Parcelforce clearance fee's (C&E duty etc)

[Its WAR]

This thread is really irritating. The principle is clearly understood, that the carriers are holding us to ransom. They have entered into a contract with the sender to deliver the parcel to the addressee. Then they only deliver if the addressee pays additional fees.

 

Now, a lot or argueing isnt helpful between those who support the carriers actions and those who do not.

 

I would like a few template letters that I can send everytime my parcels are delayed for (usually a week) before they eventually get delivered. I am happy to pay the vat , but am angry that my parcelis held to ransom.

 

So lets stop arguing and get some proper help here. This thread has been going on far too long and is all fur and no knickers.

[gaff4972]

Can i also request a template letter to not going to jail for refusing to pay for my goods at the supermarket until after I have eaten them?

 

Seriously - this is a legal charge. If you dont like it, dont import.

[barracad]

I would like a few template letters that I can send everytime my parcels are delayed for (usually a week) before they eventually get delivered. I am happy to pay the vat , but am angry that my parcelis held to ransom.

 

How about this...

 

 

Dear Sirs,

 

You are holding an item for me which has outstanding duty to be paid. I am happy to pay this amount, but rather than just pay it so that you can release the item promptly, I have decided to write this letter to delay the matter further. This way, I can then complain about the delay after the event (which I accept would not have been delayed had I just paid the duty in the first place).

 

Please can you reply to me in the next week or two, confirming what I already know, i.e. that you are holding an item for me with outstanding duty to pay, which can not be released until the duty is paid. Upon receipt of this letter I will, reluctantly, pay the amount even though I know I could have done this to begin with.

 

Yours, etc.

[ScarletPimpernel]

I have had success with not paying these 'admin fees' from courier companies such as Fedex, because they handle the entire operation and so must have known what they had to do - so they will have factored this into their prices.

 

Parcelfarce and Royal Mail are different because they are only involved when the package reaches UK. However, I am in no doubt that their fees do not reflect the work done, but are an additional revenue stream.

[barracad]

I am in no doubt that their fees do not reflect the work done, but are an additional revenue stream.

 

You could be on to something. According to this FOI request, they do get an additional revenue stream as a result of this. It looks like they could be profiting by an entire penny per item.

[Bikersal]

I recently ordered a bike rack from America costing around £85 and with postage the total was £105. Parcelforce have written to me demanding the following sums

 

Customs duty £22.25

Import VAT £169.31

Clearance fee £8.00

 

How can they do this. I can accept there may be VAT due on the total amount incl postage which would be around £20 and even a clearance fee but how can they charge £169.31! I am a biker granny who is planning to ride 4000 miles for charity on my motorbike so how can these people do this. If anyone can help me please do

 

Bikersal:-(

[MIketheindestructible]

Regarding Bikersals charges shouldn't import duty be around 2-3% and VAT is obviously 20% so those amounts are way off and MUST be an error.

Now I haven't looked through every post, but I think the point of this thread was lost a long, long time ago.

Duty and VAT must be paid, I don't think anyone has questioned that, even though it is a pain to be paying two governments (one for absolutely nothing). And I can sort of get the admin fee from PF. The problem is that you never got a choice to use this 'service', it is a fee levied upon you in exchange for you goods, and that isn't morally right even if it is legally.

HMRC demand payment, so they should contact the payee DIRECTLY, and offer the service from PF allowing you to enter into an agreed contract. This is where people surely have a legal right to claim the fee back as they never agreed to it in the first instance.

[crazibiker]

It has been interesting reading the threads about this subject, like alot of people I think RM are using the increase in goods bought over the internet and imported into this country to jump on the "charge a fee for" band wagon, after all don't we heavily sudsidise RM and PF, so I would expect them to be the cheapest, although times it by how many people are paying this fee and then the amount is not quite so small.

HMRC don't want the problem of contacting each person to claim their VAT, they sub it to RM who are only to happy to charge us for it.

Sorry, did I miss the link where I can charge RM an admin fee for reposting mail sent wrongly to my address?

[Renzokuken]

Hey guys, I just thought I'd share my current ongoing argument with royal mail over these fees. I import alot of model kits from Japan, and I'm really starting to get annoyed at Royal Fail's obvious profiteering and bullyboy tactics.

 

Anyway:

 

I recently received a grey "fee to pay" docket for a parcel that I had ordered from Japan, due to a customs VAT charge of £6.75 plus royal mail's £8.00 handling fee.

