Customs have my digital camera need help & advice!!!

Selik

Got a notice of arrival slip in the post a few days ago from their Naas Road office and from what I gather they want me to forward an invoice for the purchase of the camera to them. Now this has never happened to me before so I really don't know what the best course of action would be. I'm thinking that I'm gonna have to pay some sort of stupid rip-off tax (which reeeeeeally pisses me off!) and I would obviously like to minimize this if possible. Should I send them a real invoice or should I fake one which makes it look like the item cost a similar price to here (haha no chance!). The camera itself cost £220 with shipping £30 and mandatory insurance £10 making a total of £260 that I paid. I saw the same camera in town the other day for around €600 (typical rip-off joke price!) so maybe if I fake an invoice for that amount or something I can avoid being stung? To be honest I really have no idea how all this works I'm just guessing things here if anyone who can offer me some advise or tips on this I would seriously appreciate it!

Thanks in advance and over to you guys...

krattapopov

afaik if it was purchased outside of europe you have to pay a customs tax.... my friend bought a DS from japan and when it arrived he had to pay and extra 50 euro or so to the delivery guy.

is this it? if so just pay still sounds like your saving money

is_that_so

You have no choice here especially if bought outside EU. They don't care and I wouldn't mess with dodgy invoices for the sake of a few bob. Pay the tax. It'll still be cheaper.

Selik

Here's the camera in question. Sure it's only £30 more than what I paid anyway (probably £40 incl shipping) so surely I won't have to pay a ridiculous amount of tax? If I do then it's not fair and I'm not going to accept it.

eth0_

Why would you INCREASE the value of the camera? You'll only end up paying more tax.

Also, you're mentioning sums in £££, where did you buy this product from? If it's from the UK there's no duty to pay!

Selik

Does anyone actually have any idea how MUCH tax I might have to pay though or how I can minimize it?

Selik

eth0_ wrote:

Why would you INCREASE the value of the camera? You'll only end up paying more tax.

Also, you're mentioning sums in £££, where did you buy this product from? If it's from the UK there's no duty to pay!

Bought from www.ebay.co.uk but posted from Hong Kong.

WizZard

DOn't fake it for €600 anyway. They will want ot charge you VAT and Import Duty. Not sure how much import duty is (flat fee) but VAT @ 21%. You do the maths.
Fake it (if you dare for a lot less, say £100). Where did it come from?

krattapopov

hong kong..... theres the dilemma, my mate had to pay around 50 euro

is_that_so

Posting from outside EU makes it liable to VAT and Duty. Duty is payable on any items over €45 (pitiful amount). Friend of mine got stuff from HK, apparently duty depends on custom's valuation of it.

Selik

Ok so considering the w@nkers I bought the camera from didnt mark it as a "gift" for some reason if I printed off the email receipt I got from Ebay after changing the price to let's say £130 (so it doesn't look too unrealistic) and faxed customs a copy would that work ok? I hope they don't expect a proper invoice coz you just don't get them with these types of purhcases!

A Dub in Glasgo

The fee you will pay is based on the actual purchase price you paid. You want that purchase price to be as low as possible therefore you should send a copy of your receipt to them.

The retailer you purchased the camera from should have declared the value on the package. The customs office appear not believe this figure. The retailer could have undervalued it or the customs just think that what you paid is too cheap. Either way, they can only charge you based on what you paid, not for a like for like price in Ireland.

What retailer did you buy from?

You are quoting £ in your post, this suggests you bought it from a UK company? If you did, you do not have to pay anything to customs (afaik)

Edit: too late with all the questions!

sickle

yeah i got stuff from the US worth about €300 and had to pay about €30...was roughly 10% anyway
pain in the arse i tells ya!

eth0_

Giles wrote:

Ok so considering the w@nkers I bought the camera from didnt mark it as a "gift" for some reason

IT DOES NOT MATTER IF AN ITEM IS MARKED 'GIFT'! It's still liable for customs tax.

A Dub in Glasgo

A gift is only if it is send from a private individual and the allowance is only 45euro. Anything over that is liable.

Selik

Here's the exact auction I purchased from if it's help to all of you guys...

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3861584851&ed=1104023700000&ssPageName=ADME:B:EOT:UK:3

P.S. Thanks for all this advice on this matter I appreciate if! Isn't Boards.ie just great...

