UK Customs Charge Ridiculous!

Paulg2uk

Paulg2uk

Power User
Hi all,

My AXE FX 2 was gonna be delivered today but unfortunately UPS wouldn't let me have it without me paying the customs charge as its from the US and I'm in the UK. UPS driver said he could only accept cash or cheque and no card over the phone. I reckon he just couldn't be bothered myself. I was at work so I couldn't do anything.

The custom charge was quite a bit too. £377.97 Rip off UK yet again. I've had guitars sent from the US before and they didn't cost as much as this did.

Anyone else had and ridiculous customs charges on anything? Or had trouble with deliveries?
 
Hey Paul,
I am not from Europe but I do a lot of shipping with couriers. UPS has some of the highest customs fees around. They use their own customs broker and mark up the customs fees. I ordered my standard and paid like $60.00 for customs (using Canada Post/USPS) but now that its UPS only I think we will all be paying higher fees. I wish we coud still ship via Canada POst. I ordered $450 bucks of pickups and circutry and ups carged me $88.00 for fees. Thats 20% of the purchase is customs fees. UPS Sucks. But since I want shipping to Canada I'll takes what I can gets.
 
I feel you pain mate........had similar with DHL to UK.

I paid the charges online then the shipped it out.

The only other option is to wait on G66 stock and as far as i'm concerned that is not gonna happen anytime soon.

It's worth it though.
 
I feel your pain buddy. I have been killed for it lately. Thankfully I managed to get mine sent here in a packaged marked for $500 so they only screwed me for about 100 odd quid. Its risky business though...
 
Yeah it's 20% VAT plus about 5-7% duty, you also pay VAT on shipping cost as well as the value of the item, Sucks :(
 
Yeah that VAT tax is really high. I live in the U.S. but I have shipped alot of equipment around the World and the one place that really was a pain for the customer was Belgium.

But when ever possible use U.S.P.S. and DHL is a joke. Those clowns left a $8,000.00+ drumkit at the end of my driveway once!
 
Thanks for the comments guys.

Its a joke I reckon with the recession they are the only ones making any money with what they charge. I could of got it sent for less but do I take a chance in a piece of kit like that?

After I sent a Boogie amp over to Russia a few weeks back I'm not so sure. The amp turned up finally after a week (was suppose to be delivered within 2 days) it was damaged and dropped by customs.

The company I used to send it couldn't tell me what happened to it as they stopped tracking it after it left the UK. Complete idiots. So as far as they are concerned its lost. I just can't believe what I'm hearing half the time.
 
Which is of course offset by the fact you are not paying $1300 a month health insurance.
 
Ouch. The US and UK don't have a free-trade agreement?

Australia and the US have one so we only pay 10% GST (our version of VAT) - there are no additional tariffs or customs charges.
 
Manning said:
Ouch. The US and UK don't have a free-trade agreement?

Australia and the US have one so we only pay 10% GST (our version of VAT) - there are no additional tariffs or customs charges.
Click to expand...

I also thought so, those countries are part of the Free trade area... maybe it is just the VAT (they say it is 20%, so...).
 
Customs charges are ridiculous also in Finland. I got lucky since my AXE II shipped from US to EU cost only $299+VAT+customer fees. Yes, it was a defective unit, but works well enough for me :D
 
Paulg2uk said:
Hi all,

My AXE FX 2 was gonna be delivered today but unfortunately UPS wouldn't let me have it without me paying the customs charge as its from the US and I'm in the UK. UPS driver said he could only accept cash or cheque and no card over the phone. I reckon he just couldn't be bothered myself. I was at work so I couldn't do anything.

The custom charge was quite a bit too. £377.97 Rip off UK yet again. I've had guitars sent from the US before and they didn't cost as much as this did.

Anyone else had and ridiculous customs charges on anything? Or had trouble with deliveries?
Click to expand...

a qute from 5 yrs ago try this: add to original price 20% + 3,7 % import duty and let see if that changed.

Music Man Petrucci 5 yrs ago..
 
20% VAT is the killer.

however, I cold never get my head around why you have to pay VAT on the carriage? Thats got nothing to do with the item itself and the vast majority of that price is taken with transport outside of the UK. Thats the real ripoff.
 
Think that's ridiculous? I'm from the Caribbean. We're talking about:

-20% customs
- 20% vat
- shipping (which is quite significant)

Trust me when I say that it is quite prohibitive to bring stuff like the axe in......which is why I ask people to not include an invoice when they ship - I don't ask for falsifying forms, but with this kind of cost, you can probably understand it is done - it's just TOOOOOO MUCH!!! :S

So far, I've been able to escape customs with the axes I've brought in, and I'm lucky - I'd have to pay about 1/2 the price of the axe to get it in my hands....
 
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