 

My first complaint is that whoever filled this docket in failed to write the reference number down and instead just wrote CUSTOMS, meaning I had no choice but to travel through the snow and ice on my only day off, to collect and pay in person at my local delivery office. Which begs the question, how could royal mail possibly finish the delivery I paid them for?

 

Upon arrival at the delivery office, I queried the £8.00 handling fee with the (quite frankly miserable) member of staff in your Darlington office, I informed him in a pleasant manor that I wished to be invoiced for the handling fee, but was more than happy to settle the customs charge with him. To which he continuously quoted “Has' to be paid in full or I can't let you have the parcel I'm afraid”. I informed him calmly that I wished to dispute the handling fee, as I feel it's extortionate, and unsolicited. Eventually he retrieved my parcel, placed it to the window (which it clearly wouldn't fit through, he just wanted to show it off) and said “That'll be £14.75 please”. I repeated that I wished to be invoiced for the handling fee and he returned my parcel to the shelf with a loud sigh and informed me in a fed up tone of voice that he would “get his manager”.

 

Several minutes later he returned with a manager named [Redacted], who also claimed to be a loss prevention agent, and a loss prevention manager, which job title he actually possesses is beyond me. He proceeded to repeat the previous representatives statements to the effect of “We can't invoice you, pay in full or we'll keep your parcel”. He the began to claim that the handling fee wasn't a royal mail fee and was instead a customs charge issued by HM Revenue and Customs. When I called him out on this blatant and bare faced lie, he advised me to use the complaints procedure. To which I informed him that the complaints procedure takes 30 days, and my parcel will be returned in 21 days. Growing weary of the exchange at this point I informed him that I had not solicited the services of royal mail to pay my customs charge in my stead, and that under section 104 – 2 (d) of the postal services act 2000, it is illegal to obstruct the delivery of mail under “retention by virtue of a lien” and by withholding mail after the customs charge has been paid he is breaking the law. He looked at me in a confused manor, shrugged his shoulders and claimed to be oblivious of his legal obligations.

 

In the end, and left with no choice I paid for the full fee, requested a copy of my delivery docket and left feeling completely ripped off. Therefore I would like to request a refund for the unsolicited £8.00 customs handling fee, and also a partial refund of the £10.00 postage fee as the delivery was not completed by royal mail.

 

Dear Mr [Redacted]

 

Thank you for your email. I am sorry to hear of the problems you have experienced with a custom charged item and also for the service you received at your local Delivery Office.

As you may be aware, we are required by law to cooperate with the UK Border Agency and to work under their directions. We therefore have an obligation to present all packages entering the UK from outside the European Union (EU), which attract customs duty, to the UK Border Agency.

 

If an item of mail then goes on to have customs charges attached to it by the UK Border Agency, we will pay these fees on behalf of the addressee in order to speed up its release for delivery. Royal Mail then collects these monies from the addressee, along with a charge to cover the additional handling and administration incurred by us, before the item can be released.

We recently assessed the costs of providing the customs clearance service for customers importing goods into the UK by post, and discovered that we were operating this service at a loss. Unfortunately, we can no longer afford to offer any service at a loss and cannot subsidise this activity using another income stream. It is for this reason that our fee is £8.00, which accurately reflects the costs involved.

 

I apologise that the Delivery Officer failed to write the reference number of your item on the card left at your address and that you have to go to the Delivery Office on your day off. I must explain that payment can be taken over the phone with our Customer Service Team on 08457 740 740 and we would then have arranged a delivery of your item.

 

I am sorry for the service you received at your local Delivery Office. Our process is to hold any item that requires payment at the Delivery Office and inform the customer that we have received an item for them by leaving a card at their address. This is due to our Delivery Officers being unable to accept payment on delivery.

 

Under the Inland Letter Scheme we made under the Postal Services Act, we are within our rights to charge a handling fee. We take the approach of charging the handling fee up front as it’s the most effective and efficient way of handling these items and to get the item to the customer quickly.

 

If a customer refuses to pay for a handling charge, then the item should have been released with only the custom charge being paid for at the Delivery Office. The Delivery Office should have then taken your details and advised that you would be invoiced for the charge. Royal Mail Group may then take steps to recover the handling fee, if not paid, which may include court action. I apologise that this process was not followed and have reported your complaint to the Delivery Office manager to address with the officers involved. The Delivery Office Manager will do all that is required to ensure you receive the quality of service you should expect in future.

 

Unfortunately I am unable to consider your claim for compensation for this process and cannot refund the handling fee for this item.

