Customs Duties/Fees on Christmas gifts

jaccira

I am hoping you can help me.

My son lives and works in Germany.  Every year we send gifts and cards to him and his German family for Christmas.  This year was no exception.  We sent gifts to a value of £127.08.  We used the same company we used last year (Worldwide Parcel Services) and the parcels were delivered to our son in time for Christmas.  We opted to use DHL's click and collect service and paid WPS £20.19 for this. We were shocked and horrified when our son called us on 23 December to say they had received a bill from DHL in Germany to say they had incurred a 97 euros and 3 cents bill in lieu of taxes and fees incurred.  At no time were we informed by either company that there would be additional charges.

I checked on the UK government's website and it states quite clearly that post Brexit when sending gifts to individuals in the EU provided that they are clearly labelled as gifts (I have the invoice which clearly shows this)  and that each item is under £39 in value (the most expensive item was £36) they should not be subject to import VAT, customs duty or handling fees. As you can imagine, I was horrified to find out that a charge of nearly two thirds of the total value of the gifts had been levied.  I sent an email of complaint to both companies who have said that I have to contact Germany.  However I do not know who to contact. I feel very strongly that my original contract was with these companies, so would very much appreciate your thoughts on whether they have any legal obligations/duties to me, and how I go about contesting the charges levied.

Nannytone

Charges are German import duty.
Your son needs to sort it out with the relevant authority

powerful_Rogue

jaccira said:

I am hoping you can help me.

My son lives and works in Germany.  Every year we send gifts and cards to him and his German family for Christmas.  This year was no exception.  We sent gifts to a value of £127.08.  We used the same company we used last year (Worldwide Parcel Services) and the parcels were delivered to our son in time for Christmas.  We opted to use DHL's click and collect service and paid WPS £20.19 for this. We were shocked and horrified when our son called us on 23 December to say they had received a bill from DHL in Germany to say they had incurred a 97 euros and 3 cents bill in lieu of taxes and fees incurred.  At no time were we informed by either company that there would be additional charges.

I checked on the UK government's website and it states quite clearly that post Brexit when sending gifts to individuals in the EU provided that they are clearly labelled as gifts (I have the invoice which clearly shows this)  and that each item is under £39 in value (the most expensive item was £36) they should not be subject to import VAT, customs duty or handling fees. As you can imagine, I was horrified to find out that a charge of nearly two thirds of the total value of the gifts had been levied.  I sent an email of complaint to both companies who have said that I have to contact Germany.  However I do not know who to contact. I feel very strongly that my original contract was with these companies, so would very much appreciate your thoughts on whether they have any legal obligations/duties to me, and how I go about contesting the charges levied.

Did you complete a customs declaration?

What are the German rules regarding import taxes/duties? I'm presuming this is the UK Government website page you looked at - That is for goods coming into the UK.

https://www.gov.uk/goods-sent-from-abroad/tax-and-duty

If the German duties/taxes are correct, there is nothing to contest. The obligation is on the importer, not the courier.

Lomast

It is nothing to do with either the company you used or the uk government, it will be German customs that you or your son will have to talk to

y3sitsm3

https://www.zoll.de/EN/Private-individuals/Postal_consignments_internet_order/Shipments-from-a-non-EU-country/Duties-and-taxes/Gifts/gifts_node.html

jon81uk

I think the entire shipment needed to be under €45 to avoid customs charges.
Although it is never particularly clear.
Customs online - Gifts - Gifts (zoll.de)


I can't find anything on the UK gov site about taxes when things arrive in the EU, only for items arriving into the UK.
This does seem to indicate each item could be declared under £39 but have to be for seperate people
Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Gifts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Sandtree

Welcome to Brexit, these are now goods from outside the EU to him and therefore can be liable for sales tax and import duty. The amount will have been calculated based on the customs declaration you completed.

You dont mention what it is you sent nor the country of manufacture (important for duty considerations given the current trading terms with the EU). The €97 sounds high on a £147 parcel but you also have to check the DHL/PWS handling fee, UK it'd be circa £15 but in some countries its much higher.

The Gift exception is based on the value of the full parcel not the individual items contained within it. If they are all low value you could trying sending them individually in the future however firstly this will greatly increase your sending cost and if the German Customs think you are falsely dividing up a consignment to evade taxation they can consider them all together in which case its even worse as the higher postage would mean higher German taxes (they are charged on the total cost of the parcel not just the contents)

y3sitsm3

jon81uk said:

I think the entire shipment needed to be under €45 to avoid customs charges.
Although it is never particularly clear.
Customs online - Gifts - Gifts (zoll.de)


I can't find anything on the UK gov site about taxes when things arrive in the EU, only for items arriving into the UK.
This does seem to indicate each item could be declared under £39 but have to be for seperate people
Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Gifts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

However, a consignment is divisible if the consignment consists of different goods. These goods need to be usable on their own or be commercially available.

However that would at least presume that the items have been declared separately on the form and that it's clear that they're different goods.  Presumably "Gift £35 Gift £34" etc isn't going to cut it.

