UK VAT experts?

[matei]

Hello!

I won a hat on eBay from the US. Instead of receiving the hat today - I received a letter from Parcelfarce saying I owed them for VAT.

I've received hats from the US in the past and not had to pay VAT on them - what gives? I thought that there is no VAT on used clothing?

 

[Fleur De Guerre]

In my experience the customs and bogus brokerage charges whacked on when you go to collect stuff is entirely arbitrary and I do not understand it at all! I have ordered brand new clothes worth £50 from America and been charged £17 for VAT, customs tax and brokerage and a similar order of jewellery and paid nothing at all! If you're in the right you can contest it. Though a quick look on the HM Revenue and Customs seems to show that children's and protective clothes and accessories/ headgear are zero rated, but I couldn't find anything about second hand.

 

[matei]

Thanks for that info - I'm trying to contest this now, but Parcelfarce's automated hold service keeps "accidentally" hanging up on me. :rage:

What a shower of eejits... I've dealt with Parcelfarce before, they were unable to deliver a package to the massive bank where I work. I mean, the building is massive... yet these fools were unable to find it.

 

[Salv]

Import VAT should be payable on all goods that cost £18.00 or more, but as Fleur says it's a lottery as to whether you pay anything. I wasn't charged import VAT on a gab jacket and a pair of trousers from eBay that cost me about £50 recently, but I was charged for some records that were valued at £25.

(Off Topic, but a nice story about the records - I found a reference to a recently recorded, independently released CD by one of my obscure soul heroes, a guy named Marvin L. Sims, who had recorded a handful of 45s in the late 60s/early 70s. After some detective work I managed to get in touch with Marvin and ordered a copy of the CD from him, at a cost of $16.99. I came home from work about a week after he had received my money order him the money to find a card from the Post Office saying that I owed about £10 in import VAT, admin fees etc. Armed with my email from Marvin that showed the cost of the CD I went to the local sorting office, and they showed me the package, on which Marvin had written a value of $40.00! I then realised that his description of the contents stated that it included a CD and vinyl so he must have slipped some 45s in the package as well. I had told him in one of my emails that I was missing a few of his records, including his first and last 45s so, bless him, he included, free of charge, mint original copies of those 45s. I paid up the fees without another word.)

HM Revenue & Customs explain their charges briefly here. There's also a downloadable .pdf document available with more detail but when I tried to view it I got an error message saying that it was damaged...

They warn that...

Note: Some unscrupulous overseas suppliers openly advertise on the internet, or on their web-sites that they will deliberately either misdescribe items or underdeclare their value in order to evade customs charges that are legally due on importation. You should be aware that although the foreign sender may have completed the customs declaration form on the parcel you are regarded (in law) as the importer of the goods and responsible for the information on the declaration, and any customs charges that may be due. This means that if you purchase goods from these suppliers and the declaration is found to be false or misleading you may be liable to financial penalties or criminal prosecution. Furthermore the goods themselves will be liable to forfeiture. It is in your own interests to ensure Customs declarations are completed properly.

There's an online US-based CD seller that specializes in independent releases in all genres, and they have apparently done this in the past (not that I've ever ordered anything from this seller and avoided paying import VAT... oh, no m'lud ...) and HM Customs have apparently kept a special eye out for CDs sent by the seller.

 

[besdor]

We have had similar problems with customers who have ordered from us and have had to pay a VAT charge when the item arrived in England . One customer refused the shipment . I dont know what the percentage is , but it seems very high to me especialy whwn you have to pay the shipping charges as well.


Steven
www.bencrafthats.com

 

[geo]

Here in Canada I have to pay a 15% tax, which is more or less the equivalent to your VAT, on top of a 19% customs tax. So, for a package that's valued at $100, they apply the customs tax, 19%, and then they apply the 15% tax, not on the original value of $100, but on the already taxed value, $119. So the total tax works out to 37%.

Also, when the post delivers a package, they bring it to your door and request immediate payment of the 37% tax, in cash and the exact amount, because they don't give change. When told that I don't have that kind of money on me, they bring the package back to the storage depot, and from there it gets sent to the post office nearest to my house. It once happened that the postman brought a package to my door, I didn't have the exact change, and was supposed to go pick up my package at the post office the next day. However, the package got lost, and it took a whole week to find it again. Imagine the frustration of seeing your package in the postman's hands, so close, going to pick it up the next day, and be told that there's no trace of your package in the system, and then wait a week until you see your package again.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

Cheating the customs is really very easy. They cannot verify the cost of used clothing and such (can you imagine the nightmare of trawling all the eBay auctions to find out which British buyer will be receiving from which US seller?). The easiest way is for the seller to value the cost at something nominal like 2 pounds or so and declare it as a gift ...

What is VAT now? Still 17.5%?

bk

 

[Salv]

What is VAT now? Still 17.5%?

bk

Yes, still 17.5%.

 

[matei]

Hi all - thanks for all the helpful info. Salv - as usual, your experience has been of great assistance.

I contacted the seller, they put down the full price of what I paid on the customs form as the value of the hat, so... I guess I have no choice but to pay The Man (or would it be in this case, The Woman - it is after all Her Majesty's Customs service - no?) in order to release me hat...

Oh well... live and learn! [huh]

 

[Salv]

I contacted the seller, they put down the full price of what I paid on the customs form as the value of the hat, so... I guess I have no choice but to pay The Man (or would it be in this case, The Woman - it is after all Her Majesty's Customs service - no?) in order to release me hat...

Oh well... live and learn! [huh]

Yeah, you just have to heave a sigh, swallow that bile, and pay up. How much have they stung you for?

 

[Fleur De Guerre]

I must say, for any individual sales from ebay people or small companies (like a single person that you can interact with) I always ask nicely if they'll put it down as a gift, and usually they are more than happy to do that.

 

[matei]

Yeah, you just have to heave a sigh, swallow that bile, and pay up. How much have they stung you for?

About £18...

 

[WEEGEE]

From Canada

Things i have bought from Canada the seller always sent as a (Gift)

to avoid any taxes.

 

[Benny Holiday]

It's a lottery in Australia too

where it's known as 'import tax.' I got hit with it when I bought a 40's suit from Art a couple of years back, and when my Aero Halfbelt jacket arrived too.

fftopic: Fleur, is that you in your avatar? That's a great photo!

 

[Fleur De Guerre]

It is me! I hate photos of me usually, but this is my one and only example taken by a professional so I can live with it. And thanks!

 

[Mike in Seattle]

Interesting, timely thread. An old friend & tax client is moving to Canada in a few weeks and we were talking about his final-year U.S. tax returns which he'll have to file in April of next year. I think I'll have him prepay the fee now and then next year, when I send him the return, I'll mark it as "a gift." Tax returns - a lovely gift suitable for almost any occasion...NOT.

 

[geo]

Marking it as a gift doesn't always work. I've had things marked as gifts, but because there was a declared value and the sender was a business, I got charged tax.