If I order pen kits from Australia or China do I need to pay duty fees?

[Marker]

I have been thinking about ordering some pen kits from timberbits in Australia , also from a xiaman rizheng in china.



If I order like $1000 in pen kits from Australia, would I need to pay duty fees?
what if I were to order say only like $400-$500 worth of stuff from china. would there be any duty fees I would have to pay for this?

I just don't want to make a big order, and them find out that I need to pay so much in taxes to import it.

sorry I just don't know much about how this works.

 

[gawdelpus]

Check with David at timberbits he supplies all over the world and should have some Idea of import - export restrictions , In Australia we can import up to $1000 dollars duty free after that I have no idea being one of the less well off types hehe. Some of the other members here also do a lot of International sales and imports, so may have a better answer for you . Cheers ~ John

 

[Monty]

If Smitty doesn't chime in, send him a PM as he does a lot of importing.

 

[maxwell_smart007]

I think the threshold for duty in the US is higher than in Canada. In Canada, it's $40 or $60 or something ridiculously low. The US is in the $400 range, isn't it?

Regardless, why don't you think about making a couple of smaller purchases, instead of a mammoth $1000 buy. That way, you'd be likely under the duty threshold (someone else from the US will have to tell you what that threshold is), and thus less likely to pay duty on it.

Shipping from China is going to be the expensive part. Australia less so, as David has free shipping if you spend over $200 at the moment...

Smitty would be a good one to talk to about the Chinese company - he deals with them often.

 

[Smitty37]

Depends

I have been thinking about ordering some pen kits from timberbits in Australia , also from a xiaman rizheng in china.



If I order like $1000 in pen kits from Australia, would I need to pay duty fees?
what if I were to order say only like $400-$500 worth of stuff from china. would there be any duty fees I would have to pay for this?

I just don't want to make a big order, and them find out that I need to pay so much in taxes to import it.

sorry I just don't know much about how this works.

$400 or $500 from China will be under the limit. The shipper will provide the declared value which is usually less than you pay for it and it will normally be less than the threshold. Shipping is high.

Shipping from Australia is a lot less but the rules for customs will pretty much be the same. You are responsible for duty based on the declared value which is filled in by the shipper. Depending on how he ships you might or might not get a bill for it either from customs or more likely from the carrier.

 

[TellicoTurning]

Smitty's probably got a better handled on the process since I've been out of the import/export business for a few years now. There is a minimum that would require a broker to clear customs, but have forgotten exact amount, thinking it's about $2500... so you might be good on both shipments. If the vendors ship via postal system, likely the goods will clear customs as it goes through the post office... if they ship via forwarding companies(carriers) you likely will get clearance charges from them. I did more exports than imports, so not certain of the rules now... but I believe that both China and Australia fall into the most favored nations category and their goods have little or no duties.

 

[Smitty37]

True

Smitty's probably got a better handled on the process since I've been out of the import/export business for a few years now. There is a minimum that would require a broker to clear customs, but have forgotten exact amount, thinking it's about $2500... so you might be good on both shipments. If the vendors ship via postal system, likely the goods will clear customs as it goes through the post office... if they ship via forwarding companies(carriers) you likely will get clearance charges from them. I did more exports than imports, so not certain of the rules now... but I believe that both China and Australia fall into the most favored nations category and their goods have little or no duties.

Both get "most favored nation" treatment on imports from them. Rizheng does not use China Post. I believe Timberbits uses post office.

 

[timberbits]

Smitty's probably got a better handled on the process since I've been out of the import/export business for a few years now. There is a minimum that would require a broker to clear customs, but have forgotten exact amount, thinking it's about $2500... so you might be good on both shipments. If the vendors ship via postal system, likely the goods will clear customs as it goes through the post office... if they ship via forwarding companies(carriers) you likely will get clearance charges from them. I did more exports than imports, so not certain of the rules now... but I believe that both China and Australia fall into the most favored nations category and their goods have little or no duties.

Both get "most favored nation" treatment on imports from them. Rizheng does not use China Post. I believe Timberbits uses post office.

Hi

Thanks for your interest in our pen kits.

We use both TNT and the post office (USPS/Singapore Post/Australia Post). Orders under $100 we use the post office because the postage rate is a lot less expensive. We use TNT to post orders over $100 to the US and $200 for all other countries. This is because USPS can be very very slow with deliveries. We have found USPS very unreliable regarding deliver times, some parcels have taken over 20 working days (1 calendar month) to get delivered while TNT takes about 3 to 4 days to the US.

I believe $400USD is the tax free threshold for the US, so technically if you order under $400USD you should not have to pay duty.

Best of luck with whichever option you decide on.

Regards

Timberbits.

 

[Smitty37]

Sounds right

Smitty's probably got a better handled on the process since I've been out of the import/export business for a few years now. There is a minimum that would require a broker to clear customs, but have forgotten exact amount, thinking it's about $2500... so you might be good on both shipments. If the vendors ship via postal system, likely the goods will clear customs as it goes through the post office... if they ship via forwarding companies(carriers) you likely will get clearance charges from them. I did more exports than imports, so not certain of the rules now... but I believe that both China and Australia fall into the most favored nations category and their goods have little or no duties.

Both get "most favored nation" treatment on imports from them. Rizheng does not use China Post. I believe Timberbits uses post office.

Hi

Thanks for your interest in our pen kits.

We use both TNT and the post office (USPS/Singapore Post/Australia Post). Orders under $100 we use the post office because the postage rate is a lot less expensive. We use TNT to post orders over $100 to the US and $200 for all other countries. This is because USPS can be very very slow with deliveries. We have found USPS very unreliable regarding deliver times, some parcels have taken over 20 working days (1 calendar month) to get delivered while TNT takes about 3 to 4 days to the US.

I believe $400USD is the tax free threshold for the US, so technically if you order under $400USD you should not have to pay duty.

Best of luck with whichever option you decide on.

Regards

Timberbits.

That sounds about right.....but for whatever reason I have a lot of orders for more than that where I don't get assessed any additional fees or duty.

 

[TellicoTurning]

Hi

Thanks for your interest in our pen kits.

We use both TNT and the post office (USPS/Singapore Post/Australia Post). Orders under $100 we use the post office because the postage rate is a lot less expensive. We use TNT to post orders over $100 to the US and $200 for all other countries. This is because USPS can be very very slow with deliveries. We have found USPS very unreliable regarding deliver times, some parcels have taken over 20 working days (1 calendar month) to get delivered while TNT takes about 3 to 4 days to the US.

I believe $400USD is the tax free threshold for the US, so technically if you order under $400USD you should not have to pay duty.

Best of luck with whichever option you decide on.

Regards

Timberbits.

TNT is a good company... I've used them moving documents around the world back in the day.... I had more trouble with the efficiency of the local U.S. offices than I did the rest of the world...so I tended to only use them from point to point outside the U.S... from the U.S. I pretty much stuck with DHL for internationals and Fedex for domestics, but TNT sure had some good looking female sales reps that used to call on me..:biggrin:.. almost enough to fore go service just to have them call regularly.:biggrin:

 

[Marker]

Thanks guys,

I was going to make an order though timber bits, but he was out of stock on a certain slimline pen kit that I wanted, So I ended up making an order though a Chinese company Madeinchina.com


I just get the pen kits today, with no custom fees, I guess since it was under $500.


Thanks