Parcelforce Fees for Collecting VAT

[fionadawn]

I ordered shoes from a retailer in the US who advised on their website:

1. $35.00 flat shipping charge

2. Any additional duties and taxes assessed by customs are the responsibility of the receiver

I worked the duty out about £17.50. Then I got a letter from parcelforce advising I wouldn't get my package until I paid £18.00 duty and tax and £13.50 handling fees.

I called parcelforce and said I wouldn't pay the £13.50 but would pay the duty of £18.00. I then advised once I paid the duty they would be holding my parcel illegally. They agreed with this and delivered my parcel but are billing me for the £13.50. I contacted the retailer and they had no idea I would get these extra charges. I am faxing them the bill when I receive it and they are taking it up with USPS the courier they have a contract with.

Parcelforce are in partnership with USPS to deliver parcels when they reach the UK. To me that means they handle them through customs and successfully deliver them. All costs incurred should be charged to USPS and not the receiver. I have no idea what the contract is between USPS and Parcelforce. However a shipping fee should include all charges included in getting the parcel from the shipper to the receiver. Customs do not levy an extra charge - they only request the actual duty and tax. Someone has earlier explained why Parcelforce have this charge. However this charge should be included in the shipping fee - not as an additional the receiver is unaware of, they are in effect charging extra for just doing thier job. They could start delivering parcels and charging extra taxes on fuel etc. It is the responsibilty of couriers to fully take into account all costs they will incur and pass a correct fee onto the shipper at the time they send the parcel.

They are trying to charge me £13.50 - but really they could charge me anything they like as I was never made aware I had to pay a clearance/handling charge. I will be writing to them and telling them to take it up with the shipper and not me the receiver.

[gezwee]

Its worse for high rated excise/duty commodities, try finding a clearing/REDS agent who will disharge for less than 1% of deferred value.

 

You could always make your own declaration to HMR&C assuming of course you can fund your own deferment account and clear through chief.

 

£13.50 is a pretty reasonable minimum fee considering the work involved,it is not a simple press of a button. Remember also that they have to retain hard copy archives for a minimum of 6 years.

 

I think you would need to discuss and agree with shipper that all costs are met within purchase price. If you know you're going to be paying a £13.50 entry fee negotiate the purchase price for commodity with shipper.

[fionadawn]

You missed my point.

 

1. I didn't know I was going to be paying £13.50, neither did the retailer. It is an extra added charge by parcelforce.

2. This charge should be added into the shipping cost so the consumer is aware of it.

 

Everyone has overheads and costs in business - they add it on to the final consumer cost.

 

Parcelforce seem to think they can take SOME overheads and pass them on to the receiver.

I am not interested in what it costs Parcelforce to get a parcel to me in breakdown I just want a correct shipping charge when I place an order.

[gezwee]

You missed my point, the shipper (your supplier) needs to check all charges prior to agreeing costs with you.

 

If the shipper is prepared to enter into trade outside of his own origin country then he should be aware of all costs, your complaint is not with the carrier (who is merely obliged to uphold the legislation in which he operates) but with the supplier who should make you aware of all associated costs at time of purchase.

 

Is it the carriers fault that he is obliged by law to declare excisable goods in his care to HMR&C?

 

If at any time you are unhappy you only need to reject delivery in which case all charges (and goods) would be returned to the shipper........ how you then go about recovering your money from the supplier for undelivered goods is another matter.

 

Don't have much to do with USPS or Parcelforce but I could pretty much guarantee that this will be noted in their terms at the point of shipper contracting carriage.

 

Whilst I can understand the frustration I don't believe that pointing the finger at a carrier/clearing agent is particularly justified especially given the limited fee levied for the service.

[gezwee]

Should have mentioned, HMR&C do levy a charge for all entries.......can't remember the exact figure but think its in the region of £12.00 plus circa £1.50 per additional header

[fionadawn]

The carrier should always declare the goods and as I stated I was happy to pay the £18.00 duty and tax.

I checked with customs today and they only charge the actual duty and tax. There is no extra charge as you have advised. The £13.50 is charged by Parcelforce not Customs.

[gezwee]

Sure it was in there somewhere, may have changed since my day.