 

In order to obtain a refund of this fee, you would first need to successfully challenge the UK Border Agency and obtain a full refund of the customs charges. Details on how to do this can be found on their website at: www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/customs-travel/customs/postal/

 

Once you've done this, just send us evidence to show that you have received a full refund from the UK Border Agency and we will then refund the handling fee to you as well. Please send it to us at the following Freepost address or reply to this email with a scanned copy, quoting your reference number 1-2367241692:

 

Glasgow GEMS Team

Royal Mail Customer Service

PO Box 740

GLASGOW

G22 6WW

 

I must also explain that we aim to respond to customer complaints within 10 working days. Our complaint process may take up to 30 working days when we are dealing with complaints of loss, damage or delay due to the investigations required.

 

Please accept my sincere apologies on behalf of Royal Mail for the problem you've had, and our thanks for taking the time to make us aware of this. Please be assured that we take letting our customers down seriously and will use this information to make further improvements.

 

I hope you have found this information useful and that this explanation resolves your enquiry and concludes this matter for you. However if you are unhappy with my response you can contact the Escalated Customer Resolution Team who will re-investigate your complaint. They can be contacted by emailing: [email protected]. Alternatively you can write to: Escalated Customer Resolution Team, Royal Mail, PO Box 466, Plymouth, PL9 7HJ. If you do contact the team please can I ask you to quote your reference number 1-2367241692.

 

Regards

 

[Redacted]

Customer Service Advisor[/Quote]

 

 

 

To whom it may concern,

 

Please find enclosed a copy of my complaint made to your customer service team below, as well as their response, which I'm afraid is woefully inadequate.

 

While I understand that royal mail incurs additional costs associated with clearing items through customs on behalf of the UK border agency, I fail to see why these costs are then lumped on your customers, surely these costs should be met by the UK Border Agency themselves, as they are the ones assigning this additional work to your company. The current situation would be akin to being employed in a shop and charging my customers extra if they asked for my help. I already pay taxes, some of which goes towards funding the UK Border Agency so they can perform tasks such as this.

 

Your representative below has stated that I should have called your premium rate customer service number in order to have these charges paid over the phone. I attempted this, when I rang to complain about the handling fee originally, the representative stated that he could not process any payment on a package without a reference number, leaving me no choice but to collect the parcel myself, in person.

 

Also your representative below has failed to address my main issue, which is that these charges are completely unsolicited. I did not request that royal mail handle any customs fees on my behalf nor did I enter into any contract with royal mail as I am not the sender, I did not agree to, nor was given any terms and conditions prior to receiving your "fee to pay" card.

 

I feel that I have been perfectly reasonable in my conduct with royal mail thus far, and have only asked for the return of the fees that were paid under ransom of my package. I have not asked for the return of fees associated with calling your premium rate number, nor costs incurred traveling to your offices in order to complete the delivery myself, nor have I informed the police of royal mail's staff willfully violating the law. Should this complaint require any further escalation I will be adding the mentioned fees, as well as a fee for my time wasted on these complaints to my overall claim with royal mail.

 

Kind Regards

- [Redacted]

 

EDIT: Just received a response from the Escalated complaints team, as expected, they completely skip the issue of the charges being completely unsolicited, and deny that their staff were in breach of the postal services act by holding my parcel under retention by virtue of a lien. And continue to suggest that I claim the VAT back from the UK Border Agency, even though I stated right at the start that I'm not disputing the VAT charges.

 

Dear Mr [Redacted]

 

Thank you for your recent email dated 18th December. I am very sorry to learn you remain unhappy with our response to your complaint. As part of Royal Mail’s Escalated Customer Resolution Team I have been asked to review your case.

 

At the outset, may I convey how sorry I am to learn of this unfortunate issue and, furthermore, I sincerely regret any inconvenience you may have been caused. Nevertheless, I do appreciate you taking the time to get back in touch with us, allowing me the opportunity to furnish you with this reply.

 

Before addressing your specific concerns, I would first like to explain that, when resolving complaints received from our customers, we must ensure that we treat everyone in a fair and unbiased manner, taking into account all the relevant facts. We then need to use this information to provide a resolution or response within our guidelines and policies.

 

Having reviewed the details of your complaint, I am happy that our responses to you were appropriate.

 

If I can clarify, all packages entering the UK which attract customs duty are presented to the UK Border Agency. Whilst the postage paid by the sender covers the transport and delivery of an incoming international of mail; should the sender overseas not have an account with the UK Border Agency to pay customs charges, Royal Mail will. To facilitate their delivery Royal Mail pays any monies due in advance and then seeks to collect this from the addressee. As I hope you will appreciate, this process incurs fixed costs to operate and the additional £8 fee levied is a fair reflection of these. This fee is fixed as the additional costs incurred in processing such items do not vary with any customs duty due.

