Out of the common market

ebay mike said:
The ban on importing food into the EU appears to apply to ANYTHING that has originated from an animal (including dairy products) - so all meats and poultry, cooked or otherwise, milk, cheese, butter, eggs and anything that has those items as an ingredient. I have not yet worked out if that also means tinned foods. Consequently Mr caravan/camper van/motorhome/self-caterer will not be able to take their normal supplies with them on holiday when and if we are ever allowed to visit the United States of Europe. You can bet inward non UK travellers will not be subject to similar regulations or treatment.
Click to expand...
playmofire said:
But the Dutch are only applying the deal the UK agreed and the UK applies similar rules on personal imports from some countries. And it's no different from the situation between the UK and the USA, say, over some foodstuffs.

Details on the EU arrangement can be found here: Personal Imports - Food Safety - European Commission
Click to expand...
Dunno if you've aver been bored enough to watch some of the minor channels, and the border control programmes.

I remember one programme on Aussi border control was covering an international yachting race, and the border control guys went on board the yachts to check their provisions stores, and made them dump any amount of foodstuff that the Aussies don't allow - even though the majority of it would never have come ashore :confused::confused:
 
There has been a lot of discussion about VAT and particularly in connection with eBay the link below provides eBay's interpretation of the regulations, and how, as an intermediary they are going to manage their legal responsibility:

Your VAT obligations in the UK & EU

For those of you that are familiar with VAT this should not be a surprise.

Edited to place missing "not"
 
Last edited:
JimmyB said:
There has been a lot of discussion about VAT and particularly in connection with eBay the link below provides eBay's interpretation of the regulations, and how, as an intermediary they are going to manage their legal responsibility:

Your VAT obligations in the UK & EU

For those of you that are familiar with VAT this should be a surprise.
Click to expand...
Jimmy,
Did you miss the word 'not' out of your last sentence?

Anyone who is vat registered, should have been aware of the changes coming in July..
The way changes are being interpreted at the moment, although known about, might be a surprise in the way companies, organisations, and individuals are implementing the changes.

Rules were due to change anyway, Brexit has added another layer to the admin.
Just a bit sooner, and with less information, as the final outcome was all a bit last minute.

PhilP
 
PhilP said:
Jimmy,
Did you miss the word 'not' out of your last sentence?

Anyone who is vat registered, should have been aware of the changes coming in July..
The way changes are being interpreted at the moment, although known about, might be a surprise in the way companies, organisations, and individuals are implementing the changes.

Rules were due to change anyway, Brexit has added another layer to the admin.
Just a bit sooner, and with less information, as the final outcome was all a bit last minute.

PhilP
Click to expand...
Well spotted, and now corrected :)
 
idlemarvel said:
Good news (well may not be news but I only just discovered this), no customs duty on model trains imported into UK.
Commodity code 9503003000: Electric trains, including tracks, signals and other accessories therefor; reduced-size (scale) model assembly kits - The Online Trade Tariff - GOV.UK
Just need to make sure they use the correct commodity code on the customs forms.
Click to expand...
Excellent news!

I think, in general, the principles haven't changed. What HM Government has managed to do is to plug a few holes in the colander :rock::rock::rock::rock:

But, the big issue is that VAT is collected by HMRC (and therefore EU sales should be less EU VAT - whatever the country's rate is) and that on imports under £139, the VAT may well be collected by the handler in this country and there will be the highwayman's fee for collecting the fee :(:(

I have ordered a tinsy-winsy something from Japan at fairly low cost via Ebay who have allegedly applied VAT, so it will be an interesting experiment :think::think::think::think:
 
From conversations and emails with various suppliers and acquaintances across Europe.

My go to online EU supplier for orders up to £135 will now add the UK’s prevailing VAT rate at the point of sale, as they have registered with HM Revenue & Customs.

Many of my EU-based one man band retailers have decided that the paperwork of collecting UK VAT is not worth the hassle and as a result will no longer supply UK customers, see below in BLUE.

Anyone in the UK receiving a gift from the EU worth more than £39 will now face a bill for import VAT at 20%.

Thankfully I do not use any EU retailers that have carried on as before, that have been sending out orders without having deducted the VAT. This has led to couriers turning up on doorsteps demanding the UK buyer pay the VAT owed on the item they are receiving. The rate will be between 0% and 20% depending on the item.

For orders above £135 it becomes more complicated as these will also attract import duty, which can range from 0% to 25% of the item’s value depending on what it is, what material it is made from and its declared value. There are thousands of different rates of duty and the system is difficult to understand.

VAT is then added to the total – at the prevailing UK rate, which for most items is 20%. The couriers also add their admin charge of between £8 (Royal Mail) and £11.50 (UPS), or 2.5% of the amount paid to clear customs, with a minimum charge of £11 (DHL).