 

Will have to check next week where the costs originate from.....its not a free service for a commercial organisation.

 

Either way you still have the option of confirming all costs up front or rejecting delivery or undertaking your own clearance...manual entry with your local HMR&C office (this is definitely free).

 

All things considered, if the supplier had advised you that your order cost was going to lift by £13.50 to cover admin on arrival or that you'd need to queue for 3-4 hours clearing your own goods would you have cancelled?

[gezwee]

Scratch that bit about the manual entry.......may be more hard work than its worth, have been pointed toward finding a clearing agent to process in the past. No winning an argument with a revenue officer!

[buzby]

Consumers are not meant to be importers/exporters, therefore there is no requirement (or indeed obligation) for a supplier to know - or even care - what OYUR country's tax regime MIGHT do when your parcel is recieved.

 

If I send a parcel to the USA, how would I know what taxes and feed they might charge when it arrives on foreign soil. You seem to think the fee is a set amount for every parcel, it isn;t. Only those that are declared over a set value or worthy of further examination would be an issue. I've been lucky on many occasions where the Customs folk have NOT levied anything on my parcel when I should perhaps paid around £25. How happy do you think I would be knowing my retailer pocketed the difference as part of his profit?

 

It is you who are the importer, and your supplier will accept the payment he requires to ship it to your address at no extra cost to you. If your customs guy decides he wants more, that is an issue between you and the customs and the firm doing the clearance, not the retailer that sold it to you.

 

How a foreign supplier copes with paying your taxes when he has no idea if or what those taxes will be (for 200+ coun tries round the world) is an unreasonable expectation.

[fionadawn]

I have clearly explained that both the retailer and myself were fully aware that there would be a duty and tax charge. I have no issue with the this.

The full customs and tax charge is £18.00 which I have paid.

There is however an extra charge that is nothing to do with customs or the import laws of the UK. It is a £13.50 charge that parcelforce have added on for clearance.

My shipping charge was $35.00. Parcelforce should charge USPS a fee for clearing and delivering their parcels in the UK. The shipping charge I was given should have included all costs. If my actual shipping costs are actually approx $56.00 then I want to be made aware of this upfront.

Once I receive the bill from parcelforce I will be taking this up with the retailer and USPS. It maybe that USPS are aware the receiver will receive this charge - if so I will take this up with the BBB. However it may also be the case that Parcelforce are charging USPS for clearing and handling and then charging the customer. Until I receive the bill and take this further I do not know who is at fault.

I must be clear that my post is nothing to do with customs or tax it is only about courier charges.

[Dizzy74]

Thank you Buzby for your help, and I understand that the declaration must have been wrong, but when you go to a Post Office in a foreign country and ask what the cost of sending a parcel home would be, and what you have to do, you don't expect to be given half the information, and incur charges after paying out a small fortune in the first place. I told the them exactly what was in the parcel - ie my son's old clothes!

I have therefore paid for the service of sending my parcel home and did not expect to then be charged extra coz of being mis-informed!

I'm now at the stage of telling them to send the parcel back to sender - which was me anyway!!

[buzby]

I have clearly explained that both the retailer and myself were fully aware that there would be a duty and tax charge. I have no issue with the this.

The full customs and tax charge is £18.00 which I have paid.

There is however an extra charge that is nothing to do with customs or the import laws of the UK. It is a £13.50 charge that parcelforce have added on for clearance.

 

You expect Parcelforce to to the clearance work on your behalf for FREE? Some hopes! In the good old days, C&E ran their own offices, employed their own staff, did al the collections and arranged the book-keeping. They gave up on this, telling the couriers that THEY had to administer the process, as they weren't going to due to staff cuts. If you have a complaint, take it up with C&E it is their decision to farm out the collection process to private firms, so of course the cost will now be borne by the end user, clever, eh?

 

If you use PF's clearance services - you pay for thme - or you don;t get the goods. If you dont like their fee, use an agency that charges less. You appear to want it for free, and that isn't going to happen.

[buzby]

, but when you go to a Post Office in a foreign country and ask what the cost of sending a parcel home would be, and what you have to do, you don't expect to be given half the information, !

