I know Target don't ship to the UK directly.  Has anyone bought something from them to be delivered by a third party though?  

The item I'm looking at is exclusive to Target and not yet released.  Will ultimately be a few on eBay after release...presumably bought in bulk orders...just wondering whether it's cheaper to get a few items delivered directly as I guess the eBay resellers must be making profit.

After a bit more research, looks like 'Planet Express' offer the most economic service.  Anyone used them?

From a quick calc & USD conversion, it looks like I could save £10 on this one item compared to the eBay UK reseller, and could add more items to make the postage more efficient as well. 🤔

55 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

After a bit more research, looks like 'Planet Express' offer the most economic service.  Anyone used them?

From a quick calc & USD conversion, it looks like I could save £10 on this one item compared to the eBay UK reseller, and could add more items to make the postage more efficient as well. 🤔

Are you factoring in VAT being added?

When you buy on eBay UK, even if it comes from abroad they sort out the VAT for you.

12 hours ago, alexp999 said:

Are you factoring in VAT being added?

When you buy on eBay UK, even if it comes from abroad they sort out the VAT for you.

Nope.  I skim read that importing items below £135 don't incur VAT charges...but must have misunderstood that now I think about it?   

So say I buy an item and have it delivered to a 'home' address at Express Planet.  Then they combine a few orders, potentially from different retailers, and it comes to 100usd, then I pay 20usd for postage to the UK.  How much VAT would I have to pay, and how do I go about doing that?

Just now, TomsFocus said:

Nope.  I skim read that importing items below £135 don't incur VAT charges...but must have misunderstood that now I think about it?   

So say I buy an item and have it delivered to a 'home' address at Express Planet.  Then they combine a few orders, potentially from different retailers, and it comes to 100usd, then I pay 20usd for postage to the UK.  How much VAT would I have to pay, and how do I go about doing that?

VAT is 20%.

The allowance on items below £135 has been scrapped, you have to pay VAT on everything now.

Does the importer not sort the VAT? The new rules say that customs can reject goods which don't have the VAT accounted for.

3 minutes ago, alexp999 said:

Does the importer not sort the VAT? The new rules say that customs can reject goods which don't have the VAT accounted for.

I think I'd be the importer in this case?  Looks like it just goes through the normal postal system, rather than going to another 'import' warehouse over here first.  

Looking at the .Gov site, right at the top it states that nothing needs to be paid to the delivery company for goods under £135, which seems misleading.  I think they mean there are no delivery charges below £135, and also no customs duty below £135...BUT will still have to pay VAT, on both the item and the delivery cost.  (Seems odd to add VAT to a delivery cost, seeing as the vast majority of the items journey was outside the UK). 

Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Tax and duty - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

So, using the example above - $100 items, plus $20 postage - $120.  Converts to £95.  20% of 95 is 19.  So £114 inc VAT. 

Estimate of 4 items for that $100 (£80).  Makes postage and VAT £8.50 average per item.  Hmm, that does start to complicate things.  However, the one on ebay currently is £65...even with the postage and VAT, I'd still only be looking at £36.20 for that one item doing it this way.  Could even sell one of the 4 items myself to recoup some of the delivery & VAT costs.  (Unless there are any legal implications in doing that!)

25 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

I think I'd be the importer in this case?  Looks like it just goes through the normal postal system, rather than going to another 'import' warehouse over here first.  

Looking at the .Gov site, right at the top it states that nothing needs to be paid to the delivery company for goods under £135, which seems misleading.  I think they mean there are no delivery charges below £135, and also no customs duty below £135...BUT will still have to pay VAT, on both the item and the delivery cost.  (Seems odd to add VAT to a delivery cost, seeing as the vast majority of the items journey was outside the UK). 

Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Tax and duty - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

So, using the example above - $100 items, plus $20 postage - $120.  Converts to £95.  20% of 95 is 19.  So £114 inc VAT. 