For example, if I placed a £200.00 order from a German online retailer, it could attract 12% or £24.00 customs duty. VAT at 20% is then applied to the total of £224.00, giving a VAT bill of £44.80. Once the courier has added its £11.00 admin fee, I would be liable to pay £79.80 to the courier on the doorstep before they will hand over the package.

Orders paid for prior to 1st January should not attract these charges, DHL were sent away with a flea in their ear over this the other day, for trying to extort the £11.00 admin fee!

Yes I did get the package, and no I did not have pay the robber barons at HMRC, or the highway robbers from DHL!

Hopefully this will help clear up the guesswork!
 
Last edited:
There has been coverage in the press of customs charges for all sorts of things bought from European suppliers and shops and smaller suppliers not selling to the UK now. I am really pleased I took the chance last year to stock up from Modell Land, Heyn and Grootspoor last year.
I have had to send my Trainline Mallet back to Trainline for repair. It was 25% dearer than the last time I sent a parcel by DHL to Europe. I am apprehensive about getting it back in case there are any other charges. I was thinking of ordering some signs from Heyn and might try this to see what happens to a small low cost packet, assuming they will still sell to the UK.
Most of the character of my Railway comes from things you cannot buy here. I will be very sad if I cannot add much more to my line because it is prohibitively expensive or no longer available. Hopefully in time things will get better.
 
Ref post #124, the customs duty on model trains is 0%

Ref @dunnyrail question books are also 0%, see Commodity code 4901100000: In single sheets, whether or not folded - The Online Trade Tariff - GOV.UK

If you order from an "online market place" like eBay or Amazon, they handle the VAT so there should be no admin fee from the courier. For used items, 20% VAT is added to item cost and postage, for new items the local VAT should be subtracted first before the UK VAT of 20% is added to item cost and postage.
 
@MaybachMD, like yourself, my own Garden Railway is based solely on European practise, which in itself limits the available list of suppliers.

I respectfully suggest as I did, was to contact each supplier or individual, and to ascertain what arrangements would be acceptable to continue to supply the items that I am likely to require.

As this is a Public Forum, I will not comment or provide any further information regarding any supplier or individual, read into that what you wish!

As for the return of your repair, as long as the correct code is used for it's return, it should have an easy journey back to yourself.....
 
Last edited:
The Shed said:
@MaybachMD, like yourself, my own Garden Railway is based solely on European practise, which in itself limits the available list of suppliers.

I respectfully suggest as I did, was to contact each supplier or individual, and to ascertain what arrangements would be acceptable to continue to supply the items that I am likely to require.

As this is a Public Forum, I will not comment or provide any further information regarding any supplier or individual, read into that what you wish!

As for the return of your repair, as long as the correct code is used for it's return, it should have an easy journey back to yourself.....
Click to expand...
Interesting re the books, looking at the officialdegook I was certainly confused, so Maybach good luck with adding the correct code to get it back with no issues. That also assumes that the importers understand the complications as well. Beginning to wish that I had gone gauge 3 when I started the current Dunnybahn as I would have been using. British Components to scratch or kit-build exclusively. I can see such methods being the way in the future for many with less European layouts appearing except for the well healed.
 
Jon

That is a very sad thought. I hope it doesn’t come to not being able to model what we like. My winter loft layout is 7mm modern image running Heljan, Danish company whose products are made in China. It is all international.
 
MaybachMD said:
Jon

That is a very sad thought. I hope it doesn’t come to not being able to model what we like. My winter loft layout is 7mm modern image running Heljan, Danish company whose products are made in China. It is all international.
Click to expand...
I think you'll find that there are sufficient established importers of Heljan to ensure continuing supply, and the general principle of Brexit is no change in the trading terms with Europe.

In these instances, I think there is unlikely to be a cost implication.

As I said earlier, where there are going to be cost changes are where HM Treasury have plugged some holes in the leaky sieve - stuff that sneaked through without VAT or without duty, especially on the trading platforms like Ebay. But you will have seen from Ebay, Paypal and, if you use it, Etsy that the US was tightening up in a similar vein long before Brexit - we're not unique.

The only other area of some pain is the reduction in duty free - but that never extended as far as model trains :rolleyes::rolleyes:
 
well n the good old days way back pre EU we were in the europian free trade area, or if stuff was shipped out of the area it went vat free so we should be able to putchasw things vat free from europe when things are sorted ..some hope.
 
One of the things that is irritating me purchasing things in the net a Country of supply is often difficult to define. I have just the other day bought something and never managed to find out the supplier Country, all the clues appeared to be that it was English. Now on the delivery time it is clearly not Uk and I will probably have a big fat import bill to pay to Po. Ah well as they say, you cant take it with you.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom