06-01-2020, 05:36 AM
(This post was last modified: 06-02-2020, 04:03 AM by CrowdOfOne.)
Hey,
Just wondering if those who have received a Pinetime could give an idea of what, if any, customs and import there were.
Personally would be interested in United Kingdom & Europe, though any part of the world really, as this thread may be helpful to others.
I had 2 delivered to the UK in the same package. No delay in customs, and no duty to pay.
£25.50 tax and £8.00 handling fee.
UK.
Sent from my LYA-L09 using Tapatalk
Woaw. That's way over the cost of the device. Can you please confirm if that was definitely for the Pinetime, rather than say a Pinebook Pro?
In theory anything over (I think) £17 should be picked up by the delivery company and they will charge you VAT and duty. However it is a bit of a lottery whether the package will get noticed or not (especially for something physically small and light like a PineTime).
A today's exchange rate it looks like PineTime cost ~£20 plus postage which means if the delivery company did notice it then they you'd attract around £13 of charges (most of which is the handling charge rather than the actual tax costs).
Cheers Daniel, that's a really great answer. I sort of knew it was likely just beyond threshold and the taxes should be low, but you're right... it's the handling charge that makes it expensive. Thanks for taking the time to separate those two - explaining it in the way you did really helps to see it in a clearer light.
This is going off-topic, but as far as I previously understood it the handling charges are applied if the tax has not been declared or paid before import; however, I have always struggled to understand how it might be possible to do that.
I've previously paid $25 (appropriately enough) for an item off ebay, sent from the US, which was part of their 'global shipping programme' (which takes care of the item clearing customs). $8 postage turned into $26, along with import charges of $14, though I'm not sure how much the actual custom charges really were as ebay's T&C state they include: 'Third party brokerage fees (including advancement and disbursement charges and customs brokers handling and filing fee'. And nowhere in the T&C's do they break down what those fees are.
If I were ordering the Pine Phone or a Pinebook Pro handling charges become a minor percentage of the overal cost; however, with an item that costs $36 inc. p&p I wouldn't be surprised to find out that undeclared duties basically doubled that cost. Especially as it would be reasonable to assume their'd be even higher than those ebay paid in advance on my behalf.
Anyhow, really appreciate everyone that has chimed in with answers so far. Thank you. I'd like to try my hand at developing for Pinetime and it's just unfortunate that something so completely extraneous is an obstacle to following that urge.
Thanks Wibble. Your info about customs and about having recieved a Pinetime yourself is most helpful.
Hello,
i just received my PineTime this week, and had to pay 22 € tax for importing to Germany
Bw
Angelo
