UK to USA: Import or Taxes?

[Chrissy]

Don’t forget that as the pen is export you can ask for the 20% Value Added Tax to be removed by filling in a form so that’ll bring the price down to $250.

Fangfarrier


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Absolutely! I thought about this last night while I was in bed. You can definitely request that the item value on the Customs form should be VAT free.

[Linger]

Ehm, hello? Claiming VAT back in country of purchase and under-declaring, or not declaring at all, in country of residence? How can you not see this as tax evasion? Or smuggling for that matter?

Don’t get me wrong, it did not feel fine to pay NL import duties and VAT on imports from the US and from Japan (and soon from the UK ) but that is the way it is...

[Chrissy]

Ehm, hello? Claiming VAT back in country of purchase and under-declaring, or not declaring at all, in country of residence? How can you not see this as tax evasion? Or smuggling for that matter?

Don’t get me wrong, it did not feel fine to pay NL import duties and VAT on imports from the US and from Japan (and soon from the UK ) but that is the way it is...

Are you saying that the US have to charge Import Tax calculated on the 20% VAT that was already charged in the export Country?
I don't think I said that the 20% VAT should actually be claimed back, but merely suggested the Customs form should not include the VAT portion as part of the value of the item. If it was included then the US could be charging Import tax on the 20% VAT that has already been paid, when it shouldn't have been paid in the first place. That's why I said You can definitely request that the item value on the Customs form should be VAT free.
If the pen is just over $300 then declaring the value without VAT on the Customs form might be enough.

[Voiren]

Ehm, hello? Claiming VAT back in country of purchase and under-declaring, or not declaring at all, in country of residence? How can you not see this as tax evasion? Or smuggling for that matter?

Don’t get me wrong, it did not feel fine to pay NL import duties and VAT on imports from the US and from Japan (and soon from the UK ) but that is the way it is...

You do not need to pay VAT if you're buying from a VAT-registered seller and you are from a country outside the EU buying from inside it, for example. This is why there are some EU eBay sellers who aim at buyers outside the EU and say that any from inside will need to pay VAT on top (which really annoys me as a pricing model, but hey).

You do of course need to pay your own country's fees, taxes and duties.

[mulrich]

I thought the import duty threshold was changed to $800 a couple years ago (around 2015/16). Maybe it was changed back more recently.

[Trystanglobal]

Do you have any experience buying a pen from the UK and having it sent to the US?

Are there any import fees, taxes or other expenses incurred or does it simply arrive?

I’ve bought a few pens from Japan and not had any issues but I’m considering a purchase from the UK and it would be my first.

Now is the time to do this, exchange rates are almost as low as they’ve ever been. Value for the dollar is at an all time high.


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[Ray-VIgo]

I don't buy highly expensive pens from the UK, but I've never had any problems. For English-made pens, my favorites are Stephens lever fillers. They're affordable and usually wonderful writers. I also have a beautiful Mabie Todd English Blackbird, again not an expensive pen, but a good one to have.

[Turquoise]

For him to break the law?

.

I would guess that he is much more likely to agree to write the value as $300 than to agree to actually sell it to you for less. The value of an item does not necessarily have to exactly match the price paid for it. It can be what it is worth. However, what he writes will need to be the insurance value. That's not breaking the law.

One thing to think about when requesting a lower value is, as Chrissy has noted, that value becomes your insurance value — if the pen gets lost or damaged, the declared value, not the purchase price, will be all that the courier will reimburse. If the difference is big enough, you could be out of pocket as well as out of pen.

[TFarnon]

My solution to the whole customs issue is to only purchase pens from non-USA sellers when my purchase price is less than $200. That used to be the limit before customs got involved, but I could be wildly out of date. In any case, if I want a pen that costs more, I purchase from a US seller, even if it costs more. I figure that's the tariffs and customs bit, plus they get to deal with whatever paperwork was involved. I know this limits my pen choices a bit, but I'm not yet to the point of wanting to deal with customs myself. There are still plenty of pens for me either available through US sellers or for less than $200. We will just agree to not discuss how many "plenty" already has become, okay

[emver]

Why not ask the seller to declare the value on the shipping label as just under $300?

