Buying and Selling models to/from Europe

[MikeB]

Does anyone know how long it is taking parcels to clear customs coming into the country from the EU (Denmark to be precise)?

 

"I have had a parcel (of Lego as it happens!) that was ordered on the 1st of Jan, on the 3rd of Jan it was "Awaiting Customs Clearance" and on the 4th of January it was "Order information has been transmitted to DPD" since when nothing, not a thing and yet was supposed to be delivered in three to four business days.

 

What's going on?"

 

My experience is that there are two issues at play.

 

Customs clearance takes time, often one to two days, although it can be a few hours or at an extreme,  three weeks. 

 

Secondly, the delivery companies' tracking systems are far from perfect.  They have a few set messages which may not reflect reality and there can be gaps.  If a parcel is scanned leaving  an airport on Germany, the next scan may be several days later  when  it is received by the company's depot at an English airport, after it has been through customs. In some cases a different company may be involved in Britain to that on the European mainland.  The two tracking systems connect, but not seamlessly.

 

What seems clear is that Brexit has ended the 2-4 day delivery  of items from the EU to GB - one to two weeks now seems the norm. If nothing changes on the tracking after a week, I'd make enquiries.  

[Nick C]

Plus many product may not be available from UK suppliers - perhaps not with cycle parts, but my wife is currently waiting on two parcels of books to be delivered from Poland, and I don't know of any UK suppliers with a full range of Polish language books!

[Ron Ron Ron]

3 hours ago, MikeB said:

.....What seems clear is that Brexit has ended the 2-4 day delivery  of items from the EU to GB - one to two weeks now seems the norm. If nothing changes on the tracking after a week, I'd make enquiries.  

 

According to the (publicly viewable) tracking information, the delivery I received yesterday from Germany, was delayed for 3 days within Germany, before being scanned prior to transportation to the UK.

They're having big problems over there, related to Covid.

The delay at the UK end was because the package arrived at the UK receiving depot on Friday morning and went nowhere over the weekend, as they don't deliver non-priority stuff on Saturday or Sunday.

 

The last parcel I received from Germany, about 2 months ago, arrived within 48 hours of placing the order online. Again no customs or admin charges, no VAT.

 

 

 

[rekoboy]

We received a parcel from Germany the other day via DHL-Deutsche Post and Royal Mail - it took just three days, no problem, no taxes required, although the contents value was clearly over €100. A further parcel sent from Germany via Hermes, however, took 4 weeks and was delivered, curiously, by Parcelforce. Again, no sign of any examination, no extra payment needed. Yesterday we received a package from our friend Sybille in Köthen which took only a couple of days - but the parcel was utterly plastered with strange coded stickers from DHL, Royal Mail etc. Then we get to shipments the other way. Oh dear. In early December we sent Sybille two calendars, one for her, one for her Ma. The total value was under £10 which was clearly stated on the Royal Mail customs sticker. The package took nearly 5 weeks to get to Köthen, and then Sybille was obliged to collect it from her local Postagentur and pay €8.20 tax! Aaargh! The final straw came on Sunday when I attempted to complete on-line the docs for MyHermes for a parcel to Frau Rekoboy's best friend in Zörbig. The parcel contains goodies from Betty's Cafe (if you know York or Harrogate or Ilkley you will know Betty!!) In the MyHermes documentation you are obliged to add a customs code for EACH item in the package - and MyHermes kindly supplies you with the necessary directory of codes. I searched for ages - but there are no codes, as far as I can tell, for sweets and biscuits and cake. I gave up - and did a lot of swearing. We shall try again with the Royal Mail.

[Andy Hayter]

Biscuits  19 05 31    but you need to go into more detail if the biscuit has a chocolate coating

Cake 19 05 90 70 00

 

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/find_commodity  is your friend but it can get horribly complicated - as in the biscuit example

[Lovemymodelling]

I e just received the standard parcel force “bill” for some items I have purchased from Germany I’ve been charged £7.00 duty ontop of the VAT and their extortion charge to tap a few figures into a computer , I take the £7 duty is the difference between allowance and the cost of the model? 