A Dub in Glasgo

Giles wrote:

Ok so considering the w@nkers I bought the camera from didnt mark it as a "gift" for some reason if I printed off the email receipt I got from Ebay after changing the price to let's say £130 (so it doesn't look too unrealistic) and faxed customs a copy would that work ok? I hope they don't expect a proper invoice coz you just don't get them with these types of purhcases!

I would not go faking it, you may find the customs will confiscate the item if they suspect and charge you with fraud!

You probably bought the camera off a reseller for a company in HK, they are not about to commit fraud by marking the package down to 45euro and saying gift.

A Dub in Glasgo

The seller has even warned you

Buyer should be informed that applicable import duties (or GST or V.A.T. or other Taxes) might be imposed in various countries. In most case, that is none or little payable. In our auction, however, does exclude any tax/duty if applicable. We will put legal effort to minimize such fees. In case you are purchasing this item as gift, please let us know accordingly so that we can mark custom document on your parcel as gift. We are not gurantee, but we will do all we can legally to help you reducing your V.A.T exposure upon buyer's request.

Selik

A Dub in Glasgo wrote:

I would not go faking it, you may find the customs will confiscate the item if they suspect and charge you with fraud!

You probably bought the camera off a reseller for a company in HK, they are not about to commit fraud by marking the package down to 45euro and saying gift.

Fair enough but I'll be gutted if they ask me to pay 20% of what I paid for it AND an import duty charge(anyone know how much this is?)

Selik

Screw this I'm never buying from Hong Kong again too much f*cking hassle! I hope the w@nkers will post the item onto me as well as I have absolutely NO way of getting out to their offices in Naas during their ridiculously narrow hours of business (typical lazy government dept...)

is_that_so

Giles wrote:

Screw this I'm never buying from Hong Kong again too much f*cking hassle! I hope the w@nkers will post the item onto me as well as I have absolutely NO way of getting out to their offices in Naas during their ridiculously narrow hours of business (typical lazy government dept...)

Buy in EU in future and you won't have that problem, still fairly decent prices around for stuff.

A Dub in Glasgo

Even with a customs charge, you got a bargain!

Selik

I'll only know if I got a bargain when I know how much I'm going to have to fork out to Customs. Price on www.amazon.co.uk is only £30 more and if I'd bought from there or even www.pixmania.com it would've saved me all this bloody hassle!

CrowdedHouse

I had to pay €88 on $300 dollar watch,I think the duty was €7,€8 fees to FedEx and the rest VAT.I still saved about €180 on Irish price so wasn't TOO annoyed.

Selik

Ei2JC wrote:

I had to pay €88 on $300 dollar watch,I think the duty was €7,€8 fees to FedEx and the rest VAT.I still saved about €180 on Irish price so wasn't TOO annoyed.

How did customs calculate your VAT charge? Did you provide them with an invoice or did they assume the value of the watch themselves?

Selik

Ok so I've been in contact with seller and it turns out that they did put an invoice with the parcel for $500 HK which is around €50. Customs obviously don't believe this so they're asking me for the invoice. I've asked the seller to fake an email invoice for £100 to me so fingers crossed!

CrowdedHouse

Giles-in my case the guy that sent it put that value(300 US$) on the declaration,although it came from Austrailia!
Watch made in Switzerland-sent to Oz-bought and shipped by FedeX to a fella in Ireland.........and even paying duty etc still ends up much cheaper- will some one explain this to me !!

RainyDay

A significant part of the reason why the online price is cheaper than the retail price is down to duties. The guy in the shop has to pay the same duty on the camera.

Faking an invoice constitutes illegal tax evasion. I really do hope that the Customs guys (who might not be half as dumb as you assume, and might just be capable of Googling to find a current price for the item) confiscate the item and even consider prosecution.

Tax/Duty evasion is not a victimless crime. It deprives the state of income which can be used to provide public services. You may not like the tax, but you have no legal right to evade the tax. This puts you in the same ethical slimepool as Haughey, Lawlor, Flynn et al.

Pay the duty.

Lump

Tell them to get bent, Explain that it's a gift from a friend in Hong Kong and that they forgot to mark it up as such.... Tell them the value is only €300. They can't tax you on a gift once it's less then a certain amount €500 I think.


John

ageary2003

I love the way you call everybody w@nkers like there your worst enemy, customs is simply how things work, you still got a bargin over eu prices so paying a small bit extra shouldnt be that much distress. They site gave a clear warning this could happen, so theres nothing to do but pay the bills, dont try and dodge it or else things could get worse.

I wonder if you ever need to draw the dole or get illness benifit will you be calling the tax collecters w@nkers ?