The value of the item for tax purposes is determined by the customs official, not by the receipt from the seller. Otherwise everybody would falsify their receipts. If the customs official decides it's worth $300
then that's the value he uses to calculate any duty. Whether you paid $3 or $3000 is not relevant.

Here in the UK import duties on low value items seem quite arbitrary and are determined by the whims of customs officers. I've bought lawnmower parts from the USA for up to £100 which have escaped any duty,
yet used cameras bought for £80 from Japan have attracted £16 duty plus a £15 collection fee from the Post Office. All the cheap stuff I've bought from China has so far arrived without import duties, and quite often I've bought very cheap items (below £3) which cost less overall
than they would cost to post within the UK. How is that possible? And have our politicians stopped to wonder why we are overrun by cheap Chinese goods which rarely comply with our safety standards.

And while I'm on the subject, until very recently we were members of the European Union. We could import or export goods entirely tax free and without any effort from anywhere within the EU. Not any longer. We could also also choose to visit or live or work or study anywhere in the EU. Millions of us did those things and greatly enjoyed it, and millions of Europeans came here and greatly enriched our culture. But as a result of Brexit all of that has stopped. We inflicted this upon ourselves. Utterly astonishing madness!!!!!

[HerrFlik]

And while I'm on the subject, until very recently we were members of the European Union. We could import or export goods entirely tax free and without any effort from anywhere within the EU. Not any longer. We could also also choose to visit or live or work or study anywhere in the EU. Millions of us did those things and greatly enjoyed it, and millions of Europeans came here and greatly enriched our culture. But as a result of Brexit all of that has stopped. We inflicted this upon ourselves. Utterly astonishing madness!!!!!

You could never import and export goods as a personal buyer entirely tax free in the EU pre-brexit. The tax is paid in the country that sells you the product. Now post brexit for certain goods you can claim the tax back if you shop on the continent and take it back to UK, also now for online purchase the VAT is removed if you buy from UK and ship into EU which then adds its VAT rate dependent on the country. You could benefit from the pound to euro exchange rate but that is a seperate thing.

Apologies for cutting the quote down by the way.

[TFarnon]

I've been wondering about this: Let's say I find a vintage Conklin I can't live without from a UK or EU vendor. It's such a rare pen in such fine condition that the vendor wants $1200 for it, and I consider that a fair price. The pen in question was made in the US, and the imprint on the pen indicates that yes, it was made in America (probably the city and state it was made in). The seller correctly indicates the value of the pen as $1200. Would I have to pay a tariff on such a pen, considering it's being repatriated? I know that if the pen is over 100 years old, then it's considered an antique and tariffs aren't applicable. But what if this dream pen was made in 1948? Would a tariff be applicable?

I tried to look this up, but just finding the applicable tariffs for pens was difficult enough for me. This went well beyond my google-fu. And I'm just curious--there isn't a pen that fits the description on my wishlist, at least not at this time.

[junglejim]

Yes, you would have to pay a US Customs tax because the pen is over USD$800. It doesn't matter if the pen was "originally" made in the US 73 years ago. If the Seller sends it by Royal mail or the equivalent then USPS and US Customs may not probably catch it. If the Seller sends it by Fedex, UPS, or DHL Express, then the private companies will automatically embargo the package at their Customs Clearing warehouse, then email you a notice to pay for the proper Customs fee + their special "processing fee" (usually $15.) Ask me how I know, LOL!

[dneal]

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[Runnin_Ute]

The most expensive item I have purchased from the UK and had shipped to me here in the US was a Pelikan M400 White Tortoise from The Writing Desk. It was about $225 shipped. No additional charges were levied. I believe the number is around $800.

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[Bisquitlips]

I have purchased literally scores of pens from the UK and Europe in general. Many of them expensive (above $1000.00) and have not had an issue with import fees / taxes.

However, I am ready to pay the fees if needed.