[LimboBrit]

37 minutes ago, Lovemymodelling said:

I e just received the standard parcel force “bill” for some items I have purchased from Germany I’ve been charged £7.00 duty ontop of the VAT and their extortion charge to tap a few figures into a computer , I take the £7 duty is the difference between allowance and the cost of the model? 

If the correct customs code has been used you should not be charged duty because scale models fall under a 0% tariff.

[Gordonwis]

5 hours ago, rekoboy said:

 Yesterday we received a package from our friend Sybille in Köthen 

 

Fascinated you've got a friend in Kothen.

 

I have twice chosen the station there as a place to grice and phot stuff on the way to the Thuringian Plandampf events.

 

On my most recent visit I got lots of variety including a 232 Ludmilla, 155 (my favourite ex DR electric) , departmental 218s and even some ex DSB Nohabs. 

[Gordonwis]

I've just 'lost' around £30 of a 'sold for £90' ebay sale because it was sold to EU so tax and the Ebay final seller fee have been deducted. 

 

The net amount leaves me feeling that I wouldn't have put the item up for sale if I'd realised I would lose out so much

 

I can see why  some German model railway sellers stopped selling to UK addresses

[LimboBrit]

13 minutes ago, Gordonwis said:

I've just 'lost' around £30 of a 'sold for £90' ebay sale because it was sold to EU so tax and the Ebay final seller fee have been deducted. 

 

The net amount leaves me feeling that I wouldn't have put the item up for sale if I'd realised I would lose out so much

 

I can see why  some German model railway sellers stopped selling to UK addresses

EBay is required to take care of VAT. It doesn't matter if you have an Ebay shop or selling second hand stuff privately. This is why, for me, buying stuff on Ebay from a UK based seller is no longer interesting (unless it's REALLY cheap of course).

[rekoboy]

20 minutes ago, Gordonwis said:

 

Fascinated you've got a friend in Kothen.

 

I have twice chosen the station there as a place to grice and phot stuff on the way to the Thuringian Plandampf events.

 

On my most recent visit I got lots of variety including a 232 Ludmilla, 155 (my favourite ex DR electric) , departmental 218s and even some ex DSB Nohabs. 

My wife is from Köthen, Sybille one of her school friends. From 1979 onwards I have been a frequent visitor to Köthen! The station is great - until last year it was one of the last bigger German stations with mechanical signalling.

[Jonboy]

9 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

Biscuits  19 05 31    but you need to go into more detail if the biscuit has a chocolate coating

Cake 19 05 90 70 00

 

https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/find_commodity  is your friend but it can get horribly complicated - as in the biscuit example

Something to be aware of is that if the carrier isn’t prepared to carry it, it often simply isn’t in their automated directory’s as searchable when entering consignments.

[njee20]

4 hours ago, Gordonwis said:

I've just 'lost' around £30 of a 'sold for £90' ebay sale because it was sold to EU so tax and the Ebay final seller fee have been deducted. 

 

The net amount leaves me feeling that I wouldn't have put the item up for sale if I'd realised I would lose out so much

 

I can see why  some German model railway sellers stopped selling to UK addresses

Eh? Just so I understand this, you're saying you sold an item for £90, but you have only received £60 in your account because eBay have 'deducted tax'? That makes no sense! There is tax on the sale anyway, at most they should be deducting UK VAT and charging the buyer local VAT, no way should you be losing out.

[Neils WRX]

My wife had a interesting one with one of my Christmas Presents, (a Piko 720) which came from a well known German shop.

 

Anyway model arrived with no demand for any VAT etc.

 

Then a couple of days ago she gets a letter asking for VAT etc to be paid.

 

Not heard of one being done retrospectively before.

 

Courier was FedEx.

 

Stay safe,

 

Neil

[Jonboy]

FedEx do this regularly (and will refer to debt collectors if unpaid!!!). 

 

[Andy Hayter]

Yes a cunning ploy on their part.

