Has anyone ever been asked by a Chinese seller how much you want them to put as a value on the customs declaration form...

Has anyone ever been asked by a Chinese seller how much you want them to put as a value on the customs declaration form?
What did you reply? This seems very sketchy.

Not sketchy really, they're just trying to helpo you get it through customs without a fee.

Most of the time they just call it a $50 gift and that will bypass any fees.

He's essentially asking you if you're okay with paying import duties.

Not sure where you're from, but certain countries will tax the shit out of imports, up to like 60% of its value depending on the item. The US is fairly lax when it comes to importing, as is Australia (as long as it's under 1000 USD), but most other countries will be charging you some sort of fee. Granted, these policies change almost monthly, too so it's a giant pain in the ass to keep track of.

Now, if you were to ask him to under declare the value of the item, it would considered illegal. However, very few governments are going to crack open your package, take a look at the product, and research the common selling price of that item. The most they'll do is ask for a receipt, and if you can't provide one that matches the declared price, then they'll charge you the duties for whatever you paid.

If you're paranoid about it, just tell him that to declare it whatever you paid. If you have to pick it up at the customs office, bring your receipt.

The only way you might end up being screwed over by under declaring is if your item is lost or damaged in shipment. And even then most payment processors are so gun-ho about customer protection, all it takes is a phone call to get your money back. Most sellers, though, are more than willing to ship you a replacement for any damage or lost product, so always ask them first.

UK here. So I think it is a 20% tax on anything over £15. Does anyone ever get in trouble for doing this then?

You can potentially get into trouble, but the chances are that if you have a half-way convincing receipt (which you can usually make in a word processor or Excel), you can totally get away with under declaring for a single product. You just got to keep in mind, the government usually doesn't go after folks buying one thing every few months... They go after large corporations, people who abuse the system repeatedly, and people who order big expensive items that under declare it so low that the customs office gets suspicious.

As long as whatever you ordered can feasibly be under 15 pounds and is fairly small, you'll most likely be fine.

But, if you're nervous, just suck it up and pay the duties.

In a lot of EU countries if the thing you wish to import has any form of data storage you might have to pay a random amount of import duty.

I say random because my brother has had to pay over 250$ on things like a single 8GB USB stick or whatever it was while I have imported over a million storage devices like SSDs and USB sticks (for re-sale) without ever having to pay anything.

you ask them to put "gift"

If it's under A$1000 it doesn't matter. No tax or duty.*
The Chinese haven't realised this so everything I order comes in as a "gift".

* the Tax Office says it costs more to do the paperwork and collect the tax on sub-A$1000 items than they can collect in tax. This doesn't stop the importers lobbying for the tax-free threshold to be lowered to A$10. Protectionism in action.
The stupid part is that the importers pass any taxes on to the buyer, they get a discount for buying in bulk, and their profit markup is much more than the 10% tax on imports. So taxing sub-A$1000 items is simply punitive.

China is ripping us off in trade.

My country has 100% tax on things more than 20$, and that includes the transport fee.

>If it's under A$1000 it doesn't matter. No tax or duty.*

Chek your coutry free tax import max value thats it. Spain has it at 45€
So like he said (*) every country as his methods and for example if it beights less that X grams they wont check it

WARNING: DHL, FEDEX..... YOU WILL GET INSTA TAXED 100% of the packages get taxed (if they up that min value)

where? denmark or some other socialist hellhole in that area?

My country has an import tax on products from china. The tax is higher than the value of the product. If you buy something from china and its under a 100€ you can expect to get a tax of 120% its value with a minimum of 50€. Above and it starts to decline till it reaches 40% at a 1000€

So importing from china would be a bad deal if not for the insurance the Chinese provide, I costed them more money than they ever received from me.

Hue Hue Land

This evil shithole

>happiest country on earth
"hell hole"

wow someone's jealous

>a place where you are surrounded by people who are too stupid to realize how miserable they should be
True hell

butthurt dane detected
eat a dick marxist

Still get taxed over £35.

>What did you reply? This seems very sketchy.
Bet you live in a 1st world country, user.

>but certain countries will tax the shit out of imports, up to like 60% of its value depending on the item.
This nigga got it.

I'm not danish or huehue, but I don't get how people (e.g. americans) cheer for keeping jobs in the country, and then make fun of import taxes

I mean, if you choose to buy from chinese sellers anyway, and then also want the government to not charge you anything more -- and thus allow foreign sellers be most attractive option -- how do you want to keep jobs domestic?

then for domestic companies to have competitive pricing, they either move production abroad (like most do now), or they would need to pay as little to their workers as chinese companies do, which won't happen...

for all the problems hue hue land has, a lot of they industry they have there is because of their high import taxes, which essentially promotes companies to just build the factories there instead so the product gets manufactured locally and thus no import taxes are due

- BR law: anything bellow 100 US$ is free.
-- BR law interpretation: anything bellow 50 US$ and with no commercial use is free.
--- BR law execution: tax everything, even 5 US$ used CDs, in 60% of product value + 60% of shipping value + extra 4 US$ to grab the product at local post office (they don't sell it to your home, you must GO THERE and pay ONLY in cash. If you don't do it in 5 days, you'll have to pay another tax, now for temporary storage).

Get on my level of corruption, m8s.

Same shit here. Don't give up, brother.

The seller is being a good sport and offering you a chance to avoid paying customs and VAT fees to your gov't when you receive the package. It doesn't always work since customs have wisened up to the practice, but it's always worth a shot.

I have never had customs added on anything from china, I think there is a separate trade agreement or something.

In denmark the import fees can boost the price of cheap products as high as 313% of the original price. So this is very kind of the Chinese.

>for all the problems hue hue land has, a lot of they industry they have there is because of their high import taxes, which essentially promotes companies to just build the factories there instead so the product gets manufactured locally and thus no import taxes are due
Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrr... Which companies, user? BR Ford and the most expensive car in the world? BR Apple / BR Sony and the most expensive tech shit in the world? Cartel of 4 telecoms and the 4th expensive phone services in the world? Are you fucking serious? Analyze the small, and real, BR companies.

Hue has one of the 5 higher absolute taxes combinations on the planet. 1 employee costs another one in taxes (97%), old and heavy labor laws from 1943, 42% of hidden taxes in products/services, the most insane tax system and a shit salary basis.

Import taxes in this scenario is just the tip of the iceberg.

Dear lord, stop to spread it... Serious.

I do this all the time, my country puts a tax on stuff over $120. if you're getting a phone say it's a malfunctioning phone for replacement parts with a value of $20 or something. Bam, taxes evaded and everyone is happy but the pigs.

So what happens when they notice it is wrong?

They ask for a small payment on the side