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People of the UK - How much import tax did you pay?

Nipz

Nipz

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Nov 1, 2006
1,434
0
UK
About to get my Cousin in the US to pre order me a 32GB 3G iPad and wondered how much import tax i would be liable to pay? Need to factor this bad boy in :) i know its mean mentioned in many places but it will take forever to go back through all of them and find it :)

Hopefully i can get him to but birthday present on it and not get any but cant see that happening!

Cheers!
 
There is no Import Duty just the VAT which you work out by Cost of iPad in GBP times 1.175 :)
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

What about cost to post US to UK??
I'm thinking of doing the same thing!
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

Vat when it arrives in the UK?
How do you pay?
Confused !
 
redgaz26 said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

Vat when it arrives in the UK?
How do you pay?
Confused !
Click to expand...

Yeah the nice men at HM Revenue & Customs will inspect your parcel and then send you a lovely bill for the VAT due on your purchase.
 
sneeks said:
Yeah the nice men at HM Revenue & Customs will inspect your parcel and then send you a lovely bill for the VAT due on your purchase.
Click to expand...

Any way to get around this? The gift thing work?
 
I dunno if this would give you any indication but I had someone send me an iPhone 32gb 3GS from Australia (they're factory unlocked).
They put it as a gift and value of $100AUD and it was send fedex about a week or two later I received a letter from custom's asking for about £10 give or take a bit, considering the phone was worth more £600 I thought that was pretty darn decent :)
 
sazza85 said:
I dunno if this would give you any indication but I had someone send me an iPhone 32gb 3GS from Australia (they're factory unlocked).
They put it as a gift and value of $100AUD and it was send fedex about a week or two later I received a letter from custom's asking for about £10 give or take a bit, considering the phone was worth more £600 I thought that was pretty darn decent :)
Click to expand...

How does this work with insurance?
 
You can mark the price down but Customs will open some packages to check that the declared value matches the item which is being sent so it is no guarantee of a cheap tax bill.

You will only be insured for the declared value.
 
Nipz said:
How did you end up paying for that?
Click to expand...

Because it arrived at the depot, they didn't try to deliver it, they just called me and told me I'd need to collect it and pay to have it released.

heard stories on here that people get paper billed after the event, had that happen a month ago when I imported a new camera lens, but when I asked the woman at parcelforce on the phone this mornin she told me outright I'd need to clear the payment before they'd let me collect so I headed down with cash
 
Yeah Parcelforce have always demanded payment before they will release any item, FedEx etc usually send a invoice for the due amount within 2 weeks of delivery.
 
you guys sure you want to get a 3g? It will most likely be locked to AT&T. Plus, it uses a tiny sim that isnt used in anything else (here anyways)
 
farmermac said:
you guys sure you want to get a 3g? It will most likely be locked to AT&T. Plus, it uses a tiny sim that isnt used in anything else (here anyways)
Click to expand...

I don't want it just for the 3G I want it for the GPS as well :)
 
farmermac said:
you guys sure you want to get a 3g? It will most likely be locked to AT&T. Plus, it uses a tiny sim that isnt used in anything else (here anyways)
Click to expand...
It isn't locked to AT&T, it is unlocked... I thought that was common knowledge :)

For the person that is considering having theirs marked as gift be careful as if your package gets stolen/lost you are only insured for the gift value which is what £10/20?
 
northy124 said:
It isn't locked to AT&T, it is unlocked... I thought that was common knowledge :)

For the person that is considering having theirs marked as gift be careful as if your package gets stolen/lost you are only insured for the gift value which is what £10/20?
Click to expand...

This is true.

So everyone is 100% sure that you only pay the tax on top of the iPad and nothing else when it goes through customers?

How much has everyone being charged for shipping and from whom?
 
An FM on the other thread spoke to someone at Apple who said that the 3G devices are different. So this being true it would be a big gamble to buy the US 3G iPad only for it not to work!
 
Nipz said:
This is true.

So everyone is 100% sure that you only pay the tax on top of the iPad and nothing else when it goes through customers?

How much has everyone being charged for shipping and from whom?
Click to expand...
Yes you only pay 17.5% VAT that is all, nothing else.

I will be using Borderlinx myself as you get a free US address (no sign up fees, which the others charge) and shipping seems reasonable at $38.50 Standard.

For instance if you take the 64GB 3G iPad the total is $1019.31 which is £687.70 (incl. Tax and Shipping) using their exchange rate which I think it is better than BongoUS although not sure with BundleBox :)

Bear in mind you need to pay US Sales Tax as well in the state of your mail forwarder which for Borderlinx is in Ohio :)

Hope it helps.
 
Elise said:
An FM on the other thread spoke to someone at Apple who said that the 3G devices are different. So this being true it would be a big gamble to buy the US 3G iPad only for it not to work!
Click to expand...

+1 on this – does anybody know if the 3G iPads sold in the US will technologically be any different to the EU ones? I spoke to a Genius today, but he sounded completely clueless, so I'm not betting by sterlings on him...
 
There is no difference between the US and UK versions, the US one has an AT&T Sim in it and that is all, the UK one won't have a Sim most likely, you need to source it yourself.
 
northy124 said:
Yes you only pay 17.5% VAT that is all, nothing else.

I will be using Borderlinx myself as you get a free US address (no sign up fees, which the others charge) and shipping seems reasonable at $38.50 Standard.

For instance if you take the 64GB 3G iPad the total is $1019.31 which is £687.70 (incl. Tax and Shipping) using their exchange rate which I think it is better than BongoUS although not sure with BundleBox :)

Bear in mind you need to pay US Sales Tax as well in the state of your mail forwarder which for Borderlinx is in Ohio :)

Hope it helps.
Click to expand...

Looks a great deal! UPS want $98 for shipping which seams a lot!
 
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