 

In response to your further concerns, the Royal Mail staff at your local Delivery Office are neither violating any specific law you pertain to, nor holding your item to ransom. Regretfully I am unable to further respond to your comments as they are of a legal nature and my remit is to ensure our complaints handling process has been followed correctly by my colleagues in Customer Services.

 

As mentioned in my colleague's response, If you wish to challenge the UK Border Agency and obtain a full refund of the customs charges; details on how to do this can be found on their website at: www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/customs-travel/customs/postal/.

 

Once you have done this, you may send us evidence to show that you have received a full refund from the UK Border Agency and we will then refund the £8.00 handling fee to you as well. Details of how to do this are in our previous email to you.

 

Regretfully, I am unable to respond to your concerns that you were offered a premium rate number to pay your fee over the phone as you have not mentioned the number in question. If however, the number was prefixed 0845, then I would need to advise you that this is a fixed local rate number and any premium charging would need to be addressed to your telephone network service provider.

 

Whilst I appreciate my response may not be the favourable one hoped for, once again, please accept my sincere apologies on behalf of Royal Mail and I hope that the explanations outlined above resolve your enquiry and conclude this matter. Nonetheless, if you are dissatisfied with my response you can contact the Postal Review Panel who will re-examine all the details of your case. They can be contacted by emailing [email protected] or by writing to Freepost Postal Review Panel.

 

Yours sincerely

 

[Redacted]

Escalated Customer Resolutions Team

 

To whom it may concern,

 

Please find enclosed a copy of my previous correspondence with both the royal mail customer service team, and the escalated complaints team, both of which fail to address my issue surrounding the unsolicited customs handling fee, and the non-completion of delivery by royal mail.

 

I would like to clarify that I have no dispute with the VAT charge paid by yourselves to the UK boarder agency, which I have happily reimbursed, therefore I will not contact the UK border agency as your previous colleagues have suggested, my dispute is with royal mail's customs handling fee alone. This fee was completely unsolicited as I have no contract regarding this package with royal mail, your contract is with the sender who requested your services. I have also not received, nor read any terms and conditions from royal mail regarding this fee, prior to my purchase. This fee was extracted by local royal mail staff holding my package to ransom, in breach of your own company rules, and more importantly in breach of section 104 – 2 (d) of the postal services act 2000, which states that it is illegal to obstruct the delivery of mail under “retention by virtue of a lien”.

 

This delivery was not completed, and could not have been completed by royal mail due to mistakes made by your staff members detailed below regarding the supply of a reference number, I was forced to retrieve this parcel myself from your local sorting office, therefore royal mail did not complete delivery themselves due to their own error.

 

Therefore as stated below I would like to request a pro-rata refund of my delivery charge of £10.00, and the return of the unsolicited £8.00 customs fee.

 

Kind Regards

- [Redacted].

Edited December 19, 2012 by Renzokuken
Recieved new response.

[Renzokuken]

Accidental double post, please delete.

[Renzokuken]

So, I've just received a response by letter from the postal review panel, issuing me a cheque for the customs handling fee.

 

Dear Mr [Redacted]

 

Thank you for your email which I received on 20 December 2012 regarding a complaint you have raised with royal mail in respect of the fee they have charged for handling a parcel from overseas that had attracted customs duties. I was very sorry to hear that you were dissatisfied with the outcome of your complaint and I have now concluded my review, which had involved collating all of the notes contained within the royal mail customer services case file, and using this information to establish if you complaint was handled in an appropriate manner.

 

Having read the correspondence that was sent to you, I have found this to be appropriate as it provides an explaination of the reasons that royal mail levies the £8.00 customs handling fee. As you have said, under section 104-2 of the postal services act 2000, royal mail are not allowed to hold the item once the duty charged by the UK border agency has been paid, and customer services did explain the process that should have followed by the delivery office when a customer wishes to pay the duty only. Payment of duty can be made online, when royal mail would deliver the item, or in person at the local delivery office which you chose to do. Royal mail delivery personnel are not permitted to accept payment on the doorstep for any 'fee to pay' item as this could potentially put them at risk.

