Is it normal for HK sellers to mark down the package value to save (unfairly compete) their customers tax/duty/brokerage?

[Sacarathe]

Just wondering, it's clearly not a much discussed topic (I'm sure there are reasons), and is certainly underhanded insofar as competing with UK businesses,

 

That said, my general observation has been that even with taxes/duty the price of buying from the HK retailers tends to only come down to availability, shipping cost, shipping time, and cheapness(even when expecting to pay VAT/duty @ 1.25).

 

I recently had a $500 order from HK, excellent stuff. A single store with the entire Flyye range, much better than 5-6 in the UK to get everything I wanted, at the time of ordering I factored in paying 1.25 for importing etc but it was still cheaper than the UK, and they had to restock some items too, but I was quite shocked when it was delivered with a marked value of 1/10th of what I paid and I pocketed £85 the govt was due.

 

 

Edgy subject, I name no retailers!

 

I said 'unfairly compete' in the title, but TBH they were cheaper even when I thought I would have to pay x1.25 on import.

Edited July 25, 2015 by Sacarathe

[Samurai]

They are cheaper. The problem is when there is a problem. All in all, if everything is fine then it's cheaper, but if there is something wrong, it is more expensive than UK retailers. So in the long run, it's about the same price.

Ordering from the EU on the other hand... that's just cheaper.

[Sitting Duck]

yes very common to put down stuff like a $3 toy

 

trust me I have been on opposite end of this with importing rare gaming consoles from US & Japan

If they don't see any real value of goods they will take the insured value limit as to final amount PLUS SHIPPING FEES !!!!

 

now if a console is worth say $200 but the sender has insured it in the couriers price band of up to $400 + another 45 shipping

so Customs take the item as nearly $450 - £300 value and slap on 17.5% VAT at the time + RM pay this on HM behalf

then they whack on a f*cking admin fee on top that leaves this duck with

 

£80 bill or I ain't getting my $200 or £140 console ffs

 

ah well what you need to do is write to HM Customs with invoice from sender and a note from sender explaining blah blah blah

 

Oh btw sir you got like 14 days to pay this £80 or we are sending it back

 

to say those robbing mofo's have you but the short n curley's is a massive understatement as I am mugged by RM & HM customs

 

The above is the worst one to date but after that I reduced the urge to import rare crap over the pond

I absolutely hate them - the £28 import allowance has not or hardly risen in the last friggin' 20 years either ffs

a f*cking con is what it all is and still gets my back up thinking back to them bastids having me over a barrel

 

I did get my chance to tell them to poke it some years later....

bought a few old pcb boards from states with a very good expensive lcd chip on there

was gonna rip old chip off to mount/use in a picaxe project I was thinking of doing.....

all in it was a crazy price fleabay win of under a tenner...

RM sends me a letter saying £32 please....

F*ck off its only £9.27 all inc delivery me thinks

over the next week or so I got a few more reminders or we are returning to sender

post it into outer space for all I care - you are not getting any more money out of me on that one mofo's

 

so yeah lost a tenner but sod was I gonna give them tossers any more money - GGGGrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

In my experience - buying from US has a higher chance of it being stopped

from HongKong it is about 50/50 depending on size of parcel

 

Hence I'm buying my own vault of crap from EU before we pull out

FTW - and I don't mean "for the win"

[TheFull9]

VAT is at 20% at the moment, so that's what folks need to factor in (as a minimum) to any purchase coming in from outside the EU, being sure to factor in shipping as mentioned. At around £130 import duty kicks in, which varies by the type of goods, plus your nice fee of around £10-20 from PF/UPS/FedEx for 'handling'.

 

Last I read, the threshold at which VAT kicked in was £15 regardless of stuff being a gift or not. Doubt it's changed, but gov.uk has the info for average individuals all mixed in with the business info and spread across many pages; PITA to find right now. You get a white sticker explaining it all on the outside of any package you import ant pay VAT on.. wish I'd kept one as that's the most concise source for all this stuff.

 

It's usually the slightly smaller HK businesses that will fudge the paperwork and sometimes they take it too far. If customs don't believe the value written on the package based on the size and weight of the box (sometimes they open them up, but not often in my experience of importing multiple packages per month for about 4 years now) they'll send you the above mentioned letter asking for invoices etc then you'll definitely have to pay full whack and it takes bloody ages for them to sort it out. It gets even worse with RIFs if they query the value or the agent that checks your package isn't fully clued up on the VCRA. I've had guns held for months when they've questioned my defence and the value together, took a lot of e-mails, letters and fairly long and annoying phone calls with some particularly jobs-worth people to remedy the problems.

 

Many of the larger retailers like eHobby and AS Global will not make false claims on the paperwork, so it really varies by who you're buying from. I always use WGC and their checkout does allow you to change some numbers, but obviously nobody should do that as it's like, illegal and stuff and I'd never do that. I don't see them as being much in the way of competition to UK airsoft businesses personally. It's maybe once in a turquoise moon that a UK retailer actually stocks the things I want, so they're not 'losing' my money in that sense. I import 99% of my airsoft and kit/gear, it's saved me a lot over the years vs buying from within the UK. Probably clocking up in to the thousands by this point if I were to hazard a guess.

[Lozart]

RSOV fairly regularly mark stuff as "gift". Custome and Excise are a funny bunch though and have far further reaching powers than people realise when it comes to search and seizure and of course charging you money.

 

As SD alluded to the postage and insurance costs are factored in when calculating duty. VAT is then charged on the whole value including duty so yes, you do in fact get taxed on the tax. Buy from the EU instead. No VAT that way

[Sacarathe]

My third package was slapped with charges. £6 VAT plus £13 to royal mail, that was "speedpost" and the other two were not. But i'd have happily paid up to £55 VVAT/Duty on it so no worries. What I hate is when you pay the brokerage charges on top of VAT/Duty.

[proffrink]

Are you sure? Flat rate for RM and PF is £9 for paying your VAT.

[Sacarathe]

Got the letter from parcel force right here, VAT £6.03 Clearance Fee (zero rated for VAT purposes) £13.50.

 

The sender valued it at $30, customs clearly couldn't let it slide, and tbh, I don't blame them, but I guess specwarfare.com don't give any information with an incline of the value (which was £250).