Royal Mail's £8 customs handling charge - any way to avoid? Is it legal?

magiccake

A few weeks ago, I ordered a $25 item from the USA, and it was sent via USPS International Shipping which also cost $25.

Upon its arrival in the UK I received a card from Royal Mail informing me that there had been a £4 import VAT charge on the item, and an additional £8 "handling charge" imposed by Royal Mail.

I'm well aware that these charges are standard and have experienced them before, and the point of this thread is not exactly to complain about them. But I wondered if it was possible to avoid the handling charge.

From a legal standpoint, is Royal Mail allowed to withhold my item because I refuse to pay their £8 fee, but don't refuse to pay the HMRC charges?

Why is Royal Mail allowed to charge £8 for a service which is mandatory?

Is there any way to prevent Royal Mail from dealing with HMRC on my behalf and do it myself?

If anyone is interested, I put forth these questions to Royal Mail but all I've received are extremely wooly responses, as below.

My email to them:

My first question is, how can Royal Mail justify charging a handling charge which is nearly double the amount of the customs charge? If the item's custom charge was even lower - for example, £0.50 - would the £8 charge still apply? I hope you can appreciate how frustrating that concept is.

My second question is, is there a way whereby I can request that Royal Mail do *not* handle the import of my international packages? As far as I knew, the item would be delivered by USPS, and although I am aware they do not operate in the UK, I did not know that it would be automatically handed over to Royal Mail, specifically, to complete the delivery. Nor did I request that Royal Mail handle any revenue and customs import procedures on my behalf. Is there a way I can ask senders to label the parcel so that HMRC contacts me directly with any import issues, fees to pay, or other issues with a parcel?

Finally, can I please clarify what happens to my goods if I am unable or unwilling to pay Royal Mail's £8 handling fee, and instead pay any owed customs fees to HMRC directly? In such a case, would Royal Mail not then be withholding the goods from me illegally?

Their response:

As you may be aware, we are required by law to cooperate with the UK Border Agency and to work under their directions. We therefore have an obligation to present all packages entering the UK from outside the European Union (EU), which attract customs duty, to the UK Border Agency.

If an item of mail then goes on to have customs charges attached to it by the UK Border Agency (valued over £15 for Merchandise or £35 for gifts - based on the value noted on the customs declaration), we will pay these fees (VAT of 20%) on behalf of the addressee in order to speed up its release for delivery. Royal Mail then collects these monies from the addressee, along with a charge to cover the additional handling and administration incurred by us, before the item can be released.

I am sorry, but it is impossible to give an actual breakdown of the handling fee as this is a standard fee that is attached to all customs charged items. It is an accurate reflection of the costs involved in most cases.

The £8 fee covers handling costs involved in:

Operating the postal customs depot
Handling the package for customs examination
Opening, repacking and resealing the package if required
Paying the charges to HMRC on a recipient’s behalf

If you wish to query the amount of the customs fee you may wish to contact the UK Border Agency on 0845 010 9000. Should you think that your charge has been issued in error, you may wish to pay the customs fee to retrieve your item, then make a claim for refund of this fee via the UK Border Agency. Please note that Royal Mail will not release an item for delivery without this fee being paid. Should the fee remain unpaid for over 21 days the item will be returned to sender.

If the item is returned to the sender they would not have pay the surcharge for the item.

My response:

Thank you for getting back to me, however several of my questions went unanswered.

1) Is there a way whereby I can request that Royal Mail do *not* handle the import of my international packages, or do not pay customs fees on my behalf?

2) What happens to my goods if I am unable or unwilling to pay Royal Mail's £8 handling fee, and instead pay any owed customs fees to HMRC directly? In such a case, would Royal Mail not then be withholding the goods from me illegally?

Their latest response:

As my colleague has previously stated we are required by law to cooperate with the UK Border Agency and to work under their directions. We therefore have an obligation to present all packages entering the UK from outside the European Union (EU), which attract customs duty, to the UK Border Agency, therefore we are unable to stop items going through customs.

Turning to your comments regarding the £8 handling fee, this is part of the charge and if the full fee is not paid the item will be returned to sender.

pinkshoes

If you had to drive to the border agency and sort it out yourself, i am sure it would have cost more than £8 in petrol...

shaun_from_Africa

magiccake wrote: »

I'm well aware that these charges are standard and have experienced them before, and the point of this thread is not exactly to complain about them. But I wondered if it was possible to avoid the handling charge.

Yes, you can avoid the £8 charge but only if you act before the goods are posted and your seller agrees to mark the declaration form correctly.

