FedEx "Returned Goods Fee"

cosmo21

When travelling in the US recently, I left my kindle on an American Airlines plane. This was found and I arranged via their online webform, for the item to be couriered back to me, and paid them for the cost of the service. My item was delivered by FeEx but a few days later I received an invoice from FedEx for a "Retuned Goods Fee" of £21. I questioned this with FedEx who said the following:
You will appreciate that we have an electronic system for completing HM Revenue & Customs entries which affects automatic clearance. However, for return shipments we are obliged to pull them from the auto clear channel and present them separately to Customs. This in turn creates additional time consuming work for our clearance team and these costs are not included in our standard freight charge.

To clarify, because this was a personal item being returned, it is not subject to any HMRC taxes. This is purely an admin charge by FedEx, which at no point did I agree to paying. The fee is higher than the fee they charge for processing HMRC payments and seems excessive. Does anyone have any advice on whether I am legally obliged to pay this?

bod1467

Please edit your post to remove any styles or font settings ... put the text simply as text. I cannot read your post - it is too small. (You can still use the Quote or Italics tags for the FedEx response).

(I know I could zoom, and it would be quicker than writing this reply, but I shouldn't have to ... if the OP does it for the post above then all other posts will likely be the same - let's nip this in the bud right away).

cosmo21

bod1467 wrote: »

Please edit your post to remove any styles or font settings ... put the text simply as text. I cannot read your post - it is too small. (You can still use the Quote or Italics tags for the FedEx response).

(I know I could zoom, and it would be quicker than writing this reply, but I shouldn't have to ... if the OP does it for the post above then all other posts will likely be the same - let's nip this in the bud right away).

Sorry - hope that's better, it all looked fine on my computer?

bris

Unfortunately your caught in the same trap as everyone else. By having it sent from USA (or anywhere outside the EU) there is customs to clear. Unfortunately the sender didn't clear it for you and neither did you. Like everything else not knowing is no defence and it needs cleared whether it has taxes on it or not. fedEX clear customs unless they are told not to and pass the fee for their service onto the recipient, that's you.


Whether you pay or not depends on whether or not you want to. The hassle not paying might very well out weight the £21. Who knows how far fedEx will go but if they do then you can bet there will be other admin charges piled on by the time it's settled.