 

On the plus side it does get delivered more quickly.  But you have accepted the delivery.  Therefore you are responsible for any taxes.

 

If they demanded the taxes first, they would be faced with the "How much?"  "You can send it back I'm not paying."  Of course returning the item to the seller would be at their expense.

Edited January 12, 2022 by Andy Hayter

[njee20]

DHL do this too. I get it for business purchases, but it’s a bit rubbish as a private buyer. 

[SimonBoulton]

13 hours ago, njee20 said:

Eh? Just so I understand this, you're saying you sold an item for £90, but you have only received £60 in your account because eBay have 'deducted tax'? That makes no sense! There is tax on the sale anyway, at most they should be deducting UK VAT and charging the buyer local VAT, no way should you be losing out.

 

I thought ebay charge the buyer the VAT plus delivery charge on top of the sale price. That's what happened to me with something I bought from Germany 

[SimonBoulton]

11 hours ago, Neils WRX said:

My wife had a interesting one with one of my Christmas Presents, (a Piko 720) which came from a well known German shop.

 

Anyway model arrived with no demand for any VAT etc.

 

Then a couple of days ago she gets a letter asking for VAT etc to be paid.

 

Not heard of one being done retrospectively before.

 

Courier was FedEx.

 

Stay safe,

 

Neil

 

Guessing the value was over £135 Neil? 

[LimboBrit]

12 minutes ago, SimonBoulton said:

I thought ebay charge the buyer the VAT plus delivery charge on top of the sale price. That's what happened to me with something I bought from Germany

I thought so too. The last time I bought from a UK based seller on EBay I requested the UK VAT to be deducted from the asking price which they did. This is not so easy to do when it involves a private sale. Sure enough, Ebay then added Dutch VAT.

[njee20]

1 hour ago, SimonBoulton said:

 

I thought ebay charge the buyer the VAT plus delivery charge on top of the sale price. That's what happened to me with something I bought from Germany 

Agreed, hence questioning it. The buyer would still have had to pay tax on it, at best eBay would have removed UK VAT and charged local VAT, but as a seller you shouldn’t be ’charged’ the VAT, otherwise what’s happened to the money eBay receive in tax?

[MikeB]

13 hours ago, Neils WRX said:

My wife had a interesting one with one of my Christmas Presents, (a Piko 720) which came from a well known German shop.

 

Anyway model arrived with no demand for any VAT etc.

 

Then a couple of days ago she gets a letter asking for VAT etc to be paid.

 

Not heard of one being done retrospectively before.

 

Courier was FedEx.

 

Stay safe,

 

Neil

Interesting.   I had a parcel from Germany delivered by Fedex last month and I had an e-mail from them requesting payment of tax etc once the parcel had cleared UK customs, which I paid  online, and the parcel was then delivered.  So much better than Parcel Force who delay delivery by several days as they send the request for payment by post. I then received a letter from Fedex last week asking for the tax to be paid.  I binned the letter as I assume that they send that as standard, useful for those who need a formal invoice for tax purposes.

 

And yes, I have the email confirming the payment has been made and it is a genuine Fedex account.

[LimboBrit]

If I am ordering stuff from the UK and it gets shipped by Royal Mail once it arrives in NL it is handled by their partner PostNL. It is standard that it then gets stuck for three weeks or more for them to pull their finger out and get it cleared by Dutch customs. They also require payment of VAT/duty/clearing costs before delivery. Usually I get a request for payment in the post one day before the deadline after which they return goods to sender.

[SimonBoulton]

On 13/01/2022 at 10:00, LimboBrit said:

I thought so too. The last time I bought from a UK based seller on EBay I requested the UK VAT to be deducted from the asking price which they did. This is not so easy to do when it involves a private sale. Sure enough, Ebay then added Dutch VAT.

 

They could only deduct the UK VAT if they are a business. Private sellers don’t charge VAT 

[Jol Wilkinson]

15 hours ago, SimonBoulton said:

 

They could only deduct the UK VAT if they are a business. Private sellers don’t charge VAT 

What happens if a business is not VAT registered.