The_Conductor

Lump wrote:

Tell them to get bent, Explain that it's a gift from a friend in Hong Kong and that they forgot to mark it up as such.... Tell them the value is only €300. They can't tax you on a gift once it's less then a certain amount €500 I think.


John

I disagree.

First and foremost customs duty is collected by the different courier companies on behalf of the Revenue Commissioners. Your package is being held by the Courier Company, not by the Revenue Commissioners (Customs).

Regardless of the nature of the package- once it reaches a certain threshold (45 Euro) it becomes liable for both VAT (at 21%) and customs duty (which varies at different rates depending on the type of good) if the good is shipped from outside the EU or EFTA.

A personal example of this - I imported a Matsuomi DVD player (as a replacement for a defective DVD drive in an Apple Powerbook) from China in November. The drive cost 125 Euro. It was stopped when coming into the country (via the US) by GLS and I was served with a customs demand for 52 Euro (44 Euro Duty and VAT, and 8 Euro handling charge).

I was annoyed, but figured that I wouldn't get anywhere by arguing- if I refused to accept the package it would be sent surface back to its origin (which I was advised could take 3 or 4 months)- so I paid up.

In many cases you may get away without paying a customs demand- but the letter of the law is that it must be paid. You cannot expect to get away without paying it- in the old days a much smaller number of packages were checked, but recently with the advent of pirated goods, a much larger percentage of packages are checked. If a package originates in a particular region it may have an increased risk of being checked, but once again you are playing a game of statistics.

Put a reasonable evaluation on the good (from the point of origin- not local prices which already have VAT and duty factored in). Pop it into the office and wait and see what happens. Its annoying, but not paying their demand may result in your loosing the camera altogether without recompense. You have already sunk X into purchasing it, adding Y to the sunk cost, while annoying, is a necessity if you want to get your camera......

S.

Bri

I'm intigued that they would catch a camera. In my naivety I thought they stopped heavy/big packages. Do they simply pick up every 3rd parcel and shake it?!

I agree with the sentiments about you calling them w@nkers (reads as wOnkers to me everytime!) just be thankful you bought it outside of this country and are still saving money.

Also, given the gift limit at 45...what happens if you put NCV (No Commercial Value) on a package?
While this might not 'work' for pre-packaged cameras, how would they get clothes with labels removed?

Oh and finally - if your not buying an single item over 45eu but the aggregate price is well over that is it actually worth the bother of shipping each item seperatley? In my head the shipping cost should be similar to one large package minus the seperate packaging...or am I totally wrong and once each good is under 45 can they be bundled legally?

Selik

ageary2003 wrote:

I love the way you call everybody w@nkers like there your worst enemy, customs is simply how things work, you still got a bargin over eu prices so paying a small bit extra shouldnt be that much distress. They site gave a clear warning this could happen, so theres nothing to do but pay the bills, dont try and dodge it or else things could get worse.

I wonder if you ever need to draw the dole or get illness benifit will you be calling the tax collecters w@nkers ?

The whole point of me starting this thread is the fact that I WON'T be getting a flippin bargain if I have to pay 20% VAT on the price I paid for the camera and import duty! I'll end up costing me quit a bit more than if I shopped at www.amazon.co.uk or www.pixmania.com. Oh and I'll call them w@nkers if I want to it's nothing personal towards the guys who work it's more representative of how I feel about alot of things in this country. God forbid I actually trya be smart and save money by buying online as opposed to going into a Sony Centre and paying their joke prices.... And they better deliver this to me coz I stated before I have no way of getting to their Naas Road offices between 9am - 12:30pm and 2pm - 4pm on weekdays. Another thing about this country - why the hell does everywhere (especially Post Offices & collection companies) only open when most of the population are working? The amount of hassle I have to go though to even get stuff from my local PO at times is unbelievable!

Selik

Some more companies and servies I class in the W-ANKER category:

O2
Esat BT
Revenue
My apartment management company
Eircom

Plenty more I'm but I'm not sufficiently enraged this morning to think of them!

A Dub in Glasgo

Giles wrote:

The whole point of me starting this thread is the fact that I WON'T be getting a flippin bargain if I have to pay 20% VAT on the price I paid for the camera and import duty! I'll end up costing me quit a bit more than if I shopped at www.amazon.co.uk or www.pixmania.com. Oh and I'll call them w@nkers if I want to it's nothing personal towards the guys who work it's more representative of how I feel about alot of things in this country. God forbid I actually trya be smart and save money by buying online as opposed to going into a Sony Centre and paying their joke prices.... And they better deliver this to me coz I stated before I have no way of getting to their Naas Road offices between 9am - 12:30pm and 2pm - 4pm on weekdays. Another thing about this country - why the hell does everywhere (especially Post Offices & collection companies) only open when most of the population are working? The amount of hassle I have to go though to even get stuff from my local PO at times is unbelievable!

