Nikon D810, grey 'vs' UK stock

Grey import or UK stock

  • I would buy only UK stock, so there.

    Votes: 9 12.9%

  • Grey for me, £630 saving is too big a figure to ignore!

    Votes: 61 87.1%
  • Total voters
    70
mrgubby said:
Yup, bought from HDEW who are a VAT registered company, obviously I can't be sure that they have been correctly imported but then again I can't prove Jessops do the same.....

I would assume that if HDEW are cheating the UK out of taxes Mr Customs & Excise would have caught them by now, they're not exactly a secret :)
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It's an interesting question, on HDEW website at the bottom of the FAQ page in small writing.

'INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS. Please note that by making a purchase on this website you will be acting as the importer of the product for all purposes including all customs regulations,copyright and trademark laws.You accept that the role of HDEW Cameras is limited to sourcing products and making them available for you to import directly from the country of origin.By purchasing a product through this website you authorise us to make arrangements for clearance of customs on your behalf for the products you have ordered'.

an interesting point as the purchaser is the importer and not HDEW so not exactly a UK purchase if you are an importer. It would be interesting if import duty was charged who would be liable and what HDEW do arrange to clear customs.

You are right Customs seem yet to be acting but that may change if cuts mean they need to 'fund' themselves. With goods being able to enter anywhere in the EU it could be difficult for Customs.
 
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rob-nikon said:
Currently I think it's a short term gain for long term loss situation, an interesting downward spiral. No VAT or import duty paid means less money for the government to pay for schools, hospitals, police, council services etc and uk shops can't compete so they close meaning even less tax income and job losses resulting in a greater loss of tax income. This loss of tax income results in cuts meaning job losses in public sector and even less tax income. This all results in cuts to services, education, NHS etc. it's not only cameras where this is happening, businesses are outsourcing or buying cheaper abroad all to increase short term profits, even the government does it (just think of the train purchase contract a year ago). Most of our utility companies are foreign owned and now we don't have a publicly owned post service.
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This is not some new phenomenon, as the price difference increases it ultimately leads to less UK units being sold.
 
Brought my D3300 for £297 brand new on Ebay as a gray import, it was shipped from the UK to me. Its £390.00 at Jessips. The only difference I can tell is that the import model only has English and Jap language. No french, Spanish etc .
 
I have a D810. I bought it from London Camera Exchange; it has full European warranty and full support from Nikon. I have previously bought [a lens] from a grey importer and worried for two weeks before my stuff arrived as I found the seller had no offices that I could find and did not respond to any of my emails asking about delivery; fortunately my lens arrived but what if it hadn't.

The difference between a grey importer of the D810 and a UK official dealer is about four hundred quid -- £400 I'm not willing to risk. I like my peace of mind, others are more cavalier.
 
ShinySideUp said:
The difference between a grey importer of the D810 and a UK official dealer is about four hundred quid -- £400 I'm not willing to risk. I like my peace of mind, others are more cavalier.
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Cheapest price I can find in the UK is £2300 but from Panamoz it's £1650 which is a £650 difference or roughly 28%.

I wouldn't take buying from a UK dealer as a guarantee of anything, if they go bankrupt you could be left in the lurch and if it's a concern opt to pay with a credit card in either scenario.
 
Very valid point on the above, and the way things go. Shops can fold at any given time.
 
rob-nikon said:
This is the thing currently it's not a level playing field. Import duty is being side stepped and that only has a detrimental effect on the uk economy and not the foreign sellers. If import duty was paid prices would not be as appealing.

Currently I think it's a short term gain for long term loss situation, an interesting downward spiral. No VAT or import duty paid means less money for the government to pay for schools, hospitals, police, council services etc and uk shops can't compete so they close meaning even less tax income and job losses resulting in a greater loss of tax income. This loss of tax income results in cuts meaning job losses in public sector and even less tax income. This all results in cuts to services, education, NHS etc. it's not only cameras where this is happening, businesses are outsourcing or buying cheaper abroad all to increase short term profits, even the government does it (just think of the train purchase contract a year ago). Most of our utility companies are foreign owned and now we don't have a publicly owned post service.
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I agree 100%. Too many people want the benefits of government spending but don't seem to realise - or just don't care - that by evading taxes they're undermining it.
 
It's not just tax evasion (illegal), there is tax avoidance(legal) too. Companies like Boots, Amazon, Apple moving their head offices overseas to take advantage of lower tax rates, not to mention the guy who valeted my car recently telling me he wanted a new expensive sporty car & his accountant told him he could but it through the books as a company 'courtesy' car for his business & offset the costs as a business expense. Or another self employed acquaintance of mine who purchased laptops for his kids as 'business' computers.

