payment of duties

[goodthingsforsalerobert]

My partners Ebay site had sold a large tablecloth to united kingdom,

The buyer writes back to say that the parcel had been delivered but is in customs and they want 18 pounds before release

Buyer complains that cant afford the duty and will let the item come back to Australia 

then expects a full refund as the buyer said i should have been aware for the duty charge and should have let them know

My reply.....sorry that YOUR parcel is in customs but its your responsability to pay any taxes or duties that arise in YOUR country

Buyer is not happy and will take it further

any comments welcome

[digital*ghost]

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@goodthingsforsalerobert wrote:

the buyer said i should have been aware for the duty charge and should have let them know

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They got that totally the wrong way around. 

It is the buyer's responsibility to know what their local taxes and custom charges are, and is their responsibility to pay for it - they can not hold a seller respnsibile because they were unaware of their own country's import charges, and/or their refusal to pay for them. If they don't want to pay taxes on imports, they need to buy from the EU. 

I have in my policies elsewhere that if a package is returned to me due to refusal to pay customs fees, the only thing that is refunded is item price, and not until I receive it back. Unfortunately earlier this year I had someone (also from the UK) simply tell me the item didn't arrive - I actually paid $25 to resend it with full tracking, that got there without a problem, then about 3 months after I sent the first one, it came back to me with stickers over it showing the customer just refused to pay the duties.

Sadly, this kind of thing happens all the time with UK buyers because their threshold is so low, the admin charges so high (8 GBP on top of the taxes etc) and according to many in the UK, it's not made widely known over there, plus it doesn't apply to orders within the EU so buyers can buy from a lot of different countries before they git hit with a notice to pay import charges, so heaps of people are surprised (and angry at sellers) when it occurs.

Not that that is any excuse, the first point is the main point - it is the buyer's responsibility, no matter which way you look at it. 

Show them this, from eBay's Money Back Guarantee policy:

Generally, the buyer is responsible for accepting the item when it arrives. If the buyer refuses delivery, their claim is not eligible for eBay Money Back Guarantee.

http://pages.ebay.com.au/help/policies/money-back-guarantee.html

Refusing to pay customs charges = refusing delivery.

[imastawka]

Buyers are supposed to know the Customs costs at their end

Who pays for customs?

Generally, buyers pay additional costs such as duties, taxes, and customs clearance fees. To avoid problems, make sure that your listing clearly states this. You can copy and paste this directly into your listing:

International buyers – please note: Import duties, taxes, and charges aren’t included in the item price or postage cost. These charges are the buyer's responsibility.

Please check with your country's customs office to determine what these additional costs will be prior to bidding or buying.

If you receive negative or neutral Feedback from the buyer about having to pay import duties and taxes, we may remove the Feedback. Find about more Feedback which refers to customs delays or customs fees.

http://pages.ebay.com.au/help/pay/international-shipping-rules.html

[davidc4430]

its very sad just how many dishonest people use ebay.  these forum boards are 90% storys about either dishonest buyers or sellers.

mankind is basically not very nice to each other or animals in general

trying not to join the dishonest club is so hard

i like to think my mum and dad reared me to be a good person, i have no interest in stealing from anyone

i wish all others would be the same to me.

the duties is a basic payment in the country the buyer lives in its nothing to do with a seller.

trying to claim its the sellers responsibilty just doesnt wash.

i'm sure the Ebay UK site has a policy stating the buyer pays, perhaps sending this bozo a link to the uk policy.

refund, eat my shorts man lol

[jellybirddesigns]

A few months ago I had a very irate buyer in the UK who threatened to leave feedback to "warn" other buyers because he had to pay duties upon receipt. I sent him the Ebay text regarding the buyers responsibilty and luckily that was the last of it.

However after dodging this possible red dot I now put a notice at the bottom of every one of my listings - straight off the Ebay website as has been mentioned above. On top of which, if an item sells to the UK, I tell the buyer upfront that they are probably going to get dinged with duties, so, with their permission I separate their items into two or more packages, declare the full value on each package and just make sure that it each pack comes in below GBP18.00. In terms of postage, what I charge usually covers being able to split the packs up with no extra to pay. Buyer is happy and I get sales and there are no negative repercussions.

Also, if the buyer leaves negative feedback which relates to duties/fees etc, I'm pretty sure it's one of those times that Eaby will remove it. I'm sure there is info on the site somewhere about acceptable feedback.

[digital*ghost]

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@davidc4430 wrote:

its very sad just how many dishonest people use ebay.  these forum boards are 90% storys about either dishonest buyers or sellers.

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The sale in my story above wasn't an eBay sale, but in the other E**y site. I was actually just perusing the forums over there a little while ago, and there was a thread talking about staying positive in the midst of all the negative topics on the forum (topics there are similar to here - low sales, low views, endless site tinkering, unfair practices, suspected buyer or seller fraud.... and so on and so forth).

Then someone popped in with an analogy, which I can't link to because it's on a different ecommerce site, and because I can't link to the source (for credit) I can't really repeat what it says, but the general gist of it is, the help forums on a site like this is like a workshop, if you're a mechanic in a workshop, you're only gonna see the cars in need of repair. IWhen you get out on the road, you're going to see the - significantly more - cars out there that are driving along just fine.