Sorry Giles, if you had factored in the likely cost of customs and excise, you would have been better off buying it from those sites. The problem was, you attempted to get the camera cheaper and try and get it squeezed by customs. Your gamble failed and you might end up with a camera that cost slightly more than the ones in the websites listed. That is life, you should learn to factor in the likely cost of the customs. It is not a hiddenor stealth tax as the information is widely available and your seller even warned you that this might happen.

I ;do agree though that the personal importation limit is too low but you would have been caught if the government had raised it to a more reasonable value.

Selik

Fair enough I will obviously learn from this but I'm sure you can understand my being a little peeved.... From the hassle point of view more than anything else I mean I shoul have the camera now and it's annoying me (I want to start taking pictures gaddammit!!!)

A Dub in Glasgo

Giles wrote:

Fair enough I will obviously learn from this but I'm sure you can understand my being a little peeved.... From the hassle point of view more than anything else I mean I shoul have the camera now and it's annoying me (I want to start taking pictures gaddammit!!!)

I certainly do understand, I have been hit a number of times when importing Region 1 DVD boxsets into the UK and the success rate getting my packages through customs is about 50%. Even with the customs charge though, I am getting the DVDs cheaper.

halkar

Giles, don't fake anything, it is more likely stopped because your supplier put some sort of value on the box when shipping, they do these for insurance purposes. Just go and see what happens.

My little tip for you, if they had put value on the box make sure you check if it is Euro, US$ or HK$, they do make mistakes with the currency and I have been charged more twice, for them mistaken the Canadian $s to €€s. It might not happen in your case as 1€ is about 10HK$ but you never know

Mimikyu

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The_Conductor

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

You've been lucky- or below the threshold. Its a calculated risk.

S.

Mimikyu

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therecklessone

Giles wrote:

Another thing about this country - why the hell does everywhere (especially Post Offices & collection companies) only open when most of the population are working?

Is it not obvious? They're working the same hours as the rest of the population...

I'm glad to see you're starting to see some sense regarding the probable outcome of this episode, cos to be honest I had very little sympathy for you when you posted at first.

Buying from outside the EU is a dodgy business. Some you win, some you lose. In this case you lost.

is_that_so

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

Recently they have started clamping down on it, although I have heard of the random checks before. Also if you pay for courier charges you will have to pay any duty and VAT once you go over 45 Euro, gift or no gift.

Duckjob

They're more vigilant at this time of year due to the extra expenditure associated with Christmas.

ExoduS 18.11

pay the money, and be glad for the amount you saved from not purchasing it in ireland.

lomb

the state has a right to vat all non essential purchases at 21%.

wheres the problem, we all have to contribute, otherwise we might as well go back to living in caves and not CIVILisation.

JackKelly

lol, your complaing about the rules!

"damn poilce, i ran someone over today, and they had the cheek to come and arrest me"

As said before, your lucky to get that camera so cheap anyway.Even with customs.

Selik

halkar wrote:

Giles, don't fake anything, it is more likely stopped because your supplier put some sort of value on the box when shipping, they do these for insurance purposes. Just go and see what happens.

My little tip for you, if they had put value on the box make sure you check if it is Euro, US$ or HK$, they do make mistakes with the currency and I have been charged more twice, for them mistaken the Canadian $s to €€s. It might not happen in your case as 1€ is about 10HK$ but you never know

The seller has already forwarded me an invoice (at my request) stating that I paid £100 sterling for the camera. I'm gonna print this off and fax it to customs on Monday. I don't see how they can argue with it it's even hand written! I'll try and put the file up on the net somewhere so you guys can have a look at it. It's very convincing as it's handwritten and in docket form with a big "PAID" stamp on it. In fact - there shouldn't even be an issue with this it's so convincing...

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Selik

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

I think I'll take my chances on that one smart-ass....

Selik

I managed to get the a PDF of the invoice online so here it is!!!

https://createpdf.adobe.com/cgi-pickup.pl/EE600579073HK_inovice.pdf?BP=IE&LOC=en_US&CUS=78b21c3a203efa57c4035f2698f58937&CDS=41E16D06-1E24-006DEB