 

I have sympathy with the PO staff - they know what the list is of prohibited ites to any particular country, and that you need a customs sticker - but other than that, their interest is only in getting the cost of sending the item to the final destination, not the best ways of filling in a declaration! When sending anything belonging to be (and not for sale) I always mark the form 'Personal items - No Commercial Value) and they all sail through without a blimp!

[gezwee]

Check UPS current T&C's

 

http://www.ups.com/media/en/terms_service_us.pdf

 

You may have an argument that the shipper guarantees payment of clearance fees at destination if consignee rejects.......not an argument I'd want to have but clearly shows that shipper (had they read terms) would know there was an additional third party clearance fee (where destination country requires) on arrival.

[buzby]

Of course, he shipper has already stated taxes and charges are the responsibility of the recipient - which is as it should be. The OP expects an allk-inclusive deal, and that doesn't happen. How does a shipper pre-pay duties and fees unknown at the time of despatch?

 

As for the 'illegality' of it - there's none, the agents fees whether by invoice or at the time have to be paid regardless, PF are not going to sit idly by whilst the recipient argues with anyone who will listen that they didn't agree to it.

[hightail]

Yesterday I got a letter from Parcelforce saying that I have to pay £20.79 V.A.T.

 

This has to have been worked out on the value of the goods. Did you put a value on the customs form?

[fionadawn]

I don't expect Parcelforce to do anything for free.

I expect the shipper to advise me of the full charges involved in getting the parcel from the shipper to the receiver. This involves the courier taking into account all of their overheads. Clearance is an overhead to the courier in shipping the product I purchased. Therefore clearance should be taken into account as an overhead and added onto the shipping fee.

I should not later receive a clearance bill. If the actual cost of clearing my purchase is £13.50 why are parcelforce not passing this on to USPS who can then pass it on to the shipper? I would then receive an actual cost of shipping when I make my purchase.

USPS would be in a better position to negotiate this cost down than I am. USPS maybe already think they are paying parcelforce for clearance. I don't know. Until I see the contract between USPS and parcelforce I have no idea what USPS are paying parcelforce for. If USPS are aware there is a further courier fee and are not advising this to the retailer this is a different matter. Or maybe USPS did make the retailer aware and they did not pass this information on.

I was given certain information when I made my purchase and it did not involve clearance fees. When I get the bill from Parcelforce I can go down the chain and see who was misinformed.

I just want everyone else on the forum to be aware that Parcelforce cannot withhold a parcel if you have paid customs duty and vat. They will later bill you for the clearance fee.

The clearance fee is the only point I am disputing.

Edited September 13, 2009 by fionadawn

[buzby]

You are in no position to dispute, which is the point I'm making. There is a limbo that is well known to anyone who imports - but ignorance of the way it works is nobody's fault but the person importing the goods, not Parcelforce nor the supplier.

 

You're probably also not aware that if you want to be invoiced, you pay an additional fee for the paperwork this generates. So it is a major 'shooting yourself in the foot' exercise to complain and only pay for the duty and VAT at the time of delivery, resulting in a further £10 on the bill for an invoice. For a point of principle, it is an expensive one.

 

To reiterate - the shipper has NO obligation to you to andvise on taxes or duty, this remains the responsibility of the buyer - it always has been. It is not his counttry or laws that he needs to know, this is the sole domain of the buyer.

[fionadawn]

Why am I not in a position to dispute? I read the shipping terms of the retailer and they advised all costs would be covered for shipping. Had they stated clearance or handling charges would be added I would have checked what those were.

 

I have not been invoiced yet, but noted you have advised it will cost another £10.00. That seems like a lot of money to generate an invoice, but then £13.50 is a lot in clearance fees. I did speak to manager at my local parcelforce depot about paying the customs charges and not paying the clearance fee. He was fully aware of the laws on this and agreed to invoice me later for the clearance fee. He did not mention a £10.00 charge at any point. Can you please advise further as it's the first I have heard of this.

 

I am aware of the duty and taxes and they have nothing to do with my post. I did not need the shipper to advise me the duty tariffs on importing footwear into the UK as I know what they are.

[buzby]

It is an administration change - as they are having to input your details as a 'customer' and set up an account. The fee for most firms is around £20-25, and PF is the same. They offer a cut-price fee for those doing one-off transactions, where you save on the deal - something you rejected.