Estimate of 4 items for that $100 (£80).  Makes postage and VAT £8.50 average per item.  Hmm, that does start to complicate things.  However, the one on ebay currently is £65...even with the postage and VAT, I'd still only be looking at £36.20 for that one item doing it this way.  Could even sell one of the 4 items myself to recoup some of the delivery & VAT costs.  (Unless there are any legal implications in doing that!)

As far as I know, the VAT cannot be deferred on goods under £135, it has to be collected before it arrives in the UK.

It's usually the company shipping that has to make sure VAT is accounted for.

If it is on ebay.co.uk the price includes VAT, ebay collect it on behalf of the seller if they are not VAT registered themselves.

2 minutes ago, alexp999 said:

If it is on ebay.co.uk the price includes VAT, ebay collect it on behalf of the seller.

The item is on ebay UK, but has been imported first.  Or there are some directly from the US, including additional import fees as you suggest.  However, I could import 4 of them directly from the US, including postage and VAT, for the price of 2 from ebay.  Obviously not worth it for single items, otherwise everyone would do it, but unless I'm missing something here, it does seem worth it for 4+.

I've sent the export company an email...doubt I'll get anything more than a vague 'check regs in your own country' but we'll see.  

Got a quick email reply from them.  Understanding & informative (unlike many places I email!) but as expected did say to check local fees.  They did say they generally ship items without the duty paid, and it is up to the delivery service in the importing country to calculate and request the charges from the recipient.

Still think it's worth a try while I'm not particularly strapped for cash at the moment.  Will be an experience if nothing else.  If it works out well, I'll know for future.  If it goes horribly wrong, I just won't do it again. 

I sometimes buy stuff on eBay from abroad and had noticed that vat is collected from me through eBay now.  In the past there was some luck involved.  Sometimes stuff was just delivered and no tax levied by the uk authorities, sometimes you got a card from Royal Mail saying if you contact them and pay the taxes they will deliver the item, BUT you also had to pay Royal Mail a service charge  for collecting the tax from you. Bit like extortion really.  So maybe your package will be held to ransom when it gets to the uk for vat payment and a service charge added to

**UPDATE**

I decided it wasn't worth the cost this time.  Mainly because Target won't ship to a PO box (3rd party exporter) either.  So I'd have to pay an extra $5 for a 'personal shopper' to collect each item on top of the other charges.  I had also missed the fact that US duty isn't shown on the Target website, possibly due to different rates in different states?  But again, that increased the cost further.

It seems that I would only have to pay VAT in the UK when it got here, no customs duty as long as I kept the parcel and the postage below £135, and no delivery/handling fee either.

So I have two choices in this particular case now.  I have bought similar items through ebay from a US seller before, who has agreed to purchase these items for me and get postage & VAT calculated to determine whether it's worth posting to the UK or not.  Both in high demand so he'll have no issues selling elsewhere if it's not viable for me.  Or I could buy from the UK ebay reseller...currently asking double the US base price, plus another fiver for UK postage!  I think I'll be going for the third option in all honesty...just leaving it altogether!

 

On a slightly different note, I did get a Royal Mail ransom card last week!  UK ebay seller had failed to add enough postage to the item.  He did refund me for the extra cost and I did feel a bit sorry for him, as I think what happened was he added too much packaging, which moved the item out of the standard letter size and into a large letter instead.  Ironically, the extra packaging hadn't worked, the item then arrived slightly damaged as well. 🤦‍♂️

**Final Update**

I bought the item from a UK reseller on ebay last weekend.

Won it for 20% less than the fixed price one I was previously looking at (and decided against).  Tbh it was barely any more than the US RRP but I guess there must have been a bit of profit in it.

Have also bought items from Germany, Netherlands and the US over the last few months without an issue.  I'm sure I'll get caught out with import fees eventually, but so far I have pleasantly surprised with the ease of buying from abroad.