I'd also expect that the importer needs to make it clear these are to be treated as individual consignments. It's unlikely (in my experience) that customs are going to make any assumptions about anything. If it isn't clear that they are to be treated as such, I suspect the entire package is going to be treated as one consignment.

Sandtree

y3sitsm3 said:

jon81uk said:

I think the entire shipment needed to be under €45 to avoid customs charges.
Although it is never particularly clear.
Customs online - Gifts - Gifts (zoll.de)


I can't find anything on the UK gov site about taxes when things arrive in the EU, only for items arriving into the UK.
This does seem to indicate each item could be declared under £39 but have to be for seperate people
Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Gifts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

However, a consignment is divisible if the consignment consists of different goods. These goods need to be usable on their own or be commercially available.

However that would at least presume that the items have been declared separately on the form and that it's clear that they're different goods.  Presumably "Gift £35 Gift £34" etc isn't going to cut it.

I'd also expect that the importer needs to make it clear these are to be treated as individual consignments. It's unlikely (in my experience) that customs are going to make any assumptions about anything. If it isn't clear that they are to be treated as such, I suspect the entire package is going to be treated as one consignment.

You need the rest of the text for context... the €45 limit is per package/box not for each item inside the box.

The rest of the text is saying that if you are giving a big €160 lego set you cannot break it out into 4 separate parcels declare each to contain €40 worth of goods and get all 4 parcels through without duty because you need all 4 boxes together to make the set up

y3sitsm3

Sandtree said:

y3sitsm3 said:

jon81uk said:

I think the entire shipment needed to be under €45 to avoid customs charges.
Although it is never particularly clear.
Customs online - Gifts - Gifts (zoll.de)


I can't find anything on the UK gov site about taxes when things arrive in the EU, only for items arriving into the UK.
This does seem to indicate each item could be declared under £39 but have to be for seperate people
Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Gifts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

However, a consignment is divisible if the consignment consists of different goods. These goods need to be usable on their own or be commercially available.

However that would at least presume that the items have been declared separately on the form and that it's clear that they're different goods.  Presumably "Gift £35 Gift £34" etc isn't going to cut it.

I'd also expect that the importer needs to make it clear these are to be treated as individual consignments. It's unlikely (in my experience) that customs are going to make any assumptions about anything. If it isn't clear that they are to be treated as such, I suspect the entire package is going to be treated as one consignment.

You need the rest of the text for context... the €45 limit is per package/box not for each item inside the box.

The rest of the text is saying that if you are giving a big €160 lego set you cannot break it out into 4 separate parcels declare each to contain €40 worth of goods and get all 4 parcels through without duty because you need all 4 boxes together to make the set up

If the items are different goods, then it is divisible.  The OP sent multiple gifts, presumably for different family members.  I don't think there's an indication, for the sake of argument, that there was one box of Lego and each of the family members was going to get 1/4 of it.  Ergo the different gifts can be treated as individual consignments even if they're in the same package.

Sandtree

y3sitsm3 said:

Sandtree said:

y3sitsm3 said:

jon81uk said:

I think the entire shipment needed to be under €45 to avoid customs charges.
Although it is never particularly clear.
Customs online - Gifts - Gifts (zoll.de)


I can't find anything on the UK gov site about taxes when things arrive in the EU, only for items arriving into the UK.
This does seem to indicate each item could be declared under £39 but have to be for seperate people
Tax and customs for goods sent from abroad: Gifts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

However, a consignment is divisible if the consignment consists of different goods. These goods need to be usable on their own or be commercially available.

However that would at least presume that the items have been declared separately on the form and that it's clear that they're different goods.  Presumably "Gift £35 Gift £34" etc isn't going to cut it.

I'd also expect that the importer needs to make it clear these are to be treated as individual consignments. It's unlikely (in my experience) that customs are going to make any assumptions about anything. If it isn't clear that they are to be treated as such, I suspect the entire package is going to be treated as one consignment.

You need the rest of the text for context... the €45 limit is per package/box not for each item inside the box.

The rest of the text is saying that if you are giving a big €160 lego set you cannot break it out into 4 separate parcels declare each to contain €40 worth of goods and get all 4 parcels through without duty because you need all 4 boxes together to make the set up

If the items are different goods, then it is divisible.  The OP sent multiple gifts, presumably for different family members.  I don't think there's an indication, for the sake of argument, that there was one box of Lego and each of the family members was going to get 1/4 of it.  Ergo the different gifts can be treated as individual consignments even if they're in the same package.

We are reading the same thing but getting different interpretations of it... looking at the EU legislation it appears that you may be right Council Regulation (EC) No 1186/2009 of 16 November 2009 setting up a Community system of reliefs from customs duty (codified version) (legislation.gov.uk) however you'd need to see the German law to be certain (my German isnt good enough) as EC set minimum standards and individual nations can vary (eg UK (pre-Brexit) didnt adopt 2 year warranties because SOGA and subsequently CRA were considered above this standard). With tax minimum standards tend to be minimum tax charges as to avoid a race to the bottom within the EU.