Declaring the goods yourself

As the importer you can carry out your own Customs procedures. If you want to do this, you will need to ensure the sender clearly marks the Customs declaration form (CN22 or CN23) 'goods to be Customs cleared by the importer'. Do not write on the wrapping. If the Customs declaration form (CN22 or CN23) is not marked in this way by the sender, the goods will be cleared by customs in the normal way; once goods have been Customs cleared you cannot then retrospectively apply to self clear them.

https://www.nibusinessinfo.co.uk/content/how-declare-goods-when-importing-post

magiccake wrote: »

Why is Royal Mail allowed to charge £8 for a service which is mandatory?

Because they are simply charging to provide a service which requires them to spend time and money doing so. Customs clearance is mandatory but it's not mandatory for them to do it as you can do the same job yourself.

hcb42

Lots of things are mandatory and have a cost associated to them...

bod1467

How many times are we going to get exactly the same thread started?

(Different people, same old same old).

magiccake

pinkshoes wrote: »

If you had to drive to the border agency and sort it out yourself, i am sure it would have cost more than £8 in petrol...

Or they could just send me a letter. It's possible to pay the border agency directly, via post or telephone, without RM's involvement, I'm sure.

shaun_from_Africa wrote: »

Customs clearance is mandatory but it's not mandatory for them to do it as you can do the same job yourself.

But that's my point exactly - I didn't ask them to do it. I'd much rather receive a letter from the border agency and deal with them myself than have Royal Mail presume to do it for me.

It's the fact that customers are not even offered a choice in the matter, and that RM can withhold your parcel if you were unfortunate enough to not know about this procedure beforehand.

And also, when I asked RM point blank if there was a way to avoid their charge, they didn't tell me about the ability to self-clear as provided in your (very helpful) link, using customs forms CN22 or CN23.

Thank you very much for that link, by the way!

custardy

magiccake wrote: »

But that's my point exactly - I didn't ask them to do it. I'd much rather receive a letter from the border agency and deal with them myself than have Royal Mail presume to do it for me.

It's the fact that customers are not even offered a choice in the matter, and that RM can withhold your parcel if you were unfortunate enough to not know about this procedure beforehand.

And also, when I asked RM point blank if there was a way to avoid their charge, they didn't tell me about the ability to self-clear as provided in your (very helpful) link, using customs forms CN22 or CN23.

Thank you very much for that link, by the way!

Well you should have dealt with it yourself...........

shaun_from_Africa

magiccake wrote: »

But that's my point exactly - I didn't ask them to do it. I'd much rather receive a letter from the border agency and deal with them myself than have Royal Mail presume to do it for me.

But how would the border agency know that there is a package for you or that there are any import duties to pay?
The only way that they would know this is if Royal mail had already started the clearance process by checking every package and letter that came into the country, determined which ones were liable for taxes and duty and then informed HMRC about this.
Then once RM had found the chargeable mail, it would have to be stores in a bonded area until cleared for release.


RM wouldn't be able to release the package for delivery until HMRC had contacted you for payment, received that payment, and them informed RM that it was okay to send on the item.


Doing it this way would probably cost far more than £8 and I wouldn't be surprised if it caused quite a delay with the final delivery.

DCFC79

Dont buy stuff from america and jobs a good un.

visidigi

magiccake wrote: »

Or they could just send me a letter. It's possible to pay the border agency directly, via post or telephone, without RM's involvement, I'm sure.



But that's my point exactly - I didn't ask them to do it. I'd much rather receive a letter from the border agency and deal with them myself than have Royal Mail presume to do it for me.

It's the fact that customers are not even offered a choice in the matter, and that RM can withhold your parcel if you were unfortunate enough to not know about this procedure beforehand.

And also, when I asked RM point blank if there was a way to avoid their charge, they didn't tell me about the ability to self-clear as provided in your (very helpful) link, using customs forms CN22 or CN23.

Thank you very much for that link, by the way!

The border agency wouldn't send you a letter for free. They could charge you a fee for that, don't be surprised if its also around £8.

Everything has a cost. 'Just' doing something isn't free.

visidigi

shaun_from_Africa wrote: »

But how would the border agency know that there is a package for you or that there are any import duties to pay?
The only way that they would know this is if Royal mail had already started the clearance process by checking every package and letter that came into the country, determined which ones were liable for taxes and duty and then informed HMRC about this.
Then once RM had found the chargeable mail, it would have to be stores in a bonded area until cleared for release.


RM wouldn't be able to release the package for delivery until HMRC had contacted you for payment, received that payment, and them informed RM that it was okay to send on the item.


Doing it this way would probably cost far more than £8 and I wouldn't be surprised if it caused quite a delay with the final delivery.

Just to clarify, RM don't assess anything, they don't say which shipments are due duties and taxes.

They pay the HMRC (not border agency) to have staff present at the RM sorting hubs. These staff decide which shipments to inspect, bypass or assess.

That's what RM charge for, the movement of the mail to the HMRC staff which they pay for to be present in a hub location for speedy expediting of international freight through the hubs.

If the freight had to be moved off site to be cleared RM would charge for that too - so by having implants in the hub the costs are actually lower.