well damn fedex

My experience of foreign travel is that the US Dollar is accepted everywhere. (Credit where it due though, the Euro does make European travel sooo much easier these days).

 

Actually, there are quite a few ex-european colonies where the euro is accepted. The seychelles is one example, but I would imagine there's other examples. I would think that the USD has more world-wide acceptance though, but it's going down the drain fast...

 

Nope, I presume when it says 'Item Location: Midlands, UK' that it is in the UK.

 

You must be very angry indeed then, definately worth a nasty neg if he doesn't do the decent thing.....

 

Steve this is a good point. The EU was formed also to be able to compete against US and Japan. I believe the EU are choosing the wrong antagonist. Maybe one day they will find out that the real danger comes from China and that they (EU +US) should be together.

 

Isn't the obvious lesson not to buy from the US? It sounds defeatist but is probably the unpalatable truth. In fact, buying outside of the EU is just bloody difficult.

For a long time I wanted to buy Nikon's "photo secretary" product for my F90X, however they stopped this around 2000. I came across an alternative suite (HarTalk and SofTalk) from cocoon-creations and eagerly bought about 3 years ago. I got hit by C&E learning in the process that it was coming fom South Africa. I don'r regret th epurchase but it did open my eyes to importing.

Paul

 

For some items you could just go there, buy it and bring it back with you, walking innocently through the green lane.

For example, a low-season return fare to NYC can be had for about £200. A canon 300 F2.8L IS is $3800 there (around £2300), whereas high street price here is £4450, so it covers the air fare many times over...

 

Import duty & VAT are a pain but you know about them in advance so you need to factor them into the total price.

As many of you know, I bought a pair of speakers from the US a few weeks back. It was a surprisingly painless process and the carrier was Fed Ex who exceeded all my expectations.

Dealer in California received my funds on the Thursday and posted the speakers - Fed Ex UK phoned me Friday 5.00pm to tell me the speakers were in the UK. I paid the import duty over the phone on the Saturday. Speakers arrived safely on the Tuesday morning (the Monday was a Bank Holiday)! So, from the West Coast to my door in less than 3 working days!

Import Duties on speakers from the US are 4% of value of speakers plus delivery and then you pay VAT on the whole of that! So, yes it's a double tax and you pay tax on the shipping costs which all seems unfair but that's the way it is. As it stands, even with all taxes paid my speakers worked out at about half the UK rrp.

Matt.