it is paying the handling fee of £8 that hits you on low price items. If you bought something for £500 then £8 wouldn't seem so bad...
 
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Al1944 said:
Royal Mail only charge the handling fee for collecting on behalf of the Government
so it's not their fault this time ;)
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RM have referred the item (incorrectly) to customs far as I can see. Its down to them if to do this or not. As usual they are showing themselves to be useless.

OP: Whoever above said because the value is so low is correct, see http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channels...rtyType=document&id=HMCE_PROD_008654#P39_7232

It normally goes something like :

cost of item and postage
+ duty (usually 5-10%)
Then VAT on all of that.

Duty is based on a commodity code, there is a way of looking it up at the top of the page I have linked above.

But you shouldn't be paying it due to low value. I would suggest you challenge them on it, no point speaking to the drones in the offices, ring them up. The proper way to do it is here: http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channels...rtyType=document&id=HMCE_PROD_008654#P49_8401 but that looks like a good way to get lost in their red tape imho. You may have to go this way if they don't play ball on the phone
 
Craft said:
RM have referred the item (incorrectly) to customs far as I can see. Its down to them if to do this or not. As usual they are showing themselves to be useless.

OP: Whoever above said because the value is so low is correct, see http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPortalWebApp.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=pageImport_FAQs&propertyType=document&id=HMCE_PROD_008654#P39_7232

It normally goes something like :

cost of item and postage
+ duty (usually 5-10%)
Then VAT on all of that.

Duty is based on a commodity code, there is a way of looking it up at the top of the page I have linked above.

But you shouldn't be paying it due to low value. I would suggest you challenge them on it, no point speaking to the drones in the offices, ring them up. The proper way to do it is here: http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPortalWebApp.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=pageImport_FAQs&propertyType=document&id=HMCE_PROD_008654#P49_8401 but that looks like a good way to get lost in their red tape imho. You may have to go this way if they don't play ball on the phone
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You must have missed the update from the OP. The £4 vat was correctly charged on a £20 item.
The level of RM fees for low value items is a different issue, and seems set too high IMO.
 
Royal Mail doesn't decide how much has to be paid. In fact they have to pay the duty etc then get it back from the recipient.

"Customs officers work out the amount of any tax and/or duty payable by the information shown on the CN22 or CN23. The parcel is then passed to Royal Mail/Parcelforce who pay any tax and/or duty on behalf of the recipient."


http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/customs/post/customs-procedures.htm#1
 
stu.artd said:
You must have missed the update from the OP. The £4 vat was correctly charged on a £20 item.
The level of RM fees for low value items is a different issue, and seems set too high IMO.
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Yeah I just re-read, its about right for a £20 item.

I agree on the fees.
 
Al1944 said:
Royal Mail doesn't decide how much has to be paid. In fact they have to pay the duty etc then get it back from the recipient.

"Customs officers work out the amount of any tax and/or duty payable by the information shown on the CN22 or CN23. The parcel is then passed to Royal Mail/Parcelforce who pay any tax and/or duty on behalf of the recipient."

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/customs/post/customs-procedures.htm#1
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Royal mail do decide what to set their charges at though. The vat is half of the royal mail fee and I don't think the vat is the real issue due to it being comparatively low compared to rm fees. Charging a flat rate of £8 is too high on low value items, as it can make up almost 50% of the cost (I had vat and the £8 rm fee on something that was about £16 once).
 
stu.artd said:
Royal mail do decide what to set their charges at though. The vat is half of the royal mail fee and I don't think the vat is the real issue due to it being comparatively low compared to rm fees. Charging a flat rate of £8 is too high on low value items, as it can make up almost 50% of the cost (I had vat and the £8 rm fee on something that was about £16 once).
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Yes, I agree. The only problem is - does it cost less to collect £1 than it does to collect £1000?
 
It costs less to pay the vat on behalf of someone on a £20 item than the duty and vat on a £1000 one. That should be shown in the fee charged to the customer.

The thing is most high value items are sent via courier firms which leaves rm dealing with low value ones in general. Their fee setting is just a rip off as they are fully aware that most things it's applied to are not expensive items, and that their fee will be a significant cost added to the total.
 
The prehistoric sods only accept cash or cheque... (Yes I did write cheque) when you pay on site. I imagine their cost of collection is pretty high due to them being extremely inefficient and old school.

The item I bought is not avail. here in Blighty. Anyway, I just put it down to experience.
 
stu.artd said:
Charging a flat rate of £8 is too high on low value items, as it can make up almost 50% of the cost (I had vat and the £8 rm fee on something that was about £16 once).
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Well, that is what a flat rate is. If RM feel they need to charge £8 to handle an item then that is the charge regardless of value of the item. It doesn't cost them £2 to handle a £16 item and £8 to handle a £300 item does it so why would they have differential charging?
 
ernesto said:
Well, that is what a flat rate is. If RM feel they need to charge £8 to handle an item then that is the charge regardless of value of the item. It doesn't cost them £2 to handle a £16 item and £8 to handle a £300 item does it so why would they have differential charging?
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At the risk of repeating myself.........

stu.artd said:
It costs less to pay the vat on behalf of someone on a £20 item than the duty and vat on a £1000 one. That should be shown in the fee charged to the customer.

The thing is most high value items are sent via courier firms which leaves rm dealing with low value ones in general. Their fee setting is just a rip off as they are fully aware that most things it's applied to are not expensive items, and that their fee will be a significant cost added to the total.
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(My reasoning behind the above being that almost all high value goods I and people that I know have imported have been delivered through fedex/dhl/ups).

Anyway, I clearly don't think their £8 flat fee is reasonable when applied to low cost items, where it's at a level of 50% (or almost) of the total value. It appears you do. That's fine. I'm perfectly happy being the only person that agrees with myself.

dubcat said:
The prehistoric sods only accept cash or cheque... (Yes I did write cheque) when you pay on site. I imagine their cost of collection is pretty high due to them being extremely inefficient and old school.

The item I bought is not avail. here in Blighty. Anyway, I just put it down to experience.
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I usually just pay cash when I pick the item up from their depot. Parcelfarce (sp correctly imo :) )offer online payment via cards so RM not offering the same is pretty backwards.
 
stu.artd said:
Anyway, I clearly don't think their £8 flat fee is reasonable when applied to low cost items, where it's at a level of 50% (or almost) of the total value.
Click to expand...

I would rather it be lower too and agree it is annoying when buying something for £16 but in the big scheme of things £8 as a cost for handling is not actually very much, it just gets thrown out of proportion when linking it to the value of item (which is has no relevance to)
 
stu.artd said:
Anyway, I clearly don't think their £8 flat fee is reasonable when applied to low cost items, where it's at a level of 50% (or almost) of the total value. It appears you do. That's fine. I'm perfectly happy being the only person that agrees with myself.
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Presumably you also believe that my pal should pay 10x as much as I do when parking his car just because he drives an Aston Martin and I drive a Ford Fusion?
 
hollis_f said:
Presumably you also believe that my pal should pay 10x as much as I do when parking his car just because he drives an Aston Martin and I drive a Ford Fusion?
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Yes.
If you swap cars then you can start paying 10x as much as him and it can all even out nicely. :)
 
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