Buying private from the U.S.

Leighthal

Hi All,
If I wish to make a private transaction with someone in the States do I send them a cheque in GBP or Dollars?
For example,if the item I want to buy is $1500,do I write a cheque for this amount and my bank will debit my account with the equivalent in Pounds?
I've never done it before so I dont know how it all works.

Thanks in advance

Alfie_E

For eBay, the universal rule is that you should send the seller money in the currency they used to list their item. If you want to do anything else, you should ask the seller, and wait for a reply, before you make a bid on their item or use “buy it now”. In any other situation, unless the seller says otherwise, they’re going to be expecting payment in their local currency.

Buy far the easiest, and safest, way to pay for anything from abroad is to use PayPal funded using a credit card. You can either tell PayPal to take pounds from your card and do the currency conversion, or tell them to take the foreign currency from your card, in which case your card network,Visa or Mastercard, will be the ones who sort out converting your pounds into the foreign currency. PayPal and most credit card issuers charge a conversion fee. However, some, like Nationwide, don’t make an extra charge for payments made in foreign currencies, so in that case you should always tell PayPal to take the foreign currency directly from the card.

You should also remember that anything over £18 in value is liable to customs charges. There’s import duty, which is payable if the duty is over £7. Import duty rates ranging from 0% to 15%, on common items. On top of that, there’s the VAT that you would pay if you bought the same item in the UK. Plus, there’s a separate handling fee, £4 to Royal Mail or £8 to Parcleforce, depending on who is passing the item through customs, on your behalf. This can all quickly mount up.

Leighthal

Thanks Alfie.I'd not considered the import duty side of things.This is certainly more complicated than I'd first thought.

soolin

Like Alfie says, the payment method will almost certainly be suggested by the seller so check with them and make sure whatever payment method they want is not going to cost you a fortune.

Incidentally, it is never possible to send a dollar cheque from a sterling account, you would need to make special arrangements with your bank to issue a dollar cheque or transfer money in dollars, both of which may cost a fair bit.

Soo