Importing wine from Europe

Mr. Flibble

Does anyone know if it is legal to get a shop in Europe to send wine to you in Ireland, for personal consumption, without paying any taxes? Are there any limits to how much I can order?

parsi

If it's under the limits for personal consumption (on the revenue site but over 100 bottles) then you should be ok. However you will be paying the relevant taxes in the country of purchase (if EU) and shipping can be an issue...in fact I would expect shipping to be the killer.

There was a Luxembourg site which was shipping cheap booze but they got so large that they ended up having to charge Irish customers Irish vat rates so their competitiveness dropped (iirc).

Mr. Flibble

parsi wrote:

There was a Luxembourg site which was shipping cheap booze but they got so large that they ended up having to charge Irish customers Irish vat rates so their competitiveness dropped (iirc).

Cheers parsi. It says
"There are no limits on what you can buy and take with you when you travel between EU countries" here.


But it doesn't say anything about when you aren't traveling. Do you think it its the same?


Edited

1carrot2

There was a court case regarding this which was referred to the European Court of Justice in November 2006. Their ruling can be seen at:

http://www.curia.europa.eu/en/actu/communiques/cp06/aff/cp060093en.pdf

To cut to the chase - you are only exempt from the Irish taxes if you purchase the goods in person and transport them yourself.

Mr. Flibble

Nice one carrot.

El Stuntman

whenever I order booze online from James Nicholson wines (very good) in Co. Down, I get Irish duties and other crap added onto the bill

bit annoying but there ya go

I'm off to Bordeaux on holidays next month, presume the same will apply there if I ask ppl there to ship me a crate or two?

Mr. Flibble

El Stuntman wrote:

whenever I order booze online from James Nicholson wines (very good) in Co. Down, I get Irish duties and other crap added onto the bill

bit annoying but there ya go

I'm off to Bordeaux on holidays next month, presume the same will apply there if I ask ppl there to ship me a crate or two?

It looks that way El Stuntman. But you can bring up to 90 liters with you as you come home.

El Stuntman

Mr. Flibble wrote:

It looks that way El Stuntman. But you can bring up to 90 liters with you as you come home.

Thanks Mr F but could be tricky for my baggage allowance! I wonder if there's a link anywhere that would let me calculate how much duty/VAT I'd have to pay if I shipped stuff from France to here? anyone?

who let you out of the poker forum?

Mr. Flibble

El Stuntman wrote:

Thanks Mr F but could be tricky for my baggage allowance! I wonder if there's a link anywhere that would let me calculate how much duty/VAT I'd have to pay if I shipped stuff from France to here? anyone?

It might not cost too much more to pay to carry more with you on the flight than paying postage for wine.

El Stuntman wrote:

who let you out of the poker forum?

I wanted to expand my horizons from a solely poker related existence, so I came here.

beardybrewer

When we were traveling by ferry from Cherbourg to Roslaire we filled the car to the rafters. We had quite a night in the hostel sampling 12 wines (and sharing the remainder) to decide what to buy cases of. We averaged €3-4 a bottle and brought back enough to last 6 months. We met 3 guys who hired a van and brought back loads. They said they did this every year at a substantial savings. You can do the same with cigarettes, but they said to be sure to buy the same brand or else they'll suspect they aren't for personal consumption. Also, people at work swear there are still limits -- possibly established limits on what could be considered personal consumption?

Ferry-wise the best setup is probably in Calais. When we traveled there from Dover there were loads of adverts for the english booze-cruise. They can cruise over, go to the warehouses, and stock up and the ferry is cheap. Its not as cheap for us and Cherbourg's stores are okay but its still a good savings. Liquor-wise the prices weren't fantastic compared to some of europe (I saw Jameson for as cheap as €10 in Italy) but still much better than here.

biaduit

I've done the booze cruise to Cherboug a couple of times now - once for our wedding and a few times since. There is no absolute limit as what constitutes personal consumption but over 90 litres per person the burden of proof that's it's for personal consumption moves to you, under 90 litres the custom's agent must prove that you are going to resell the wine.

Normandie Wine Warehouse in Cherbourg is quite good for wine and will do a full tasting with you - so you don't have to taste everything in the hostel. I find €3-4 gets you a decent very drinkable wine and at €8-€12 you are getting some really good wines.

HTH

beardybrewer

biaduit wrote:

Normandie Wine Warehouse in Cherbourg is quite good for wine and will do a full tasting with you

Good stuff biaduit! I can't remember the place we went but it was a large warehouse type of place. Some wines were available for tasting but not many. My in-laws just did a booze cruise to Cherbourg and brought back a lot of 1 & 3 liter sizes. Even 10 liter was an option. I tend to shy away from box wines but they say these are quite good and cheaper again. Anyhow, I'll keep Normandie in mind if we ever find ourselves out that way again.

Has anyone seen some of the shops in Calais? I had the impression they would be equivalent to Bevmo in the US; perhaps bigger.