UKC

Hi folks,

Can anyone shed some light on what sort of extra fees (customs duties, import tax, etc) you have to pay on used goods that are shipped in from outside the UK? With the chaos of brexit it's hard to find clear info anywhere about it and I'm worried about getting slapped with a bill for £500 in various taxes once my package arrives.

The item in question is a used speedwing valued at about €900 being sent from Switzerland that I'm buying through facebook marketplace.

Cheers

Duty and VAT are levied on ALL goods.

Duty and VAT are on the "value" of the goods - you can't just slap down a spurious purchase receipt of £2.50 for a Faberge egg and expect it to sail through.

to avoid delay and potential lost packages, you're relying on the sender getting the right paperwork in place.....

all the best, n good luck

Not that it makes a difference now, but were you to do the same purchase pre-brexit you'd still be slapped wth the self-same charges as Switzerland was never in the customs union. Learnt that the hard way

Same thing with Norway as i'm a slow learner...

You'll get charged 20% vat on the combined value of the goods AND postage, a possible 2.something% duty depending how the seller codes it for export, and a £10/£15 handlng fee from the courier/RM/handler

What about ones which have previously been in the UK and had VAT paid, for example a boat that was bought in the UK and VAT paid and subsequently moved out of the UK and is now being sold back into the UK?  The UK boating mags used to be full of 'UK VAT paid' classifieds.

Then it was never exported for tax purposes. No doubt the boating mags are full of stuff from expats that suddenly found their boats suddenly needed to be imported to Spain or wherever because of Brexit. Previously (pre-EU) one usually had 6 months then it was an import and you paid.