 

I have noted that the delivery person that left the notification card did not endorse this with the tracking number, which has been delt with by the delivery office manager as this should always be done. This should not however prevent online payment and redelivery. I was very concerned to hear that the members of staff at the delivery office did not appear to be aware of the correct procedure to follow when a customer wishes to pay the UK border agency charge only and be invoiced for the royal mail handling fee. I have brought this matter to the attention of the regional delivery director for him to take the appropriate steps to arrange additional training in this area.

 

In closing I have found that royal mail customer services have delt with your complaint in an appropriate manner, I am very sorry that your local delivery office did not follow the procedures in place. Royal mail is allowed to charge a handling fee for dealing with dutiable items and this is written in to the royal mail scheme for inland letters September 2012, which is made under the postal services act 2000. I do not however feel that on this occasion and in recognition of royal mail's lapses in following the correct procedures, that the handling fee should be reimbursed. I have therefore enclosed a cheque for £8.00 which I trust you will accept along with my sincere apologies. I have not met your request for an additional £10.00 in travel costs to collect this item because I do not believe that despite the item reference number not being put on the fee to pay card, this would not have prevented you making payment online and arranging for the package to be delivered.

 

This is the postal review panel's final decision on behalf of royal mail regarding your complaint. If you are unhappy with our response you can make an application to the independent body POSTRS (the postal redress service), which is free of charge. POSTRS will be able to advise you if your complaint falls within the scope of the scheme rules and the enclosed fact sheet provides information about the scheme.

 

Further information and an application form for POSTRS can be obtained through their website http://www.postrs.org.uk; by writing to POSTRS, 70 Fleet Street, London, EC4Y 1EU; email: info.postrs.org.uk or telephone 020 7520 3827. Please note that you must make an application to POSTRS within 9 months of you first making your complaint to royal mail.

 

Yours Sincerely

[Redacted]

Postal Review Panel

 

Well, I don't know about you guys, but that counts as victory in my book.

[the worm that turned]

As yet another man (or woman) becoming subject to a third party attempting to levy their costs upon me without prior consent, agreement or indeed a contract I feel the need to comment here.

 

This is actually the first time that I have purchased a thing from a man that dwells on the land mass commonly referred to as the United States of America, so naturally it is the first time I have become aware of these "shenanigans".

 

I think it is important to state upfront that no contract can be forced upon a man (where I say man I mean both men and women). This is a commonly accepted fact in an open and fair world, although the truth in relation to this may be somewhat different but that is not the subject of this thread!

 

I openly entered into a contract with another man. The contract is good although currently not perfected. This man dwells some distance away from me, and part of the land between us is covered with saline water. I agreed a price with him for the thing I wanted and for the cost of it being delivered to MY DWELLING. His part of the contract included the arrangement of delivery to my dwelling, for which I effected payment IN FULL. He chose a third party to fulfil this part of the contract and therefore he has established a SEPARATE CONTRACT between him and USPS.

 

USPS have delivered my thing to the place commonly known as England and USPS have entered into a SEPARATE CONTRACT with a legal entity known as Royal Mail Group Limited (trading as Parcel Force Worldwide) to deliver my thing to my dwelling.

 

There are now a number of presumptions and assumptions that take place, which, left un-rebutted stand AS fact and therefore may enable a tacitly accepted contract to form between ME and third parties (such as Royal Mail Group Limited, HM Revenue & Customs, or both).

 

At no stage have I thus far knowingly entered into an agreement or contract with HMRC, USPS or Parcel Force in relation to these matters.

 

In my instance, it would appear that HMRC have presumed and assumed that things they call Import Duty and VAT ("Charges") are applicable to the thing I have purchased in my private contract and have further presumed and assumed that I am a person and therefore am subject to these Charges.

 

Big presumptions and assumptions to make and they go to the very root of how this country (and no doubt all others that create positive law via legislative powers bestowed upon Governments) operate. And, as I previously stated, if these presumptions and assumptions are left un-rebutted they stand AS law.

 

Separately, Parcel Force have taken it upon themselves to accept HMRC's assumed Charges as fact and effected payment of them for my thing. This is a contract between Parcel Force and HMRC.

 

Parcel Force are now attempting to enter into a contract with me and in doing so attempting to make me liable for THEIR costs from the Charges and in addition attempting to apply further charges to me for their efforts ("Clearance Fee"), none of which I agreed to.

 

The interesting part now begins in ensuring that I, a man, ensure that I know my rights, I remain fully aware of any contracts I enter into and ensure that any claim I do not accept is rebutted honestly, openly and in good time.

