Did you have to pay import tax and how much was it?

[Foxchild]

UK, 20% VAT on the declared value (USD25) = £3.81, plus £8.00 Royal Mail Handling fee = £11.81 total.

I really think the Asendia experiment was an awful experience and, at least for the UK, would prefer China post or DHL (or ANYONE else) in future. It was expensive, it was slow, and 3 weeks with no tracking updates is ridiculous.

I did contact Asendia directly - the first time they said it was not in their system. When I sent a screenshot showing it was, they blamed Royal Mail. This was during the 3 week blackout period - they were the last people to touch it but they clearly have a Teflon (nothing sticks here) attitude to business. If there is anything more I can do or say to help prevent anyone else having such a rubbish experience I am happy to help!

... but you ended up paying less than 12 quid in the end. Would you rather pay £30-40 and have it in a week?

[edit] the above could be read as tentative on my end, its not, I am honestly asking: would you rather pay more and have it quicker?

Yes, please! I would really like to pay more and have it in less than a month!
The whole Asendia shipping experiment was a terrible idea and I will never order at pine64 again if I am not completely sure that it's not being shipped by asendia.

Also, you really have to work on keeping your customers informed and up to date. I really don't think that the little post about some shipping issues because of corona virus was nearly enough.

---

A low value and ticking the gift box means an instant investigation in Czechia. Please don't do this. I had to send store receipt plus bank statement confirming the price. I paid 828CZK plus 200CZK handling fee. So that's 1028CZK total, or 45USD.

This happened to me (in Sweden) too. I will be paying 58€ and customs has had it since the 27th, today it was cleared.

I rather have it marked with what it actually is and with the actual value since it will a rather smooth affair to get through customs if everything is in order.

Is this true? Asendia marked packages as "gift"?   Besides not being very intelligent, that is not quite legal. No wonder my package has been with customs for a week...

[qrsBRWN]

UK, 20% VAT on the declared value (USD25) = £3.81, plus £8.00 Royal Mail Handling fee = £11.81 total.

I really think the Asendia experiment was an awful experience and, at least for the UK, would prefer China post or DHL (or ANYONE else) in future. It was expensive, it was slow, and 3 weeks with no tracking updates is ridiculous.

I did contact Asendia directly - the first time they said it was not in their system. When I sent a screenshot showing it was, they blamed Royal Mail. This was during the 3 week blackout period - they were the last people to touch it but they clearly have a Teflon (nothing sticks here) attitude to business. If there is anything more I can do or say to help prevent anyone else having such a rubbish experience I am happy to help!

... but you ended up paying less than 12 quid in the end. Would you rather pay £30-40 and have it in a week?

[edit] the above could be read as tentative on my end, its not, I am honestly asking: would you rather pay more and have it quicker?

Yes, please! I would really like to pay more and have it in less than a month!
The whole Asendia shipping experiment was a terrible idea and I will never order at pine64 again if I am not completely sure that it's not being shipped by asendia.

Also, you really have to work on keeping your customers informed and up to date. I really don't think that the little post about some shipping issues because of corona virus was nearly enough.

---

A low value and ticking the gift box means an instant investigation in Czechia. Please don't do this. I had to send store receipt plus bank statement confirming the price. I paid 828CZK plus 200CZK handling fee. So that's 1028CZK total, or 45USD.

This happened to me (in Sweden) too. I will be paying 58€ and customs has had it since the 27th, today it was cleared.

I rather have it marked with what it actually is and with the actual value since it will a rather smooth affair to get through customs if everything is in order.

Is this true? Asendia marked packages as "gift"?   Besides not being very intelligent, that is not quite legal. No wonder my package has been with customs for a week...

They also claimed it was worth $25 which took me receipts and a few hours to explain.

Now it's supposed to be en route to me at last so...

[dukla2000]

Is this true? Asendia marked packages as "gift"?   Besides not being very intelligent, that is not quite legal. No wonder my package has been with customs for a week...

This is, IMHO, a really tricky area. The standard shipping label has tick box options for
Gift
Commercial Sample
Documents
Other

In reality Pine should go with Other I guess, although nearly 100% of what I import has Gift ticked. At least in the UK it makes little difference as UK customs only believes in Gifts between private individuals, so it ignores the ticks in the Gift box in 99.9% of cases.

Pine did accurately describe the contents as a PinePhone Brave Heart, value USD25. Again IMHO this is probably fair for the BOM costs but is risky on the low side. If UK customs get upset with this valuation they decree the value is what you paid (including P&P) and proceed on that basis.

[mogwai]

It took 2+ weeks after shipping from HK for the phone to appear in the local postal services tracker here in Belgium.
It's been stuck in customs ever since, which is now about 2 weeks ago. I haven't heard anything from the customs office; no call/letter/email for extra information. I can't even find any contact information for the customs office to ask them about the progress. I'm getting a desperate here.
I just hope to ever receive it...

Getting back on topic: I've read stories from other Belgians that have received their phones (one or two days after they arrived in the country). It seems they paid an extra ~70 EUR, though: ~30 EUR flat fee to pay for the privilege of having customs "investigate" the parcel + ~35 EUR VAT. So that adds up to a ridiculous ~50% extra.

So I have to chime in: please also offer other options than Asendia in the future. It's not only ridiculously slow to get it to Belgium, but also ridiculously expensive. Those 10 EUR extra don't really make a difference anymore, especially if you get your shipment weeks earlier.

PS: Re-reading the text above, I sound a bit bitter. Well, I actually am, but only about the shipping process (mostly due to Belgian customs). I'm still really, really psyched about the phone.

[8jef]

Got the Pinephone tonight.

No tax to pay for me. I'm  in Canada.

Declared value on custom label was USD$25, which seems low enough.

Hope I'll find time to play with it soon. I'm so looking forward to that. Was able to boot and test, and get a full charge.

Did you get it in east Canada?

Yup, near Montreal

[hex]

Yes, UK, £11.81 (£8 for handling, £3.81 for VAT).

[hmmmmm]

PS: Re-reading the text above, I sound a bit bitter. Well, I actually am, but only about the shipping process (mostly due to Belgian customs). I'm still really, really psyched about the phone.

Why are you bitter about Belgian customs? They didn't put $25 and gift on the package.

[llnu]

Switzerland ~48 chf.
The customs asked for price confirmation which took extra 7 days to finish (total 10).
At least it's here^^

[quixote]

No import tax charged. I'm in New Zealand. The usual rule here is that if it's less than NZ$300 they don't charge import tax, so it would have been odd if they had tacked that on.

Mine shipped, if I remember right, Jan 22 (or maybe that's when it left Hong Kong? one of the two) and arrived here Feb 11. So, on the slow side, but it's even nicer that shipping costs did not break the bank.

[someGermanGuy]

Switzerland ~48 chf.
The customs asked for price confirmation which took extra 7 days to finish (total 10).
At least it's here^^

Unfortunately i can not PM you. 
There should be no tax but 7.7% VAT.
The other fee is from the shipping company. Please dont mix that! 
It would be nice to have the costs separately listed. Could you do that please?
So pine64 knows how bad the courier is because thats the price trap.