Ebay and Irish Revenue

eskerman

I though this was worth a thread.. I was quite surprised when it popped in my letterbox.

I recently purchased an old Russian Rangefinder camera on Ebay from a private collector. I haggled and haggled and got the price down to the manageable amount of €25.99 ( €17.35) plus postage charges of $27.00 from The Ukraine. Paid by paypal, job done....:rolleyes:

Letter in this morning from Revenue that my little parcel was being held at Customs & Excise in Dublin...!

Dear Sir,

In order to receive your package, you must send your Paypal receipt by email or FAX to ............. within the next 14 days. Please put the official parcel number ..... AT THE BEGINNING OF of the subject line.

On receipt of your email we will reply, by email informing you of the total amount due, if any, and the expected day of delivery of you letter packet. The customs charges due will be collected by the postman on delivery , payment by cash or bank draft or postal order, we cannot accept payment by VISA or Laser.

There is no facility to collect you package in person from the above office, if a reply is not received in 14 days your letter parcel will be returned to sender.

Note:

Information on purchasing goods on the internet.

Import charges and VAT are payable on goods, valued at over €22, ordered over the internet or from a mail order catalogue and imported into Ireland from outside the EU.

The charges consist of:

Customs Duty
21% VAT and
A post office handling charge of €6 for processing the goods through customs

Customs charges are calculated on the total cost of bringing a consignment into the country including postage, packaging, handling, insurance and freight.

Moral of this sad story is don't buy old secondhand Russian Rangefinder cameras on Ebay and try to smuggle them into this great little country, big brother is watchin you..

Its not April 1st by any chance is it...???

tenchi-fan

I bought some old Nintendo stuff online. The idiot who sold it to me put an even higher value on the package than I had paid him resulting in an even higher charge to me

It's nothing new by the way.

eskerman

tenchi-fan wrote: »

I bought some old Nintendo stuff online. The idiot who sold it to me put an even higher value on the package than I had paid him resulting in an even higher charge to me

It's nothing new by the way.

I bought privately and the amount paid was genuine, the postage charges from Ukraine was more then the old camera ( which was about 30 years old and not working..:eek:)

If this is what Revenue are at now we are all doomed in this god-forsaken debt ridden country..

Disgraceful when the real culprits of the downfall of Ireland remain The Untouchables..

Dr Galen

Not really a thread for politics

Cheers
DrG

jor el

Link to Import Duty thread.

It's not disgraceful, nor is it new. You live in a country where import duty and VAT are applied to practically everything you buy. Just because you don't normally see it itemised, doesn't mean it's not there. The fact that it is old and not working is irrelevant. You bought something of value, therefore it attracts value added tax.