New Buying From China (incl AliExpress) guide discussion

wrf12345

Thanks for the update, I did not get to the final payment when I tried so bad news, I thought foreign companies might have ignored our VAT man. Still, should not be a £8 customs check charge for goods up to £135, so some savings for larger purchases as the VAT would have been charged to the customer on import. A lot of Brits in the EU are being charged a double loading of VAT when buying from the UK via eBay etc but may sort itself out. A possible alternative is to try to buy direct from the Chinese manufacturers not via aliexpress but only going to work with a credit card as no protection otherwise, and do you really want credit card numbers going into the ether? I will probably go ahead anyway with Aliexpress as something on there for £36 inc VAT costs more than twice that here. Unfortunately, things like long sleev tee-shirts that I could get for under £3 will now be more expensive than stuff in Primark so may be a lot of annoyed Chinese vendors, although I suppose they could offer them in lots of say twelve at a reduced rate to offset the increase in VAT (which would not have worked before because of that additional £8 customs check charge). Be interesting to see if they adapt or not.

jogu

This isn't particularly a downside of Brexit as the same change (i.e. removal of the small item waiver) is being made in the EU, albeit delayed until July:

https://www.avalara.com/vatlive/en/vat-news/eu-2021-ending--22-import-exemption--import-oss-returns.html

Overall (although it's rather annoying to lose a cheap way to buy things) this is a positive change - it's making British businesses more competitive and protecting British jobs. UK businesses will now not be unfairly undercut by foreign suppliers, who were previously able to take advantage of a loophole to avoid charging VAT.

Unfortunately there is still not a level playing field - for utterly crazy reasons it's cheaper for a Chinese seller to post an item from China to the UK than it is to send an item within the UK. I've literally bought items from China that all in cost me less than the price of a 2nd class stamp - effectively anyone using RoyalMail in the UK is subsidising cheap imports from China, which is surely going to be fixed at some point.

troffasky

jogu said:

This isn't particularly a downside of Brexit as the same change (i.e. removal of the small item waiver) is being made in the EU, albeit delayed until July:

What I was getting at was, we diverged from EU rules by doing it 6 months earlier than them. Typical!

 UK businesses will now not be unfairly undercut by foreign suppliers, who were previously able to take advantage of a loophole to avoid charging VAT.

I suppose it's for the best really, my irritation here is that it only appears on checkout, not on the listing, and is therefore misleading. I have submitted feedback to AliExpress about this, no idea if they will take it on board.

Ebay says:

"Starting 1 January 2021, eBay is required to collect VAT on certain orders delivered to UK addresses ... You'll see the VAT included in your order total at checkout, and you can view and download a tax invoice from the Order details page"

I just tested this and got as far as the payment stage but without actually purchasing. The price displayed on checkout for an item from China is the same as on the listing, so it looks like eBay are doing it properly [although it's not itemised].

Unfortunately there is still not a level playing field - for utterly crazy reasons it's cheaper for a Chinese seller to post an item from China to the UK than it is to send an item within the UK.

Like him or not, Donald Trump kicked up a stink about the same thing with subsidies of post China->US. Not sure if it went anywhere.

https://www.dw.com/en/pexit-us-prepares-to-pull-out-of-universal-postal-union/a-50569818

wrf12345

Well, just went to order a motorcycle windscreen, expecting to pay around £36 inc vat and delivery and it has come up with no uk shipping, whilst some sanding disks (from my wish list) at £6 plus the new VAT with free shipping will  now only ship via ems at £22! Spent half an hour looking for an alternative windscreen, searching with free shipping ticked but when I click through they all come up with only ems shipping at £25-30! Possibly the manufacturers using EMS so that the tax is included??? The smaller companies possibly aren't bothered and are priced as before?

It may sort itself out, but as I suspected Brexit means the big companies carry on as normal whilst normal people get done over - so where is all this power that I have taken back, then? The UK market has long been overpriced but when in the EU you could always buy via Amamzon or eBay from other EU countries, forcing UK prices down to a more sane level - for the moment, that seems to have gone!

wrf12345

Sorry, the above all via aliexpress

troffasky

wrf12345 said:

Well, just went to order a motorcycle windscreen, expecting to pay around £36 inc vat and delivery and it has come up with no uk shipping, whilst some sanding disks (from my wish list) at £6 plus the new VAT with free shipping will  now only ship via ems at £22! Spent half an hour looking for an alternative windscreen, searching with free shipping ticked but when I click through they all come up with only ems shipping at £25-30! Possibly the manufacturers using EMS so that the tax is included??? The smaller companies possibly aren't bothered and are priced as before?

Shipping and tax are [probably] unrelated. AliExpress have been told to deduct the VAT regardless of what the seller does. The shipping thing might be brexit-related uncertainty, or it might be due to a recent shortage of empty shipping containers in China. On my most recent order [2 days ago] the shipping costs were nominal, but then everything I ordered fits in a small packet, which I imagine a motorcycle windscreen does not.

jogu

wrf12345 said:

Well, just went to order a motorcycle windscreen, expecting to pay around £36 inc vat and delivery

Assuming the shipper was previously truthfully recording the value, the new rules (where VAT is collected at point of sale) should work out better, as for a £36 order from Aliexpress the delivery carrier now won't be collecting the VAT - meaning you don't have to deal with the courier trying to charging an additional £8 or more fee for doing so / holding packages to ransom / etc.

Unfortunately in the short term things are unlikely to work well, between the last minute Brexit deal, ongoing COVID related issues and the Christmas disruption at Dover international shipments into/out of the UK aren't working well. Many sellers may have taken the option of temporarily withdrawing from selling to the UK until they're 100% clear on the new paperwork requirements and confident packages will not be rejected/held by customs, as they won't want to be on the receiving end of negative feedback related to things they can't really control. I'd guess things should settle down in a few weeks time... 

wrf12345

You have to laugh, found another one (identical product as far as I can see) for £31.60 inc VAT with free shipping so just paid for it before it disappears, so that is close to the old price I was going to pay before changes. More likely a glitch with aliexpress than anything else, I guess... just checked, my sanding disks they are back to free shipping albeit with 20 percent VAT added so probably won't bother with that for the moment.

wrf12345

Yes I realize I am saving £8 on the customs charge. When buying vitamins from the USA before Brexit there was the option to have the customs charges paid in advance using either ems or hermes so in that instance I think the shipper was paying the VAT to customs and the customer avoided the £8 charge that way, so if the Chinese companies have been told to pay the VAT they may be doing that, and then aliexpress are doubling up. Similar thing is happening to Brits in the EU buying from the UK via eBay or Amazon UK, the co's are still charging VAT and ebay and Amazon are charging VAT on top of it, so they are getting whacked with UK VAT and Spanish VAT at the moment.

martyp

Hi all,
I've bought things from Aliexpress before and received an invoice for purchases before to cover import or customs duties and a Royak Mail handling fee. I've now noticed that Aliexpress are now charging VAT based on the following:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/vat-and-overseas-goods-sold-to-customers-in-the-uk-using-online-marketplaces
What I'd like to know is does that mean that I have no fear of customs or import duties being charged on top as VAT is now being charged when the product is purchased?