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Stung by a customs charge for the first time and confused :|

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Stung by a customs charge for the first time and confused :|
Not sure if this has been mentioned (skim read the thread), but I THINK they include postage costs in the total? I'm sure I read that somewhere a while ago, it's gotten me a few times too... I know that wasn't the case this time (such an annoying error! :(), but just a heads up to you guys :) I could be wrong but I always remember that postage seems to be included, like if a pack was a gift and worth $20 but postage was $7, it's over by $2...

Having said that, I've received many packages that have been worth over £25/$25 by quite a bit and still not gotten charged for them, so who knows which flawed system they're using?! :P
 
And what's even more stupid? Not sure how it goes in other countries, but over here, when you recieve something with fees, it just has an A4 paper with it, saying "administration costs 15 € & customs fees ... €".
So how on earth are you knowing what you are really paying for? So it's really just to trick people. Surely you must be paying for a certain item(s) then?

Ugh, this gets me on my horse so badly, haha :lol:
 
I always put less than $15 and gift when shipping internationally. There have been so many problems with customs that it prevents easy trades and sales from happening at all :( to be safe keep the value as low as possible without being ridiculous.

I hope it works out, keep bugging them until they see it your way ;)
 
The fees wouldn't be so bad if Royal Mail didn't charge you £8 for them putting a sticker on the parcel! It's really not that hard to print out a sticker Royal Mail -____-

I've only been stung once in recent months, and it was for a $30 parcel and I got charged £12 fees :/ it's so silly!
 
My last customs charge was about £20. Nome of that was for customs though. About £3 of it was VAT and the rest was a Royal Mail 'handling fee' when I asked the bloke what they do with the money, he couldn't give me a straight answer. Basically they are robbing *insert angry word here* ..
 
I feel for you guys....I am sorry... Usually I put $20 on my packages even if it is worth more, because I heard they would charge if it was more... but I didn't know they are doing it for $20 now... I will do $15 from now on.

I told my postal worker about this a few weeks ago and he was floored. He was like "REALLY?"
 
Yes postage is included in the custom fee (well it is here in Ireland anyway)So the total declared value is added to the postage value and then the tax is calculated on that. Ups and Fedex are the worst for handling fees, I was caught badly once by Fedex. Along with the customs charge/tax there was a large handling fee (far more than the customs charge) something like €25......eh for what exactly!!!!!!
If I send anything outside of Europe I now send it by registered post (as it's traceable) and put a value of €10 on it.
 
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Whats annoying is that even if customs own up and refund you the excise duty, the PO fee of £8 is not refundable under any circumstances. The PO charge that for having to shell out the excise duty and then recoup it from you. If HM Customs make a mistake incurring you the £8 PO charge, they should refund you that part too! But good luck with that!!
 
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