 

All of which I say above is my truth and my understanding of these matters. If you do not agree please avoid personal insults and provide structured rebuttals of the claims I make.

[BazzaS]

 

I agreed a price with him for the thing I wanted and for the cost of it being delivered to MY DWELLING. His part of the contract included the arrangement of delivery to my dwelling, for which I effected payment IN FULL. He chose a third party to fulfil this part of the contract and therefore he has established a SEPARATE CONTRACT between him and USPS.

 

 

If you agreed with the Seller they would bear any and all costs for delivery including customs charges : the Seller can inform the deliver company that they wish to pay them (and, if pre-paid, could avoid any "admin fee")

[nhow]

We just got a notice from PF that we owed £30 on a shipment of coffee from the US. Coffee is exempt from VAT and we've ordered it many times. But now, we have to pay the £30 or they will return the parcel to the US. Then, in order to get our money back we have to file a claim form with HMRC, then, once we get the refund we need to request our £8 fee back from Parcelforce!!! This is utterly ludicrous! HMRC makes a mistake so we get to be out of pocket for who knows how long, then run around trying to get it back again. No justice.

[arkadiygaydar]

Thank you Renzokuken and the other posters!

I can now say that the letters quoted here indeed work!

My relative bought a small used item from USA, costing £20. +£7 delivery. Received the note from Royal Mail that the fees were due - it was about £6 VAT and £8 RM charge, to his dismay! So he paid it under protect, called the RM call centre to complain. Then i heard this, I found this thread, and we deided to wait until the RM "rejection letter " arrives.

They said exactly what you described here- that £8 is justifiable, bla-bla-bla, no break down of the charge, despite requested.

 

So I made cut and paste from the genius letters above, adding that, since RM are happy to process a recorded 1st class delivery large letter for £1.79 (take the letter, process credit card, give tracking receipt, delivery, take signature, update internet... etc, all for this money), there is no way £8 is reasonable. I put (on behalf of the person charged) that I only would consider about £0.80 reasonable. I mention that the fees combined took nearly 100% of the cost of the item, and that the recipient of the parcel has no contract with RM... and he sent it as I wrote, by email to Postal Review Panel (free!).

About a month later £7.20 worth of stamps arrived to my relative, with more bla-bla-bla" about the fee being justified etc. from Postal review Panel. Ha-ha, what matters is £7.20, let it be stamps - this is nearly a full refund of the £8 fee.

Victory again.

I hope other people will follow this thread and will get their money back as well!

So, basically, although Royal Mail do not admit that they make an unfair charge, they pay back if pressed hard... they do not want a court hearing.

It did take me a bit more in time than £8 but the principle is worth it!

[tcagnumpty]

Apologies for opening up a what is essentially a very old thread. I did however find it useful. Shame the Catcus chappy did not follow through with his NIP as this could have changed the law for good. However I digress.

 

I have spoken to the HMRC who state that all the person receiving the goods (The Importer) needs to do to avoid paying a "Handling Fee" is to tell the sender to write on the declaration form "To be cleared by importer"

HMRC wil then send the importer a declaration to fill out and then pay for said goods if there is a requirement.

To make things quicker for anyone all fee's can be pre payed by the seller as long as they come from a country with a memorandum of understanding with the UK

Memorandum of understanding countries are:-

Hong Kong

Channel islands

Singapore

New Zealand.

It would appear (according to what I've read - I may also be wrong here) one can registered oneself on the Memorandum of understanding by not being one of the pre designated countries.

 

I hope this helps anyone else not liking a couriers "handling fee".

[tcagnumpty]

I wrote to RMG/Parcelforce/Border agency to complain and I got someone from Parcelforces head office writing back to me in a very uncourteous manner.

 

At the bottom she goes as far to say this.

"I can advise we will defend any case brought on this issue. I can advise a very small number of people have issued proceedings in the past but all of them have either withdrawn before the hearing once they have seen our defence or the Judge had dismissed the case before the hearing and we have never had one case go as far as trial."

 

How cocky is that!?

Well I have requested information from her dept and given them the statuary time to reply. I wish to see this through so everyone can benefit from non misleading information from RMG.

If they advertised that it's possible to not 'have' to pay their charges on their customs form then I probably would not have a problem with it. As it stands I feel they are misrepresenting the Postal Act 2001 which states the word "May" charge and not "have" to.

 

I don't understand why HMRC specifically state that Royal Mail and Parcelforce will charge a handling fee. Though they also do mention the customs declaration form bit whereby you can import the item yourself and how to go about it.

 

We will see if they reply to my requests.