If I ever buy anything from you...

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Skykid
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If I ever buy anything from you...

Post by Skykid »

And you're overseas, please make sure never, ever to send anything by UPS (Not USPS, that's ok.)

UPS are the kings of tax rape - any item sent with them will be overpriced for you, and hit with unreal charges for UK recepients.
As a rule, all items should be valued to around $15 tops, and sent by standard registered airmail. EMS seems fine in most cases too.

I just received a UPS package marked at $90 value, the tax charge was $53, over half the actual item's marked value. Of course a 12 year old PCB isn't on customs record books, so they just looked at the value and made their calculations from that - hence, mark it a dollar if you like, they don't know any different

Thanks :wink:
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MX7
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Post by MX7 »

I learnt this the hard way. The bloke who shafted me was nice about it enough, but having to cough up an extra £20 on the doorstep for a fucking £15 bog standard arcade that I had already spent a crap tonne on shipping for was not fun. NEVAR AGAIN.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

My seller is fantastic to deal with, it was just a case of third time unlucky (previous two instances were standard airmail - I guess he was considering the safety of the item and shelled out extra for UPS.)
He's already offered to halves on the fee, which is extremely noteworthy and another example of good trading on shmups.

Even though this is the first ever instance of this happening to me on shmups, it is important just to mention these things in the long term.
UK and UPS don't go, ever. The fees on our end are astronomical - and that's not the first time I've heard of charges outweighing the actual item cost MX7, I feel for you dude.
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Daigohji
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Post by Daigohji »

Yeah, UPS screwed me royally when I imported my HRAP from Play-Asia. £40 for shipping up front plus another £35 upon delivery, so a stick that retailed for £45 ended up costing me £120. All that, plus it took a week for delivery versus the 2-3 day estimate. Fucking ridiculous.

Off topic, what prompted all these asian boobs avatars everyone has recently?
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MX7
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Post by MX7 »

Daigohji wrote:
Off topic, what prompted all these asian boobs avatars everyone has recently?
We're all wapanese and white womens sicken us.
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xenepp
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Post by xenepp »

I did notice actually, the girl in Skykid's avatar's boobs are in proportion with her head :shock:

-Joel
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SAM
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Post by SAM »

xenepp wrote:I did notice actually, the girl in Skykid's avatar's boobs are in proportion with her head :shock:

-Joel
This is because, they are closer to the lens than her head. And maybe someone had done a little photoshop.
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Etrian
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Post by Etrian »

The same could be said of people in the UK who use royal mail, since it's about the same.. and asking someone to use something which isn't their country's most popular shipping method is a big thing to ask.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

Etrian wrote:The same could be said of people in the UK who use royal mail, since it's about the same.. and asking someone to use something which isn't their country's most popular shipping method is a big thing to ask.
UPS is which country's most popular shipping method?
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nem
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Post by nem »

USPS =/= UPS
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

nem wrote:USPS =/= UPS
So, I thought UPS was different from USPS.
I was under the impression UPS was a private postal service (the doodz in the brown vans etc) and seperate to the USPS, which is the standard US postal company.

:?:
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TLDragoon
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Post by TLDragoon »

Skykid wrote:
nem wrote:USPS =/= UPS
So, I thought UPS was different from USPS.
I was under the impression UPS was a private postal service (the doodz in the brown vans etc) and seperate to the USPS, which is the standard US postal company.

:?:
You are correct, but I believe he's saying, in a round about way, that USPS is the most commonly used if not most popular shipper in the US and does not equal UPS.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

TLDragoon wrote: You are correct, but I believe he's saying, in a round about way, that USPS is the most commonly used if not most popular shipper in the US and does not equal UPS.
Okay, basically Etrian needs to pay more attention to the original post before confusing things.

USPS = OK

UPS = Hellspawn, and no country's preferred method of shipping. Boycott.
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TLDragoon
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Post by TLDragoon »

Skykid wrote:
TLDragoon wrote: You are correct, but I believe he's saying, in a round about way, that USPS is the most commonly used if not most popular shipper in the US and does not equal UPS.
Okay, basically Etrian needs to pay more attention to the original post before confusing things.

USPS = OK

UPS = Hellspawn, and no country's preferred method of shipping. Boycott.
Yeah, USPS is fine shipping. I've only encountered one problem so far with them, but it was the fault of the seller shipping the game in a thin envelope and the envelope being ripped open during shipping. The only reason I like UPS (or FedEx for that matter) for shipping within the US is because they have better tracking.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

TLDragoon wrote: The only reason I like UPS (or FedEx for that matter) for shipping within the US is because they have better tracking.
Yep, in-land shipping is never an issue - it's just UK customs rape that's the matter at hand here. And UPS love to dish it out harder than anyone else.
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Post by PC Engine Fan X! »

In the USA, one can choose to ship internationally with any of the four major mailing/shipping entities:

United States Postal Service

United Parcel Service

Fedex

or

DHL Express (is based out of Germany but has a U.S. branch to handle such USA & international shipping as well)

Among the three independent major shipping enities are ranked in the following order:

1.) UPS
2.) Fedex
3.) DHL Express

It is during crunch time like Christmas shipping season that the USPS uses 3rd-party shipper UPS to handle a fair share of mailing packages to get to their destination on time. Time equals money in this day of age...why not take advantage of the competition to split the load and not overtax the USPS system. ^_~

It's true that sometimes such mail can get lost as with the USPS and there have been some bizarre cases of mailed letters being sent off in the mid 20th century late 1940's-1950's that got lost in the postal system only to recently be discovered & delivered just recently in the 21st century. WTF!?

