Customs duty on gifts (getting hit for)

My UK citizen son marries a wonderful US girl in 3 weeks time. They have recently sent gifts/personal possessions in both directions, and on both occasions been hit for huge customs bills upon delivery. Is this for real?

She bought him a wedding ring in the US, which needed to be altered. She sent it over for size checking. But before Royal Mail would hand over the parcel they demanded £50.

He has just sent two suits for her brothers by UPS. Marked as gifts for the wedding, value just £300. She has had to pay 89USD in order to take delivery.

This is getting expensive!

Can you not send gifts/personal possessions like this free of duty. It seems they can make up whatever charges they like.

It looks like sending anything across the Atlantic is going to be economically impossible.

Although my wife has been sending and receiving birthday and christmas gifts for years with a cousin in NH without even a whiff of charges.

Can anyone shed any light on this?  Thank you

For the UK:

If it's a gift and it's worth less than £36, it will NOT be subject to VAT or customs fees.

If it's a gift and it's worth more than £36:

- It will be subject to VAT
- If it's worth less than £135 it will NOT be subject to customs fees.
- If it's worth between £135 and £630, it will be subject to a flat duty rate of 2.5% (although some items may have less duty).
- If it's worth more than £630, the rates will depend on what the item is.

See: https://www.gov.uk/goods-sent-from-abroad/tax-and-duty

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For the US:

- Gifts worth up to $100 are not subject to duty or tax as long as the same person doesn't receive more than $100 worth of gifts in a single day

- Gifts worth more than $100 are subject to duty and tax

See: http://www.cbp.gov/travel/international-visitors/kbyg/gifts

Totally real.  It's a horrible part of being an expat.  My mom is now terrified to send me gifts.   

Jeez, when we were still in the US we sent a pile of candy/stuff to my wife's daughter.......no where near £136....my wife's daughter had to pay about £60 to get it......basically what the crap inside was worth. I guess it may have just been "unlucky", but at that point we stopped sending anything. We had several packages stolen that were sent to the US containing UK chocolate that my wife was craving. One package was to be signed for....which it was......but not by us and we never saw it. The last couple years we were in the US.....it just wasn't worth mailing anything either way.

I have found that if it's something that can be shipped directly to the person (like my mother in America using Amazon UK to send us gifts in the UK) then you can work around most customs issues. My mom has always managed to avoid incurring customs charges for me when she sends things. I think she always marks things as used personal possessions or something like that. She has had a lot of experience dealing with weird customs stuff as my older sister spent 2 years living in Malawi.


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I have found that if it's something that can be shipped directly to the person (like my mother in America using Amazon UK to send us gifts in the UK) then you can work around most customs issues. My mom has always managed to avoid incurring customs charges for me when she sends things. I think she always marks things as used personal possessions or something like that. She has had a lot of experience dealing with weird customs stuff as my older sister spent 2 years living in Malawi.

If you order from Amazon UK to be shipped within the UK, then there's no international shipping and you just pay regular UK shipping fees, because it's delivered from a UK warehouse to a UK address.

However, if you were to order from Amazon US and have it sent to a UK address, you have to pay higher shipping fees and UK customs charges.

I once ordered a DVD boxset from Amazon US - it was worth £19 and I had to pay shipping fees plus an extra £15 in customs charges just to receive it :S.

Totally real.  It's a horrible part of being an expat.  My mom is now terrified to send me gifts.   

My mother had some weird notion that when they asked for a value it was really for insurance purposes or something so she tended to give a much higher figure.   

Hi,

A little late to this thread but I'll put forward the information you need to know.

ALL Goods and Services coming INTO the UK are subject to Import Duty and VAT. The 'rates' at which they're charged vary depending on what it is. A massive and comprehensive listing of products is on the HMRC website. There's a threshold as mentioned above, if anything is lower than that figure it's exempt, anything more is subject to charges.

It doesn't matter if the item is new or used, it's still subject to the fees. Correctly marking what's in the package and paying the due charges is part of the UK's financial income. The temptation to undervalue items to avoid or reduce taxes chargeable is illegal and Customs Officers aren't stupid ! Everything is scanned and X rayed upon entry to the country.

When it comes to personal parcels, the above all applies still, however, a quick scan of what the declaration says, the weight of the parcel etc will 'flag up' things which might be incorrect. Else, it's processed, checked, scanned and charges added and sent on for the delivery chain. Items which have been mis-declared for the purposes of reducing or avoiding taxes get through all the time given the sheer volume of parcels/packets coming through but plenty are also intercepted and the correct amount of tax is applied and the recipient notified to pay prior to getting their items/goods.

The other way around and sending items TO the USA. This depends on which state it's going to and the state legislation on imports etc. They vary from state to state. Generally, there's no import duty coming into the USA, but I have read it can be applied.

There's no legal way of avoiding paying the charges and those who try will/often/do get caught.

I do quite a lot of Importing into the UK and cover this topic a lot on other forums where people post to say they've been 'ripped off'. They haven't! the legislation is available on the HMRC website! I'll soon be ramping up my exports as well. A lot of importation is of course done by companies and businesses and the 'costs' are added to the product for when it hits the 'retail' stage. Different countries have different levels of pricing from the manufacturers or the exporters sending the goods, and you've guessed it, the UK has some of the highest importation/buying levels in this regard - which is a big part of why the exact same product in the UK is quite a lot more expensive when directly compared to the the price in another country.

Cheers, DtM! West London & Slough UK!

Can I have my 30 shoes, computer, 2 cases of clothes put into my excess baggage allowance with the airline and not get hit with a customs tax on my personal items?


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Can I have my 30 shoes, computer, 2 cases of clothes put into my excess baggage allowance with the airline and not get hit with a customs tax on my personal items?

If you want, though you probably wouldn't actually get hit with customs charges on those items anyway, but just depends which is more cost effective for you.

I shipped two boxes of clothes and a bicycle (in 2 boxes) from the US to the UK and I didn't have to pay any customs charges... though it cost $400 to send them all through USPS.

I asked UPS as well, to see how much they would charge to ship the bike and they wanted $1,000!

You won't have customs duty on personal belongings.  It's gifts that get tricky.  I believe technically schmechnically you need to have owned the items for more than 6 months to not have to pay duty.  But as long as you are not toting a brand new Mac in the box and designer clothes with the tags still on, you won't have any issues.  Even then, it's unlikely you'd have any issues. 

Yes you are right,,, usps quoted me approximately $150 per 50lb largest box I could get in with a dolly. .... I went to UPS and FedEx... Same box was $500 and $900 respectively.

The airline i travel with charges 80$ for a bike or each additional excess luggage...


Thank you what a relief


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Can I have my 30 shoes, computer, 2 cases of clothes put into my excess baggage allowance with the airline and not get hit with a customs tax on my personal items?


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I came over with two checked bags, as big as they could be, stuffed with clothes and shoes. My carry-on had my laptop, ipod, ipad, and several breakable items that I didn't trust to the hold. I had no issues with anything. I only paid a fee for one extra bag and that bag weighing more than was allowed.