Brexit deal and imports

[el48tel]

"politician" and "good idea" are not two ideas I'd use in the same paragraph, let alone sentence.

That depends what you want to do with/to the Politician, tel.

You wicked boy ... but I like it

[el48tel]

Indeed, Blurb seem to be well on top of their obligations re. UK VAT and our potential 'problems' re customs and handling charges this side of the water. Let us know how you get on please, my book will be a day or two behind yours

Just delivered.
One of the label strips shows a declaration of sorts.

And the email delivery data shows that it barely hit the table in the Customs hall in Stansted. We can assume that Blurb has a good arrangement with Customs and duty has been paid.


And the book .... photos and artwork composed during 2020

Edit
Don't ask how it pasted two copies of one image??????
(Tony_R removed duplicate image.)

[Tony R]

Excellent, Terry.
Mine arrived too this morning, not 15 minutes ago.
Superb service from Blurb and FedEx as always.

[FredG]

I was just browsing Conophytum and noticed that eBay have +20% vat on plants from the USA.

Do eBay have their lower undergarments in something of a corkscrewed mangle?

[MatDz]

I was just browsing Conophytum and noticed that eBay have +20% vat on plants from the USA.

Do eBay have their lower undergarments in something of a corkscrewed mangle?

eBay is responsible (from "after Brexit" I think) for paying the correct import tax in the UK, so they simply add it on top of the price.

[ralphrmartin]

Online marketplaces are responsible, as Mat says, for collecting VAT on imports, for items under £135. There is no "small item" exemption like there used to be. For larger items, the system works as before, basically, as far as I can see.

Already, quite a few online stores have stopped selling to the UK as they cannot be bothered with the paperwork etc.

This really seems like a barmy approach. If every country had similar rules, the marketplaces would have a couple of hundred sets of rules and paperwork to deal with, and the result would be just a handful of global stores who had the scale to cope. So much for competition.

[esp]

This really seems like a barmy approach. If every country had similar rules, the marketplaces would have a couple of hundred sets of rules and paperwork to deal with, and the result would be just a handful of global stores who had the scale to cope.

I agree. It's bonkers.
One can only hope that the government will see fit to negotiate more a appropriate trade deal, which actually facilitates trade.

[Keith L]

I believe that this summer the EU will be introducing a similar system (delayed from last summer due to the virus) for sales in between EU countries, where the vat chargeable on a sale between EU countries will be at the rate of the customer's country rather than the seller's country (I believe large companies have had to work this way for a while).

VAT rates are different in each country, and for what particularly affects my sales is that book VAT varies from 0 in the Republic of Ireland to 25% in Denmark. In the past they have benefited from the UK zero rate so their purchases from me are potentially much more expensive by their countries VAT plus collection charge.

At the same time the exemption for low value items from VAT, Euro 22 in many EU countries but by no means all, will also be abolished.

So I think there would have been similar complications even if we had stayed in the EU but I understand EU sellers would only have to make one VAT registration to cover all the other EU countries rather than one just for the UK.

It's all so complicated! And as for the problems of selling to the EU just for simple books .....!

Regards

Keith

[Bill]

This really seems like a barmy approach. If every country had similar rules, the marketplaces would have a couple of hundred sets of rules and paperwork to deal with, and the result would be just a handful of global stores who had the scale to cope.

I agree. It's bonkers.
One can only hope that the government will see fit to negotiate more a appropriate trade deal, which actually facilitates trade.

But this is not about trade as such, its about personal imports, and it seems the only real difference to buying say from América, is that goods under £135 should be taxed at source.

[ragamala]

But this is not about trade as such, its about personal imports, and it seems the only real difference to buying say from América, is that goods under £135 should be taxed at source.

Bill, I suggest you check, in my understanding there is no difference, and what you are saying now applies equally to the USA or any foreign country.

"At the end of the transition period, the government will introduce a new model for the VAT treatment of goods arriving into Great Britain from outside of the UK. This will ensure that goods from EU and non-EU countries are treated in the same way"

See
https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... nuary-2021