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~
Last edited by PC Engine Fan X! on Sat Aug 09, 2008 4:17 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by SFKhoa »

Fuck UPS. Period.
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Post by iatneH »

Is it duties at customs? Because I have gotten an invoice from UPS over a month after my item was delivered. It was something like $35 for a $90 item.

I just find it crazy how I already paid the seller $20 or so, so that HE could pay UPS for the shipping service. And then after the item was delivered, I am supposed to pay UPS again? If it really is duties, that's fair enough, but I would kind of feel better about paying directly instead of having to mail a damn cheque to UPS.

I also avoid UPS at all times now. Never had any problems with DHL though. Maybe UPS just are especially prone to customs inspections?

edit:
Daigohji wrote:Off topic, what prompted all these asian boobs avatars everyone has recently?
I also wondered. But it happened while I was away for a week. I came back and suddenly there were all these big jugs everywhere.
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Post by GaijinPunch »

FedEx here will basically take ANYTHING coming in to the tax office, slap even a menial fine on it, then make you pay an extra 500 yen service fee b/c they paid the tax for you. Really irks the fuck out of me when my mother sends FedEx (huge discount) and then they fuck me like that. I told them to fuck off a few times.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

SFKhoa wrote:Fuck UPS. Period.
What he said.
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professor ganson
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Post by professor ganson »

Skykid wrote:
SFKhoa wrote:Fuck UPS. Period.
What he said.
Yep, I've had several packages get smashed or lost. I've had ok luck with them coming from Play-Asia, but in the US we don't have to pay customs charges up front. I think you are supposed to declare them when doing your income taxes.
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Re: If I ever buy anything from you...

Post by honorless »

posters not in the US wrote:UPS dicks us over, so don't use it.
I tend to stick with USPS anyway, but their hours are so amazingly inconvenient that I could have seen myself heading to the UPS store if I needed to ship something on a weekday. Thanks for the heads up; now that I know this, I'll just have to wait until Saturday.
professor ganson wrote: I think you are supposed to declare them when doing your income taxes.
I know that you're technically supposed to declare items bought from other states (i.e. over the internet) on your taxes. However, I'm really not sure it's the same with imports.

...The problem is, I'll probably never know because all the stuff I've imported is duty-free according to the HTF. At least as far as I can tell. That thing is almost impenetrable.

(Anyone from the US ever import a camera? Those are supposedly subject to a tariff...)
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Post by KindGrind »

Won a Psone lcd 15$ off Ebay, had to pay the aforementioned 53$ when it came to my door.

Lesson learned, screw UPS.

EDIT: There was a TV program here where they find crooks and tell you how to protect yourself from them on national TV, and once the subject was that fee with UPS. They could never get anybody from UPS to speak about it.
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jpj
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Post by jpj »

yeah, UPS are a bunch of robbing bastards. strangely the guitar shop over the road from me *always* use UPS :? the dutch distribution company that used to sell fender gear went bust a few years back, i hope they aren't importing direct from the states...
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

Maybe the mods should Sticky the topic in the trading thread: Do not use UPS under any circumstances! :shock:

It's best for everyone here anyway.
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Mark III
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Post by Mark III »

UPS is equally bad for Canada, they charge a flat $50 fee to clear ANY package through customs regardless of size or value. Their shipping prices from Canada are absolutely ridiculous too, I was quoted $97 to ship a single saturn game to the UK. :roll:
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Post by Lordstar »

Etrian wrote:The same could be said of people in the UK who use royal mail, since it's about the same.. and asking someone to use something which isn't their country's most popular shipping method is a big thing to ask.
Unless your in businesses and have an account with couriers and such the only way to send things is royal mail or pay though the nose for Parcel force. But then if the buyer is paying I dont really mind how it gets sent.
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Stan
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Post by Stan »

UPS is a bunch of criminals.
A few years back my order from US contained an invoice with ridiculously high import tax.
They used the item value plus some huge "flat rate" value for the calculation of that tax and told me in the subsequent exchange of letters with them that they didnt know the exact shipping costs (yes, their own prices!) / it was a mistake by them.
At the end they reduced it to 12 EUR, which seemed ok for me.
A week later I asked the german customs and they told me only the customs themselves or the german post are allowed to collect import tax, not
the couriers. So anyone in Germany simply ignore their tax demands.
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Icarus
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Post by Icarus »

Holy fucking Christ.
Just received my iScan VP30 from UPS, a day late. The item cost about £90, it cost £90 to ship it to me from the States, and (get this) it cost nearly £115 in duty fees. So I paid for the item three times.
Fuck you, UPS.
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Skykid
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Post by Skykid »

Icarus wrote:Holy fucking Christ.
Just received my iScan VP30 from UPS, a day late. The item cost about £90, it cost £90 to ship it to me from the States, and (get this) it cost nearly £115 in duty fees. So I paid for the item three times.
Fuck you, UPS.
It's official. Let's firebomb their head office.
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