 

As for being advised of it... why? You were adamant you weren't going to pay the clearance fee at the time of delivery and they provided the solution, the fact you weren't told it would cost you more is as irrelevant as not understanding that the sender has no control over the taxes and fees charged in your own country.

 

The retailers is NEVER responsible for local taxes, that's why there is no requirement for them to say so - items are always sent from the iriginating country tax paid (that's THEIR tax, paid) alternatively, many professional exporters arrnge to ship tax-free from a different jurisdiction and you end up paying the full tax on delivery. The difference here, is that the tax-free price you pay is less than paying BOTH US and UK taxes - but there are times it is too difficult to find a shipper/exporter capable of shipping items in this way.

[fionadawn]

There is no £10.00 charge.

Where I have on a number of occasions made it clear what my objection is you still bring up customs and Vat charges.

The title of this thread is Parcelforce fees for collecting VAT. Can you therefore keep any response to this subject and not again advise on Customs and Vat charges.

My concern would be that consumers would think that clearance fees, vat and duty are one and the same when they are not.

[buzby]

My dear - there is. It is a commercial fee billed to users for services provided. Only someone who has a limited grasp of the real world would thing that something that involves import duties, VAT and service fees ARE one and the same. For simplicity, the recipient is asked to pat a single amount, not three different lots.

 

The title is also incorrect - their get their fees for collecting the VAT as WELL as the customs duty... or did you forget that. I'm afraid I'll write what I like, as for completeness, it helps to show how ludicrous your argument is, and it is to this I'm trying to prevent others from falling into the same trap of misdirection your posting led to.

[gezwee]

I'm with Buzby on this, however Gezwee now drops out of this game of ping pong....... as a final note I would say it is probably prudent for anybody importing to the UK to check all possible destination/arrival costs prior to entering into a commercial agreement.

 

Whether understood or not at time of placing order you have agreed shippers terms and entered into a commercial agreement with a commercial carrier with an associated cost to be determined upon arrival. It is clear within primary carriers terms that 'if' any costs are identified on arrival these would be charged to the recipient.

 

The carrier would not be aware of full costs until he has sight of all export documentation and goods, this would be the primary reason that costs are not set at point of export.....I find it difficult to imagine that anybody would effect carriage with a commercial carrier if they fixed clearance costs on collection allowing for all possible outcomes and set fee at £100.00 - £200.00.

 

You could ask the shipper to prepay/bear all costs at origin but they in turn would err on the side of caution.

 

Once a contract of carriage is placed with a commercial carrier to import goods to the UK you are effectively (by virtue of laws and conventions applicable to carrier) acting as a commercial importer.

 

It would not be proper to argue that you were not made aware or did not know of aditional costs when agreeing to purchase and sale terms.

 

PF in this instance appear to have acted correctly and within their remit, argueably the fee charged is well below industry standard. Indeed if they had not acted to clear goods they would have been subject to seizure and all associated costs. This would ultimately leave the consignee to even greater expense.

 

Simple answer would seem to be that if you do not want to pay for goods to be lawfully entered into the UK market let a high street store do it for you and purchase within the UK.

 

Gez

[Flat Stan]

I buy off e-bay all the time and have never been charged , why?

 

simple

 

click the UK only button on the left hand side

 

 

Parcelforce are not the ones who set the charges - that's HM customs

 

Parcelforce are not the ones who even send the letter , its on their headed note paper but not sent by them.

 

If a Policeman turns up at your door , without a serch warrent , you have the right to send them away.

 

If a customs officer turns up at your door you do not have the right to refuse entry - its for the secuirity of the country

 

HM customs are heading towards 100% of items coming into the country being checked, to stop bombs and other prohibated good comming in.

therefore your item is no longer in the mail system.

 

you can either pay for any your VAT ect before customs get it ( no idea how) and then pay 15+ to get it sent from customs to your house

 

or

pay the courriour at the cheaper rate

[fionadawn]

I spoke to the managing directors office at parcelforce and got my parcelforce charge waived. At the onset of my transaction I had never been aware of the parcelforce charge. It is quite simple. The parcelforce charge has nothing to do with customs charges. I knew at the onset what my customs charges were and paid them straight away.