Lots of large & small businesses get away with not paying taxes, legally & illegally. The average worker has to pay their PAYE, NI, & VAT taxes, they have no choice.
 
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If people want to be party to smuggling items into the country, avoiding the duty and taxes due that is fine, but please do not kid yourselves that the savings are legitimate, and down to greedy UK suppliers.

They should have a new section on the forum for grey importers ... it could be called Jamaica Inn :D
 
Martyn... said:
If people want to be party to smuggling items into the country, avoiding the duty and taxes due that is fine, but please do not kid yourselves that the savings are legitimate, and down to greedy UK suppliers.
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It's not because of suppliers, the majority of the price difference is due to 20% VAT.
 
I'd either go DigitalRev or more likely HDEW tbh. HDEW seems like as you get a UK invoice that Nikon/Canon will service it.

It does depend on the saving of course.
 
simonbarker said:
Cheapest price I can find in the UK is £2300 but from Panamoz it's £1650 which is a £650 difference or roughly 28%.

I wouldn't take buying from a UK dealer as a guarantee of anything, if they go bankrupt you could be left in the lurch and if it's a concern opt to pay with a credit card in either scenario.
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I've said this in another thread but again I will say it -- with Panamoz you can't pay with a credit card. They give the impression you can -- using Paypal-- but that's not paying the supplier with a credit card, it's paying Paypal with a credit card and they forward your money. If something goes wrong with the transaction your credit card company will ask you if there had been a problem with Paypal and there probably hasn't in which case the card company will say something like " your transaction was carried out, we have no further interest in the matter". When you use a credit card to pay by Paypal, your transaction is with Paypal not the company who supplies the goods.

I bought my D810 and qualified for a £175 cashback from Nikon -- duly received -- so the price drops to a little over £2000.

I'm not trying to convince anyone not to buy from a grey importer, I'm just saying it's not for me.
 
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simonbarker said:
It's not because of suppliers, the majority of the price difference is due to 20% VAT.
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I have HDEW invoice in my hand. It includes VAT at 20%. So where is that difference then?
 
ShinySideUp said:
I've said this in another thread but again I will say it -- with Panamoz you can't pay with a credit card. They give the impression you can -- using Paypal-- but that's not paying the supplier with a credit card, it's paying Paypal with a credit card and they forward your money. If something goes wrong with the transaction your credit card company will ask you if there had been a problem with Paypal and there probably hasn't in which case the card company will say something like " your transaction was carried out, we have no further interest in the matter". When you use a credit card to pay by Paypal, your transaction is with Paypal not the company who supplies the goods.
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If that's the case then you simply contact PayPal and file a claim with them, if the item wasn't delivered it should be a simple matter for them to resolve the dispute in your favour.

ShinySideUp said:
I'm not trying to convince anyone not to buy from a grey importer, I'm just saying it's not for me.
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Nor am I trying to convince you to use an importer, I'm merely pointing out there's risk whatever you decide.
 
I don't think the answer is as black and white as that.


















See what I did there
 
I really should stop commenting in these 'grey importers vs official dealers' as it goes nowhere. It's like trying to convince a protestant that the catholic way is right and vice versa, or Shi'ites vs Sunnies et al.

Dammit, I've just commented again!
 
ShinySideUp said:
I really should stop commenting in these 'grey importers vs official dealers' as it goes nowhere. It's like trying to convince a protestant that the catholic way is right and vice versa, or Shi'ites vs Sunnies et al.

Dammit, I've just commented again!
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And in your previous post you said you weren't trying to convince anyone
 
daugirdas said:
Same as listed on their website.
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I don't see VAT listed when I glance at their website and I don't see how they can match/beat other importers and have VAT included in the price.

How are they able to do it cheaper than anyone else despite having the overhead of being in the UK?
 
simonbarker said:
I don't see VAT listed when I glance at their website and I don't see how they can match/beat other importers and have VAT included in the price.

How are they able to do it cheaper than anyone else despite having the overhead of being in the UK?
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HDEW is UK registered business. Quite clearly they sell enough to be registered for VAT (and are). It is simple so far. So everything they sell must include VAT, unless they don't report some sales (since you have to remind them about the receipt - a fairly minor inconvenience saving you hundreds...)... I don't know about that, but I do have receipts with VAT reg. no and full breakdown so all must be in good order.
 
daugirdas said:
HDEW is UK registered business. Quite clearly they sell enough to be registered for VAT (and are). It is simple so far. So everything they sell must include VAT, unless they don't report some sales (since you have to remind them about the receipt - a fairly minor inconvenience saving you hundreds...)... I don't know about that, but I do have receipts with VAT reg. no and full breakdown so all must be in good order.
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Well that makes stuff insanely cheap, after you claim back VAT that'd make a D810 under £1.5k. It seems too good to be true.
 
Back in 2009/10 I got a cracking deal on a Canon 50D and an 24-105L IS lens from Ian (kerso) but I have no idea if he is still around.
Personally I couldn't care less about tax what with living in rip off Britain (we all know technology prices are far better in the likes of the USA).
If I can deal with someone in the UK who can honour the warranty and save myself some money then I am all for it.
Besides, a small trader is not going to steal too many customers from well established businesses.
Look how many people compare the store prices of the likes of PC World then compare them to UK online sites and save themselves some money, I'm sure plenty have read about the tax avoidance of one huge online retailer but that hasn't stopped them from buying from them has it?
If you try and import a product from outside of the UK then get stung for charges, that's life and part of the risk one takes.

Don't blame the people for trying to save money, blame the manufacturers for hiking up prices in europe (it was proven years ago that Microsoft and Sony could still make similiar profits in the UK and the whole arguement about shipping costs etc were blown of the window).
We pay more tax on petrol, ciggies, booze and god knows what else on than quite a few other countries.
Believe it or not I am all in favour of supporting small independent UK retailers, Digital Depot price matched the best UK price on a Tamron 17-50 f2.8 VC when it was first launched in the UK and I would happily by from them again.

Someone in the EOS M thread is buying an M3 via amazon in Japan, have look at the massive price difference between there and the UK!
 
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Try to be constructive in your criticism; puerile statements are not flattering.
 
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hashcake said:
Personally I couldn't care less about tax
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But I bet you'd care about having the police and ambulance coming to the scene if you were in a car crash. How do you think they're paid for?

hashcake said:
... rip off Britain (we all know technology prices are far better in the likes of the USA).
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Not true, as has been pointed out again and again on these forums. Excluding the effects of taxes, UK prices for camera gear are generally very competitive against US prices. It's generally only the taxes which make a difference.

hashcake said:
Look how many people compare the store prices of the likes of PC World then compare them to UK online sites and save themselves some money
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Do you really not understand the difference between comparison shopping and tax evasion?

hashcake said:
I'm sure plenty have read about the tax avoidance of one huge online retailer but that hasn't stopped them from buying from them has it?
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Tax avoidance is legal. What most grey retailers promote is evasion, which is illegal.

hashcake said:
Don't blame the people for trying to save money, blame the manufacturers for hiking up prices in europe
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In the camera market, it's not the manufacturers. Excluding taxes, prices are remarkably consistent from one country to another.

hashcake said:
We pay more tax on petrol, ciggies, booze and god knows what else on than quite a few other countries.
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And we get more government spending on health care, education, law enforcement, unemployment benefits etc etc than quite a few other countries. If you don't like it, either campaign to get it changed or move to a different country.

hashcake said:
Someone in the EOS M thread is buying an M3 via amazon in Japan, have look at the massive price difference between there and the UK!
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That is the one area of the camera equipment where UK customers *are* exploited. The M3 is brand new to the market, and UK retailers charge significant premiums to early adopters. After a few months, the price in the UK will have fallen significantly and the prices in Japan, US, HK etc won't. I really don't know why this happens. I suspect that sooner or later retailers in other countries will wake up to the fact that they can make money from the must-have-it-now-at-any-price brigade.
 
I don't agree with people evading paying tax however according to HMRC, (see link below) tax avoidance accounts for £4billion & evasion £5.1billion out of a total of £35 billion tax 'gap'. I would imagine the revenue 'lost' on grey camera sales (legal or otherwise) is a very small part of this lost revenue.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27372841
 
If tax avoidance is good enough for the likes of Price Waterhouse, for MP's, for large corporations, and HMRC is aware its going on yet takes many many years to do anything about it, meaning they're evidently not worried about it, or are being encouraged in some way to look the other way, then to be honest, its good enough for me.
 
redhed17 said:
Nikon are repairing D750s for this specific fault, ;) I doubt they will be so accommodating with other faults of Grey imports.

If you buy a camera with the aim of selling it on, the extra you lose because of going Grey has to be taken into account, as does the lack of a UK warranty. .
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But if you sell your grey camera to upgrade to another grey model then that's irrelevant. Once most people go down this route they seldom go back to UK purchase because of good value and good service.

Panamoz give 3 years UK warranty.

I've purchased both. D810 and D750 from them and never looked back. My D750 is currently with Nikon having the reflective issue fixed. I'm certainly aware that Nikon also fixed the D810 thermal issue on grey imports. Plenty of other success stories on here of other faults being fixed too.
 
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